New government data has revealed that across London including Ealing, 336,366 households were on local authority waiting lists for social housing in 2024. In Ealing alone, 6,958 households are currently on waiting lists.
According to London Councils, the collective of councils, which includes Ealing Council, London accounts for 25% of England’s national total and is the highest number for over a decade. The previous record was 344,294 in 2013.
Councillor Grace Williams, London Councils’ executive member for housing & regeneration, said: “London is grappling with the most severe housing and homelessness crisis in the country. The capital is becoming increasingly unaffordable and, as these numbers demonstrate, there is a desperate need for more social housing.”
Councillor Williams added: “Boroughs are doing everything we can to build the affordable homes our communities are crying out for. However, we are also struggling with enormous resource constraints and immense challenges to housing delivery in London.
“Boroughs are determined to turn the situation around. We are strongly pro-housing growth and as committed as ever to working with the government to turbocharge housebuilding in the capital. We are also working to ensure we have the resources needed to cope with the immediate homelessness pressures we are facing.”
Speaking to EALING.NEWS, an Ealing Council spokesperson revealed the extent of waiting lists in the borough. They said: “As of today, there are 6,958 households on our housing register – the waiting list for a socially rented home in the borough.
“The total on 1 April 2013 was 13,348 – almost twice as many as the current total.”
The spokesperson explained that the reason why its waiting list dropped is due to nearly 7,000 Band D applicants being removed from its waiting list in 2023.
They added: “In September 2023, the council adopted a new allocations policy which no longer includes a fourth priority band. At that point 6,737 Band D applicants – who had very little chance of ever reaching the necessary level of priority to successfully bid for a socially rented home – were removed from the housing register. In 2013, almost half the total were Band D applicants.”
