We must cap rent rises, says Green mayor candidate
GREEN mayoral candidate Sian Berry today called for City Hall to be given the power to limit rent rises as she revealed she could be among those forced out of London by soaring costs.
The Highgate councillor suggested rent should be linked to wages, with tenants spending no more than a third of their take-home pay on housing.
Ms Berry, who stood against Ken Livingstone and Boris Johnson in the 2008 race, admitted she spent about half her income renting a flat in Tufnell Park.
“I can afford that, just about, but it’s a crazy amount of money. I’m one of the people worrying about rent increases. If my rent went up one more time I think I would be forced out of London,” she said. “There are thousands of people who, like me, are not badly off, but are still having to make those difficult choices about where to live and it can’t go on. Some rent stability could be a good thing.” Ms Berry said she would rewrite the London Plan, the Mayor’s planning bible, to increase house building and bring empty properties into use.
Ms Berry, 40, who is standing against City Hall aide Tom Chance and Islington councillor Caroline Russell for the Green nomination, said she would charge firms £300 a year per parking space, with revenue going on public transport projects. Fares would be reduced, although investment would be sustained with more money from central government. She would cancel the three proposed road crossings over the Thames to the east of Tower Bridge and instead build more cable cars for pedestrians. She said Boris Johnson had been a less “aggressively Tory” Mayor than she had expected, but added: “There has been a lot of neglect, par ticularly on the planning and housing side. He hasn’t made an effort to address the housing crisis at all.”