More than £11 million has been spent by Sutton Council buying back Right to Buy homes, it has been revealed.

The authority has forked out £11,766,950 on purchasing back 44 properties which have been previously sold under the Right to Buy scheme.

Figures released via Freedom of Information (FOI) requests have revealed that 429 council homes in the borough have been sold off to private renters.

And roughly 29 percent of homes which have been bought through Right to Buy are now being rented out privately.

Now London Assembly member Fiona Twycross AM is backing calls for the Government policy to be scrapped in the capital, following Tom Copley AM's 'Right to Buy: Wrong for London' report.

Ms Twycross, who insists the scheme has “deepened” the housing crisis in Sutton, said: “It simply isn’t right that so many homes, originally built for the public good and to be let out at social rents, are now in the hands of private landlords, some of whom have used the Right to Buy scheme to bloat their property portfolios.

“We are in a progressively desperate situation where Sutton Council is having to pay big sums to buy back homes they were forced to sell at a discount under Government policy.

“We have a lot of local families stuck in unsuitable temporary accommodation or forced to pay sky-high rents in the private rented sector. Keeping the Right to Buy policy would be both irresponsible and unsustainable.

“Homeownership is of course important to many Londoners, but it should not come at any cost. I am urging ministers to immediately act upon the stark findings of this report in order to protect our local housing stock.”

Introduced in 1980, Right to Buy enables council tenants across the country to purchase their own homes at a discount.

If you live in a house then you get a 35 percent discount if you’ve been a tenant between three and five years, and after five years it increases by a percentage for every year you’ve been there.

The scheme differs slightly for flat tenants, who gain a 50 percent discount which rises by two percent for each additional 12 months.

But Right to Buy is facing criticism because local authorities are buying back properties to rent them out again, often at much higher prices.

Housing minister and North West Hampshire MP Kit Malthouse said: “Under our Right to Buy scheme, over 100,000 social housing tenants have now got a foot on the property ladder since 2010, including more than 17,000 in London.

“This Government is determined to make the dream of home ownership a reality for as many families as possible, and to deliver much needed homes in the capital.

“We have lifted the HRA [housing revenue account] borrowing cap for local authorities so they can build more houses in the areas where they are needed the most, and delivered 1,025 new affordable homes for rent in Sutton since 2010.”

Sutton Council has not respond to requests for comment at the time of publishing.