Of course, so long as the government expects developers to build affordable housing, mixed tenure is a given anyway, otherwise the profit doesn’t stack up. But that doesn’t make the social agenda any less heartfelt. Although councils are now allowed to become developers again, they too must build homes for private sale, not exclusively social housing. Mixed tenure is the antidote to sink estates. Aspiration is the social glue that binds neighbourhoods together. We’re all middle class now.

Let’s set aside the question of whether this philosophy is generating enough of the housing most badly needed – family-sized, social rented homes. Do mixed-tenure communities work? Remarkably, when I asked the Department of Communities if it had carried out any research, it couldn’t direct me to any particular study.

And just how mixed is mixed? The leaseholder ascending by private lift to his £5 million river-view penthouse from his secure parking space is shielded from the hoi polloi in the two-bedroom private-sale flats on the lower floors. And neither he nor they will be borrowing a cup of sugar from the shared owners and social tenants sequestered in the block overlooking the grim gasometer.

Developers don’t waste high-value river views on affordable housing. But it’s also easier to manage a development if the affordable housing is in a separate block, run by the housing association. It’s not just the lack of a decent view that makes some in a mixed-tenure community less equal than others. The leasehold system plays its part too.

Don’t have a voice

The social renters, and even the shared owners although they pay full service charges, aren’t the leaseholders of their properties, but have a tenancy agreement or a sub-lease from the housing association. So they often don’t have a voice on the residents’ association – they must rely on the housing association to relay any complaints about the management of their development.

True, most housing associations are keen to act in their tenants’ interests. And there are some developments where the same agent manages all tenures and anyone can join the residents’ association. But the logistics of setting this up make these the exception. And segregation by block is still standard.

There is a way of creating a truly mixed community, where private leaseholders, shared-owners and social tenants live as next-door neighbours and you can’t tell by looking at anyone’s front door what tenure they have. It’s called “pepperpotting.” But it’s incredibly rare.

I only know of two examples in London – there may be more, but the London Housing Federation couldn’t name any. One is a 1999 33-home Notting Hill Home Ownership/Hounslow Council development in Hanworth. The other is a 300-home East Thames Housing Association scheme still being completed in Stepney. The East Thames development has some canal views, but these will be democratically distributed between the tenures. There’ll be community facilities and a residents’ association open to everyone.

So, if mixed communities are the ideal, why isn’t pepperpotting the model for most developments? Because it doesn’t appeal to developers. If it’s central to the concept that all properties should look identical, there isn’t much scope for creating higher-value flats, let alone £5 million penthouses. There may be fears that private buyers will shrink from living next door to a social renter. And then, again, there are the problems of managing different tenures that aren’t confined to separate blocks.

Social housing provider

It’s no coincidence that, with both the pepperpotting schemes, the freeholder is a social housing provider. Hounslow Council are the freeholders of the Hanworth development. East Thames bought the freehold of its scheme from the original developer Bellway.

As housing associations increasingly become developers themselves, perhaps pepperpotting will become more common. The Hounslow scheme seems to be a success and East Thames are planning research to see how theirs works out.

But there is one fundamental question. Mixed tenure may be the only way of persuading developers to build affordable housing. But are artificially mixed communities what people really want? The East Thames development is likely to succeed because it won’t feature huge disparities in income. But what about those residents overlooking the gasometer in traditional mixed tenure schemes? And don’t most of us prefer neighbours with whom we have things in common?

Desperate need

So let’s talk heresy for a moment. We’re already in desperate need of social rented housing. And as mortgage famine and market uncertainty bite, more of us will look to rent. In terms of security of tenure alone, social housing offers a better deal than the private sector. Why don’t we allow councils and housing associations to build social rented estates?

If they were designed, not to satisfy the aspirations of architects as in the 1960s and 1970s, but on a human scale, with pubs, corner shops, crèches and social clubs, and if many more of us lived on them, they would not be ghettos, but genuine mixed communities.

You’re already shaking your head. And where would the money come from? Not from this government, that’s for sure. But wouldn’t it be better to meet real housing need by creating real communities, rather than failing to meet it by chasing an ideal?