Situated in the heart of central London we know that it’s increasingly difficult for people to stay in the area they grew up in. We’re already proud to say that we’ve delivered more affordable homes, over 1,600, than anywhere else in the capital over the past three years, to ensure genuinely mixed tenure communities.

But the pressure on housing in our big cities remains enormous. Southwark’s a pioneering borough so we are building more council houses than anywhere in the country. We’ll build 11,000 new council homes over the next 30 years and will have 1,500 finished homes by 2018. We are already on site or have planning permission for the first 300. These will be let at council social rent levels.

The challenges we face are huge. As London’s biggest social landlord, and the second biggest in the country, we have an investment programme of £326m to make every council home warm, dry and safe. But that’s just taking care of existing stock. So we established an independent housing commission to explore options for Southwark’s housing. The findings led directly to a new homes investment plan.