Build, baby! Build! 626 flats in Mitcham and none ‘affordable’

Housing correspondent, BARRATT HOLMES, on a developer-friendly decision which might yet set the trend for all of London

This is what you get when you “Build, baby! Build!”

Merton Council has granted planning approval for 626 homes on the Mitcham Gasworks site, with not a single unit to be designated as “affordable housing”.

Streatham and Croydon North MP Steve Reed, the Secretary of State for housing, must be so pleased to see his property developer-friendly approach having such an immediate impact…

Residents’ groups in Mitcham, meanwhile, have described the council’s decision as “unconscionable”.

Properties built at the Mitcham Gasworks site by developers St William, a subsidiary of the housing giant Berkeley Homes, could have an estimated value of more than £150million. Kerrrching!!

But while the development might boost Berkeley’s companies annual profits, it is unlikely to do anything to fix the housing crisis in Merton or across the capital.

In London, “affordable housing” is anything but affordable. “Affordable” housing is capped at 80% of market rents, supposedly to help key workers and lower-income households access housing.

According to the most recent available figures, the average private rent in Merton was £2,072 per month, meaning that according to government- and GLA-approved criteria, “affordable rent” would be more than £1,600 per month. Plus the deposit. Plus service charges.

For the past decade or so, the Mayor of London has been trying to hold the line that any scheme of nine units or more should at least provide 30% so-called “affordable” housing, impringeing on the property developers’ profits.

But with this Mitcham scheme, St William have been let off the hook, and it is possible that not a single flat will have to meet the affordable criteria.

Priority here has been given to private developers’ concerns over “viability”, with the implicit threat that if their demand to dodge the “affordable” requirement was not met, then there was a risk that none of the housing would get built. St William said that without grant funding being forthcoming – in other words, a hefty public subsidy – they could not deliver the 200-or-so less-expensive expensive flats that they might have done otherwise.

Had the council refused planning consent because of the failure to meet the “affordable” housing requirements, the landowners, most likely, would sit on their property and wait for a more profitable option.

There was much gnashing of teeth and wailing from Labour-controlled Merton Council, with councillors saying how the decision that they had just taken was “regrettable”. Hmmm.

Tony Burton, from the Mitcham Cricket Green community group, said: “It is unconscionable that the largest new housing development in Mitcham for a generation should provide no affordable homes.”

But imagine the precedent this decision might create for every other mid- to large-scale housing scheme brought forward in London by private developers. Build, baby! Build!

After almost 14 years, the planning application for Westfield’s long-delayed scheme in Croydon town centre has been postponed again, as the Paris-based developers bide their time, waiting for the “right” level of public subsidy for a project which will now likely involve 3,000 apartments along the Wellesley Road and where the Whitgift Centre is today.

For the old Mitcham Gasworks site, this was the third version of a planning application to go before Merton councillors.

The approved scheme is different in that some attempt has been made to address locals’ concerns about the over-tall, imposing towers to be built facing Hay Drive and Portland Road. But it also increases the density on the development, from 579 to 626 units.

Those extra flats alone could be worth an additional £10million to the developers’ bottom line. Build, baby! Build!

The developers say that they are waiting on a possible grant from Merton and the GLA for at least 146 homes at social rent. This will not be confirmed until at least April 2026, when the next round of GLA funding becomes available (timing which may also be relevant in Croydon town centre).

Neither St William nor Merton Council had published their full viability assessment for the scheme. Of course they haven’t… Build, baby! Build!

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

Click here for more details about how MyT can revolutionise your accounting using AI

Inside Croydon – If you want real journalism, delivering real news, from a publication that is actually based in the borough, please consider paying for it. Sign up today: click here for more details

Inside Croydon has moved to Bluesky. Click here to join us there for latest updates and insights

PAID ADS: To advertise your services or products to our 10,000 weekday visitors to the site, as featured on Google News Showcase, email us inside.croydon@btinternet.com for our unbeatable ad rates

Check out our archive of podcasts on Spotify, including our monthly news discussion panel show thingy, the Croydon Insider, and The Andrew Fisher Interview

If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com

As featured on Google News Showcase

We offer FREE ads to community groups when they have members who are paid subscribers to Inside Croydon

Our comments section on every report provides all readers with an immediate “right of reply” on all our content. Our comments policy can be read by clicking here