London Mayor announces £137 million fund for affordable homes

The funding has been allocated to 56 housing providers, mainly comprising housing associations and London borough councils, who will begin work in this Mayoral term, delivering 6,000 affordable homes, securing up to 12,500 jobs.

Johnson used the announcement to reiterate his "call for urgent action" from the Government to help meet the increasing demand for housing in London by granting a continuous, reliable funding stream for housing. The Greater London Authority (GLA) said that such funding would assist Johnson to achieve the recommendations of the London Finance Commission report from earlier in the year by enabling him to "get the best deal for Londoners, negotiate longer-term agreements with developers, and secure the housing the capital needs to continue to thrive and grow".

"Building up this future pipeline of affordable housing is essential to maintaining the capital's economic competitiveness," the GLA statement said. "With a rapidly increasing population it is predicted that at least 40,000 additional homes need to be built every year in London by the 2030s. Without these homes Londoners who work in the city will find it increasingly difficult to be able to afford to live here."

Johnson said that continuous funding, rather than a funding stream "full of stops and starts" was needed. "With fair and continuous funding from the Government, based on the vast sums raised through stamp duty on London's higher value homes, we can meet this need - at no cost to the Treasury - and go on to maintain London's position as the greatest city on earth," he said.

If London were to be allocated what it yields in Stamp Duty, the GLA roughly estimates the Mayor would have £1bn a year to provide more homes.

The Mayor's Housing Covenant scheme was launched in September last year and will provide £100m of capital investment to supply homes for working Londoners and to boost the construction industry. The launch of the next phase of this scheme follows the Government's Spending Round, announced in June this year, which included an extension of the Government's Affordable Homes Programme by investing £957 million capital funding each year from 2015/16 to 2017/18.