Activist group Generation Rent is again urging the government to take urgent action on what it calls “soaring rents”.

It declared yesterday to be ‘London: Cost of Rent Day’ – the point in the year at which, it claims, all of an average renter’s income earned so far has gone on rent. 

In London, this comes three weeks later than the national average of May 11. 

Ben Twomey – who shortly leaves his role as chief executive of the organisation – says: “Homes are the foundations of our lives. But when Londoners are forced to spend so much of their income on rent, it means children going to school hungry and older renters who can’t afford to turn the heating on. 

“High rents trap people in homelessness and rip money out of local communities.

“It’s not right that London renters are handing over more than five months of their income every year to landlords. 

“The government must urgently give Mayor of London Sadiq Khan the power to slam the brakes on soaring rents by limiting rent increases.”

Generation Rent claims that tenants in the capital spend 42% of their income on rent on average according to the Office for National Statistics, which it describes as “significantly higher” than the England average of 36%.

It also cites claims that private renters in London are three times more likely than owner occupiers “to live in poverty.” 

And it concludes by saying that the local authority area where ‘Cost of Rent Day’ falls latest in the entire country is Kensington and Chelsea, where it is September 26.