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Former Barratt chief to head up London council’s housing unit

A London council has appointed the board for its housing company, with a former regional Barratt Homes boss as its chair.

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The Westbury Estate in Lambeth, which the council hopes to regenerate through HfL (picture: Google)
The Westbury Estate in Lambeth, which the council hopes to regenerate through HfL (picture: Google)
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Former Barratt chief to head up London council’s housing unit #ukhousing

Richard Reynolds, previously managing director for London and the South East at Barratt, will head the board of Lambeth Council’s company, Homes for Lambeth (HfL).

Wendy Stokes, who was formerly managing director of Ealing Council’s development company Broadway Living, has been appointed as a non-executive director along side Peter Walters, chair of Sutton Council’s ALMO, Sutton Housing Partnership.

Six senior officers and one councillor at the local authority will make up the rest of the HfL board.


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Mr Reynolds said: “I’m delighted to be joining Homes for Lambeth alongside people with such a broad range of experience.

“Lambeth has a very ambitious programme to build more and better homes in the face of the housing crisis and we will be doing all we can to deliver the council’s housing agenda.”

The HfL group includes development subsidiary HfL Build, registered housing association HfL Homes and private rented sector firm HfL Living.

Mike O’Donnell, who was previously executive director at Camden Council, will chair HfL Homes, while Gerri Scott, a former director of housing at Southwark Council, also joins the association’s board.

They will be expected to deliver HfL’s business plan, as agreed each year by the council’s cabinet.

Lambeth Council hopes HfL can build 300 homes over the next five years, mainly through three large estate regeneration schemes, as well as acquiring a further 200 through Section 106 agreements.

In January, it approved plans to loan the wholly-owned firm £300m.

It has not specified how many of the homes it delivers will be social or affordable, but said it “aims to maximise the number of homes provided at genuinely affordable rents”.

“A large proportion of the new homes built by HfL will be let at council-level rent to existing and new council tenants,” the company said in a press release.

In addition to the council HfL will also report to an ‘ownership and stewardship panel’ which includes councillors and tenants.

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