Dean Russell, Conservative MP for Watford, said: “In urban centres, councils are blotting out the ‘blue belt’ making clear views of the sky an impossibility.
“For most communities the decisions on the height of tall towers are made in council chambers whilst its residents have to live with these monolithic structures overshadowing their lives.”
Actor Griff Rhys Jones, president of conservation charity the Victorian Society, who wrote the foreword to the report, said: “London is particularly plagued by silly aggrandisement. Many of the latest, high-rise follies have all the tacky appeal of a footballer’s kitchen.”
He added that tall buildings only played a “performative” role in addressing the capital’s housing crisis.
A Labour spokesman defended Mr Khan’s record, saying: “Under Sadiq’s mayoralty, there has been a massive increase in genuinely affordable housebuilding, including increasing council home building tenfold.”
“The election on May 2 is a close two-horse race between Sadiq who has pledged 40,000 more council homes by 2030 and 6,000 rent control homes and his hard-right Tory opponent who would cancel 12,000 council homes and has nothing to offer renters.”
“Sadiq makes no apology for delivering the highest number of housing completions since the 1930s and ushering in a golden era of council housing.”
The Mayor of London was approached for comment.