Former Labor MP appointed to oversee London's biggest brownfield regeneration project

An old Work An MP has been appointed to oversee Londonthe largest brownfield regeneration project, where thousands of homes and a vast high-speed rail station are being built.

Lady Karen Buckwho resigned as MP for Westminster North at the July general election, was appointed last month by the mayor Sadiq Khan become president of Old Oak and Park Royal Development Corporation (OPDC).

The company is overseeing the redevelopment of 650 hectares of land around the project High speed 2 station at Old Common Oakwhich will also be served by the Elizabeth line.

The appointment of Dame Karen, who chaired Mr Khans' re-election campaign earlier this year, comes after the August announcement of the resignation of current chair Liz Peace, who had held the role since 2017.

Dame Karen faced questions about her suitability for the role on Monday morning at a meeting of the London Assemblys confirmation hearings committee.

The all-party committee unanimously agreed to approve her appointment after nearly two hours of questions, with members saying she gave excellent answers and appeared to have a solid understanding of the responsibilities of her position. Dame Karen will take up her role in January.

The OPDC, established by Boris Johnson in 2015, does not have a glorious record, committee chairman Neil Garratt has said.

He highlighted the fact that in 2019 the company had to return 250 million euros of money provisionally granted by the governmentafter used car dealership Cargiant successfully challenged OPDC's request to acquire its land through a compulsory purchase order. This meant that almost 6,000 proposed housing units had to be removed of the company's master plan.

Dame Karen, who was transport minister under Tony Blair, said most major developments will experience setbacks at some point, but lessons have been learned and the OPDC is now a transformed organisation.

The former MP stressed that she was keen for the corporation to meet its target of 50 per cent of new housing classified as affordable – with a strong social bias. [homes] inside of that.

Dame Karen was first elected as a local councilor in Westminster in 1990, before becoming an MP in 1997. Reflecting on her 34 years in public service, she said: Probably from the first day she was elected to Westminster, the Housing need has been the biggest problem.

Over these decades we have seen a steady loss of affordable housing and, in particular, social housing – with Right to Buy having eroded the stock and [it] was not replaced.

She added that local authorities in London are now pay 4 million per day to house homeless households in very expensive private rented accommodation.

Asked by Mr Garratt whether imposing a strict target of 50 per cent affordable housing could make parts of the project unviable and end up delaying the delivery of all types of housing, Dame Karen said: she was very confident that the goal was achievable and that it would be absolutely essential to the company's work.

We absolutely must do this, she said. We must ensure that the affordable component [of the] Housing is not always an issue that gets left behind, because it so often is.

According to the latest edition of the Mayor's Plan for London, published in 2021, the OPDC was tasked with delivering a total of 13,670 new homes in the ten years to March 2029.

As of May this year, some 7,789 housing units had been approved and more than 4,000 housing units completed since the creation of the OPDCs. The committee heard that 38 per cent of homes delivered so far are considered affordable.

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