Last week I launched a petition asking for the Bakerloo line to be extended south from the Elephant and Castle to Camberwell and Peckham in the heart of Southwark. The proposal to bring the tube to Camberwell is nothing new. In 1913 the then Lord Mayor of London advocated the tube’s extension to Camberwell, and enabling legislation was passed in 1931 and 1947. But nothing happened. So for 100 years the residents of Camberwell and Southwark have waited in vain for the tube to reach them.

I am under no illusions that if Southwark is to persuade the mayor of London and the government to prioritise the Bakerloo line extension we will not only have to demonstrate a robust economic and environmental case, but we will also have to bring forward a financial plan and evidence to prove the viability of the scheme. As Lambeth and Wandsworth councils have done at the Vauxhall Nine Elms development, we will have to commit to making significant financial contributions either directly or indirectly through our community infrastructure levy to underline our commitment to the proposals.

Because, by design or default, local government is now, and must continue to be, the real driver of regeneration. There is nothing more important than skills, jobs and growth for our residents – and local authorities must be activist partners in their delivery.

This is the role which we have played at the Elephant and Castle, a major regeneration project in the heart of Southwark. Familiar to most as a roundabout to be avoided, the Elephant and Castle was first proposed for regeneration in the 1990s by the then Labour administration. Homes on the failed Heygate Estate were becoming impossible to let, crime and antisocial behaviour were rife, and the area had become a byword for inner-city decline.

When Labour lost control of the council in 2002 the momentum for the regeneration was also lost. But after eight long years of dither and delay under the Lib Dems in May 2010 the newly elected Labour administration pledged to prioritise the Elephant regeneration, to begin delivery of the new homes, jobs, transport and leisure improvements that we knew the project could achieve.

We got on and signed a regeneration agreement with our development partners Lend Lease in July 2010 and last month the masterplan for the Heygate Estate site was approved by Southwark’s planning committee. Work is already under way on a new leisure centre and there have already been transport improvements at the Elephant’s southern roundabout.

The masterplan will deliver: 2,500 new homes, at least 25 per cent of which will be affordable; over 6,000 new jobs; a new tube station; the largest new park in zone 1 for 70 years; new retails and business opportunities; new civic space and public realm and a genuinely mixed community – delivering an ambition to pull the centre of London southwards and make the Elephant a destination for all Londoners, as it was a century ago when the tube extension to Camberwell was first debated.

None of this has happened by accident. It has required political leadership and the willingness to take on the small but vocal band of opponents of the regeneration. Simon Hughes and Southwark’s Lib Dems have called for the regeneration agreement to be torn up and renegotiated – once again advocating dither and delay over progress.

But my colleagues and I would be failing in our basic duty if we followed that course. Generating jobs and growth is not easy. So opportunities must be seized and pursued. Leadership must be shown and we must be the advocates for economic change in our boroughs.

Time and again since May 2010 the coalition government has shown it is unable or unwilling to drive the jobs and growth agenda. It is an agenda we must take for Labour in local government.

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Peter John is the leader of Southwark council. He tweets @peterjohn6

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Photo: ladycharlie