London mayoral candidate Zac Goldsmith's housing vision for the city needs local SME building firms to be successful, according to the Federation of Master Builders (FMB).

In his manifesto, the Tory candidate pledges to double home building in the capital to 50,000 a year by 2020.

However, even though Mr Goldsmith identifies small local builders as 'vital' to addressing the housing crisis in London, the FMB states his vision 'fails to go far enough'.

Brian Berry, Chief Executive of the FMB, said: "Both of the frontrunners, Zac Goldsmith and Sadiq Khan, in the mayoral race have put housing front and centre of their manifestos and rightly so – whoever wins on 5th May, solving London's housing crisis will be the greatest challenge they face.


"The pledge to give SMEs first right of refusal to build on small plots of public sector land could do a great deal to speed up house building rates in London.

"Goldsmith is also right to identify the morass of red tape that disproportionately affects smaller house builders as being a serious problem that needs addressing."

However, Mr Berry added there "remains a lack of recognition" on some of the factors behind why London is a challenging environment for SMEs.

"Skyrocketing land values and the difficulties of securing funding for developments hit local developers here more than anywhere else in the country," he said.

"Moreover, to introduce the role of a Chief Architect to oversee every development built on public sector land could be a case of giving with one hand and taking away with the other when it comes to cutting red tape.

"This additional stage in the process would need to be very carefully implemented as it's difficult enough for SMEs to get permission to build without Goldsmith adding more rings through which to jump."

(LM)