Two of the three women allegedly held for 30 years as slaves had lived in a political collective with their captors, police have disclosed.

Metropolitan police commander Steve Rodhouse told reporters that two of the alleged victims met the male suspect in London through a shared political ideology and began living together in a "collective".

The address where the women lived with their alleged captors is understood to be a three-storey block in Peckford Place, Stockwell, south London. Police are conducting house-to-house inquiries in the area.

The suspects, both 67, are of Indian and Tanzanian origin and came to the UK in the 1960s, police said. They have been released on bail to a date in January.

A 30-year-old British woman, a 57-year-old Irish woman and a 69-year-old Malaysian woman were rescued from a house last month, after one of the women called a support charity asking for help. All three women are believed to have suffered emotional and physical abuse.

Scotland Yard revealed that part of the agreement when the women were removed from the address on 25 October was that police would not at that stage take any action.

None of the women was reported missing after they were rescued. Officers have recovered a birth certificate for the 30-year-old woman, who is believed to have lived her entire life in servitude.

Rodhouse said police agreed to move at a slow pace to accommodate the fragile state of mind of the alleged victims.

"Part of the agreement on 25 October when they were removed from the suspects' address was that police would not at that stage take any action. Since that date we have been working to gain their trust and evidence. That came to fruition on 21 November, when we were in a position to make arrests," he said.

Rodhouse said police were examining the nature of the cult. "The people involved, the nature of that collective and how it operated is all subject to our investigation and we are slowly and painstakingly piecing together more information," he said.

"Somehow that collective came to an end and … somehow the women ended up continuing to live with the suspects. How this resulted in the women living in this way for over 30 years is what we are seeking to establish, but we believe emotional and physical abuse has been a feature of all the victims' lives."

The 30-year-old woman's birth certificate was the only the official documentation that police have recovered.

"We believe she has lived with the suspects and the other victims all her life, but of course at this early stage we are still seeking out evidence," Rodhouse said.

Meanwhile, as officers stood guard on Saturday at the three-storey block in Stockwell, neighbours spoke of their shock. One local resident, Abdul Rogers, said many people living in the area did not speak to each other. "It's really shocking," he said. "It's a kind of quiet area. I don't even know my next-door neighbour. If I met them on the street now I would not be able to tell it was my next-door neighbour, which is not good for community cohesion. Nobody speaks to each other."

A woman, who gave her name only as Valerie, said the area was usually quiet and calm.

"People who live here respect where they live," she said. "There is still a little community. Seeing all this going on is quite surprising to me. It's shocking really."