Angela Rayner

COUNCIL chiefs are to plead with the Labour government to allow rent-capping after declaring a housing emergency.

The Town Hall passed a motion calling for the intervention on Thursday night – and must now convince Local Government Secretary Angela Rayner to give councils more control over the private rental market.

Rent freezes have been a flagship plank of Green Party leader Zack Polanski’s campaign to win next week’s parliamentary by-election in neighbouring Camden.

But the motion in Islington was brought by the ruling Labour group – meaning the onus is now on Labour councillors to convince Ms Rayner and other colleagues at Westminster that they are needed.

Housing chief Councillor Jason Jackson said: “Families who work here, raise their families here and contribute to our borough are increasingly asking: ‘Can we still afford to live here?’And when someone can no longer afford their rent, the consequences don’t disappear. They come through our doors, through homelessness, through temporary accommodation, and through increasing pressure on council services.”

He added: “Islington should never become a borough where only the wealthy can afford to live here.”

While Labour and the Greens agree on a rent cap, they disagree on whether this should take the form of a freeze – and the opposition party said there should be a commission of inquiry set up in Islington to explore how rent controls could work in the borough.

Cllr Jackson told the Tribune: “I do believe this is a topic we all believe in across the membership. I’m not going to be caught up in political theatre.”

“It’ll be a lot of lobbying,” he added, saying that the council’s campaign going forward is going to be “100 per cent” visible and “very vocal”.

He said: “We know Angela Rayner took a position that it’s not possible, but rent controls have happened in the past.”

Cllr Jason Jackson

Average rent in Islington is the third-highest of any London borough, and its birth rate is among the lowest of any local authority in the country. Primary schools have shut down in Islington in recent years due to falling pupil numbers, with high housing costs thought to be a key force driving young couples and families out of the area.

Labour councillor Nick Wayne said the Green proposal for a commission on rents would be a “talking shop” and delay action being taken.

But Green councillor Jackson Caines said the idea for a commission on rents was taken from the new Labour mayor of Manchester’s manifesto.

He told the Tribune: “The amendment wasn’t an attempt to waste time at all. It was a good faith attempt to make the motion even stronger, particularly by adding a specific request that instead of merely lobbying central government for legislative change, they actually start doing something tangible now.”

Callum Waterhouse, from renters union ACORN, said: “It’s good to see that Islington Council are making these motions – but, at the end of the day, they are just motions to lobby the government. In terms of impact on the ground here and now, it can only go so far.”

Mr Waterhouse said ACORN would like to see the council take a “zero-tolerance policy on bad landlords” and commit to using the maximum extent of their legal powers to punish landlords who break rules.

He added that although there are benefits to influencing central government through private channels, the council’s lobbying needs to be visible. “There needs to be public pressure put on the government,” he explained. “It’s an effective way of challenging the govern­ment, and we need to know Islington Council are putting their money where their mouth is.”

Ms Rayner said earlier this summer: “I don’t think that rent freezes, rent controls, is a way forward at the moment.”

When asked by the BBC why new prime minister Andy Burnham had called for the measures when he was the mayor of Manchester, she said: “Three years ago, Andy called for that because there was a significant crisis in the rental market. We implemented between then the Renters’ Rights Act which is giving renters more power and control.”