RESIDENTS on an east London estate have accused Newham council of “buying” a Yes vote to demolish their homes, as calls grow for the ballot result to be cancelled. 

Last month, 73 per cent of residents of the Carpenters estate in Stratford voted to support redevelopment under a ballot system introduced by London Mayor Sadiq Khan. 

The redevelopment scheme involves partially demolishing the large estate, situated near the Olympic Park and the Westfield shopping centre, to make way for 2,000 new homes, of which 1,000 will be offered at social rents, according to the council. 

But campaign group Focus E15, which include estate residents, has accused the council of excessive spending as well as using“blatant propaganda” in its campaign for a Yes vote. 

After the group submitted freedom of information requests, it emerged that Newham council and its housing company Populo Living spent £350,000 during the campaign, while residents had scant resources to argue their case. 

Focus E15’s solicitors at the Public Interest Law Centre have now written to Mr Khan’s deputy for housing Tom Copley urging action to ensure fairness in future ballots.

In a separate call, Green London Assembly member Sian Berry wrote to Mr Copley at the weekend arguing for the Carpenters estate vote result to be voided and a new ballot held. 

She stressed that unless normal democratic principles are applied to the process, for example by capping campaign spending, then “estate ballots cannot be considered to represent residents having a democratic choice in the future of their homes.”

Newham Mayor Rokhsana Fiaz denied that the council had bought a Yes vote, insisting that the ballot had been conducted independently and honestly.

Estate resident and campaigner Jade said that, ahead of the vote in December, the community felt invaded with “flurries of ‘vote Yes’ leaflets” and representatives of the council at their doors. 

“We never had funds or resources like the council to campaign against the demolition of our homes,” she said. 

Since 2018, councils have been required to ballot residents on housing estate redevelopment schemes in order to access public funds from the General London Assembly. 

The ballot system was introduced as part of Mr Khan’s 2016 manifesto pledge to “require that estate regeneration only takes place where there is resident support.”

The vote took place after a years-long battle between Carpenters estate residents and the council that has seen residents gradually “decanted” from the blocks of flats since 2005. Now 450 of the estate’s 720 units stand empty. 

In 2013, campaigners celebrated victory when plans to demolish the entire estate to make way for a £1 billion university campus were abandoned.