Too many households in Bromley are struggling with rising prices, high housing costs and insecure work. While the Conservatives have closed local safety nets and even tried to plug budget gaps by charging disabled residents to park, Bromley Labour will focus on practical help that makes day-to-day life easier, keeps people in their homes and supports fair pay and fair work across our borough.

Summary

• Building more affordable homes
• Supporting families through times of crisis
• A fairer local economy and strategies to reduce poverty (including child poverty, food poverty, and ending homelessness in Bromley)
• Raising housing standards, tackling rogue landlords and HMOs.
• Becoming a London Living Wage Employer
• Widen the Council Tax Support Scheme

2.1 Build more affordable homes for Bromley

Bromley spends around £26 million a year on temporary accommodation, and too many families are being uprooted from their communities because there simply are not enough genuinely affordable homes locally. Under the Conservatives, the Council is buying up to 500 homes hours away in places like Essex and far-flung corners of Kent to move homeless families many miles away from their schools, jobs and support networks.

Bromley Labour will take a different approach, focusing on preventing homelessness, building homes in Bromley for Bromley residents, and keeping families close to the places and people they rely on.

Conservative-led Bromley has failed the former Conservative Government’s Housing Delivery Test, falling short on the homes our borough needs. Bromley Labour will work to put that right and deliver the right homes, in the right places, for Bromley residents.

We will:

• Raise the borough’s affordable housing target to 50%
• Deliver 300 new council homes by 2028 for Bromley residents
• Focus development on brownfield, grey belt and appropriate redevelopment sites
• Oppose speculative or unaffordable development on green belt land
• Work in partnership with housing associations and other social landlords to bring forward genuinely affordable and social housing schemes that meet Bromley’s needs

Bromley Labour will also play our full part in Labour’s national Warm Homes Plan, making sure local residents can access grants and low-interest loans for insulation, solar panels and low-carbon heating, and targeting support first at those in the coldest, least efficient homes.

We recognise this additional development will require more capacity in housing staff and will find this much-needed investment by ring-fencing the additional income the Council would receive by extending the Empty Homes Premium to properties empty for between one and two years, which it is estimated would impact 510 properties, raising revenue of £600k a year.

Alongside Bromley’s own council house building, we would fast track developments from housing associations and other developers with more than 50% social housing provision, with the aim of delivering 3,000 units of affordable housing by 2030.

2.2 Supporting families through times of crisis

We will reopen the Bromley Welfare Fund to help families in crisis with essentials such as beds, fridges and cookers.

We will ensure:

• Clear criteria for support, written in plain English
• Strong signposting through schools, GPs, children’s centres and voluntary organisations
• A close link between the Fund and debt, housing and welfare advice services

2.3 A Bromley anti-poverty strategy

We will not treat poverty as inevitable.

Bromley Labour will:

• Work with local charities, schools, faith groups and advice agencies to develop a Bromley Anti-poverty Strategy
• Include clear, measurable targets to reduce and ultimately end food poverty and child poverty in our borough
• Publish regular updates so residents can see the progress we are making and where further action is needed

We will also work with our local NHS, public health and community partners to tackle health inequalities that have widened after years of Conservative cuts, focusing on early intervention, mental health and long-term conditions that hit poorer households hardest.

2.4 No one in Bromley should go hungry

No one should go hungry in our borough.

We will:

• Work with schools, charities and community groups to tackle child hunger, including support for holiday food and activity programmes
• Support and strengthen local food partnerships, food banks and community kitchens, while working to reduce the need for emergency food over time
• Expand access to debt, welfare and benefits advice in community venues so people can get help before they reach crisis

The Labour Government has introduced free breakfast clubs in every primary school to tackle child hunger and help parents with the cost of living.

Bromley Labour will:

• Work with schools to make sure every eligible Bromley primary school takes up the national breakfast club offer and that it reaches children who need it most
• Join up breakfast clubs with wider support such as holiday food and activities, school uniform help and advice services, as part of a local child-poverty-reduction plan

We will also work with the Mayor of London to make sure every eligible Bromley child benefits from London’s universal free primary school meals programme, and that families know about their entitlement, saving them money and helping to ensure that no child in our borough goes hungry at school.

To go further, Bromley Labour will:

• Produce a Bromley Food Plan that looks at access to affordable, healthy food across the borough and identifies gaps and priorities
• Appoint a lead member for food to pull together work on food poverty, public health, school food, planning and local economic development
• Support the establishment of food co-ops and community owned shops where residents want them, especially in areas with poor access to affordable food

2.5 A strategy to end homelessness in Bromley

We will:

• Adopt a new homelessness strategy with the goal of ending rough sleeping in Bromley by 2030
• Prioritise prevention and early intervention so people get help before they lose their home
• Strengthen joint working with charities, faith groups and community organisations
• Expand access to debt advice and tenancy support
• Work with Bromley and Lewisham Credit Union to provide loan support that can prevent eviction

We will align Bromley’s homelessness strategy with the London-wide Rough Sleeping Plan of Action, which aims to end rough sleeping by 2030, making full use of London-wide funding and support.

