Foreword

Over the past decade, London has faced successive challenges of considerable gravity and scale, including the departure of the UK from the European Union, the COVID-19 pandemic, chronic national political uncertainty, extraordinary technological change, the ongoing war in Ukraine, significant inflation, and major conflicts in the Middle East. Each has affected the capital in significant ways because of its openness to the world and its primacy within the UK.

This report presents the data that shows how London has nevertheless remained a resilient global metropolis, and in many respects has continued to make economic, environmental and social progress. However, it also shows that new civic problems have emerged and there remain persistent concerns.

While no single report can capture the full complexity of London, the data presented here provide some of the most pertinent indicators about life in the capital. Each chapter is structured around a set of London-level outcomes: outcomes which the Mayor of London has set and express what he wants to achieve for the city and its residents. The report provides readers with data and analysis for each outcome, to support informed discussion, scrutiny and decision-making about the city’s future.

This year’s report is published for the first time as a digital product. This reflects a commitment to improving accessibility, timeliness and transparency, enabling a wider range of users to explore the data and analysis more easily. The transition to this format has been made possible by the expertise, dedication and collaborative effort of analysts across City Intelligence and the GLA, whose work underpins both this publication and the wider evidence base used by the organisation.

Many thanks go to all the teams and people within the Greater London Authority who contributed to this publication, but special recognition should go to the following: Jubair Ahmed, Ellie Bloom, Mike Brondbjerg, Pauline Bucher, Yiqiao Chen, Matthew Daley, Sophie Deakin, Gordon Douglass, Monet Durieux, Hector Espinoza, Anja Garbely, Joe Heywood, Nick Jacob, Chris Knight, Jeff O’Reilly, James Scott-Brown, Colin Shepherd, Micheal Slade, Matthew Tibbles, Veronica Tuffrey, Simon Webster, Lauren Wool, Guk Yu and Sixia Zhang.