The new council homes have been built on sites across the borough, providing desperately-needed homes for Southwark residents in the middle of a national housing crisis.
Looking ahead, Southwark Council has also outlined plans to create hundreds more genuinely affordable homes by partnering with a constructor to make them a reality, and identifying priority sites from its existing pipeline.
The council plans to launch a tender process to appoint potential partners, in February 2025. Under the partnership, the builder would fund the cost of providing new council homes on these sites, and also create some housing for private sale to help pay for the new council homes.
Southwark Council is aiming for at least 50% of the new homes across the entire procurement package to be genuinely affordable homes. The council will always seek to maximise the numbers of council homes on any development.
The proposal comes as councils across England face a very difficult outlook for building new council homes, after several years of escalating interest rates and increasing construction costs.
Cllr Helen Dennis, Cabinet Member for New Homes and Sustainable Development, said: “We want decent homes for everyone in Southwark and I’m proud to celebrate this milestone of 500 brand new council homes ready for our residents this year.
“Good homes transform lives and each of these homes will make a huge difference to the individuals and families who have moved in.
“At a time when councils face major challenges in delivering more homes, and many schemes across England have stalled, we are still committed to building , and will always seek to deliver as many council homes as we can across Southwark.
“With over 18,000 households on our waiting list, doing nothing is not an option. Partnering with builders is a tried and tested way of providing fantastic high-quality new council homes at the pace and scale we need, and we’re now seeking to establish partnerships so we can keep building more council homes over the coming years.
“I look forward to working closely with local people as these plans develop and to ensure that this next chapter meets the needs of our residents.”
Southwark is one of the largest local authority home builders in the country, having already built more than 1,700 new council homes and with more than 1,300 council homes under construction.
Southwark Council is campaigning for the future of council homes. Its report Securing the Future of Council Housing, is backed by more than 100 councils across England.
It is calling for five actions from Government to save council homes, including steps to make it easier to build new and replacement homes.
The council is expecting to sign a development agreement in spring 2025, with the timescales for building the new homes to be worked out from that point.