We will also ensure Bromley is at the forefront of the London Ending Homelessness Accelerator Programme, using this investment to simplify access to help and redesign our homelessness pathways so that residents get rapid, joined-up support rather than being passed from service to service.

The Conservatives have overseen a dramatic rise in Bromley of residents in temporary accommodation being moved out of the borough, with now over 80% of placements outside Bromley, almost the highest in London. We will focus on temporary accommodation being predominately in-borough during this next term, to help keep family ties and support networks.

2.6 Raising housing standards and tackling rogue landlords

Our aspiration is that every home in Bromley is decent, safe and secure. Most landlords want to do the right thing, but a minority do not and that harms not just tenants but whole neighbourhoods.

We will:

• Take action to ensure our aspiration for every Bromley home being decent includes tackling rogue landlords and poor housing conditions
• Review the whole borough to identify hot-spot areas where problems with standards or HMOs are concentrated
• Introduce a tougher series of licensing requirements for HMOs including waste provision and conditions for renewal, in order to protect both new tenants and longstanding communities
• Where the evidence supports it, introduce additional landlord controls in those hot-spot areas, such as targeted licensing, or stronger planning and enforcement tools
• Introduce a compulsory landlord register and a code of conduct for any landlord receiving council funds

2.7 Community led and co-operative housing

As well as building new council homes, we want more people to have a direct say in how their homes and estates are run.

Bromley Labour will:

• Enable community-led housing within social housing by supporting tenants who want to manage their own estates, where there is clear resident support and robust governance in place
• Work with co-operative and community-led housing organisations to bring forward new models of permanently affordable housing in Bromley
• Make sure that any such arrangements are transparent, democratically run and focused on improving conditions and community life for residents

2.8 Fairer finance through local credit unions

Too many residents rely on high-cost credit because mainstream banking has withdrawn from our high streets.

Bromley Labour will:

• Provide council staff with the option of payroll deduction into a local credit union, helping people to save regularly and access fair credit when needed
• Encourage our larger contractors to offer similar payroll deduction schemes as part of being a good employer in Bromley
• Provide space for credit unions in appropriate council buildings and as part of future shared banking hubs, to bring ethical financial services back to local centres

2.9 A fairer local economy

We will:

• Become a London Living Wage Employer
• Phase in a requirement for commissioned providers, starting with care providers, to pay the London Living Wage
• Develop a local procurement strategy that prioritises Bromley businesses, co-operatives and social enterprises where possible

2.10 A fairer Council Tax Support Scheme

Since 2022, while those of pension age who are eligible continue to receive a 100% council tax reduction, thousands of the lowest income households in Bromley have faced huge increases in their council tax liability, as Bromley Conservatives cut the Council Tax Support Scheme – raising the minimum contribution from 20% to 50% in just two years. This means those least able to afford to pay faced big increases, on top of the 20% rise in council tax Bromley Conservatives imposed for all council tax payers since 2022.

We will:

• Exempt Care Leavers from council tax for the first two years of living independently, providing financial support to a group of vulnerable adults as they make this transition
•  Provide 100% council tax support for individuals with a terminal illness, or families living with someone who is terminally ill
• Review Bromley’s Council Tax Support Scheme in 2026, including engaging in public consultation to make the scheme fairer for working-age adults and consider revising the threshold and exemptions

How Labour’s national plans support this locally:

• Labour’s national programme to grow the economy and make work pay will help lift more Bromley residents out of low pay and insecurity, complementing our local Living Wage and Good Employer commitments.
• National action on child poverty, including free primary school breakfast clubs and wider family support, will give us the tools and funding to go further in Bromley on food poverty and children’s life chances
• Reform of social security, debt enforcement and consumer protection will make it easier for local schemes such as the Bromley Welfare Fund and credit union partnership to keep people in their homes and out of crisis
• Labour’s national housing programme and reforms to planning and regulation will make it easier for Bromley to deliver more genuinely affordable homes, including new council housing, in line with our higher local target
• The Warm Homes Plan, with grants and low-cost loans for insulation and clean heating, will give Bromley residents practical help to cut their bills while we target local retrofit programmes at the coldest homes.
• National action to strengthen tenants’ rights and improve private renting will back up our local work on landlord licensing, enforcement and support for tenants facing poor conditions or unfair eviction