A leading trade union has stepped up its attack on Barking and Dagenham council over the level of affordable and social housing in developments being built across the east London borough.

The GMB, which last month accused the Labour-controlled local authority of “gentrification” over its plans to revamp of a site in Barking occupied by a derelict office block, said only 16% of a planned 9,700 homes to be built by the council-owned development firm Be First in the next four years would be social or affordable housing.

The union’s regional secretary Warren Kenny said: “This is way out of line with the policy set out by the Labour Party nationally that the majority of the new homes planned to be built over 10 years should be genuinely social housing.