Speeches by Rigby.

“Fundamentally, we are expecting them to deliver more houses. That is obviously not the sole element of the Treasury’s work; we have been working hard to make sure that there is demand as well as supply by trying to ensure that mortgages are more affordable for people, and helping people to save for deposits. There are …”

“In addition to some of the other things that have been raised, yes. I have thought about it from the point of view of very long-term mortgages, which I understand are more available—or more common, I should say—in jurisdictions like the US. They are, as you know, available in this country, but as to the long-term impac…”

“I understand the question. Not that I am aware of, no.”

“That is a very good question. Not that I have come across, but I turn to Alanna.”

“Understood. Overall, it is progressive, and we have the relief for first-time buyers, in addition to all the changes we have just discussed.”

“Because of what has happened to house prices and to more supply coming online, the fact of mortgages being more affordable, and in addition to what the FCA is doing, there is also the FPC’s relaxation of the rules when it comes to the high loan-to-value lending or the flow limit. As a package, we are seeing houses beco…”

“I suspect that, to the extent that it was considered, it would have been considered by my colleague the Exchequer Secretary. I do not know whether this is a long-running proposal, or something that was made pre Budget. I will let Minister Pennycook come in as to whether it was something they considered. Failing that, I…”

“The starting point is that stamp duty is a very important source of revenue. It raised in the region of £14 billion last year and will do going forward. I referred earlier to the changes we have made for the purposes of landlords, which is the important 2 percentage point increase, which equates to 5%, for additional d…”

“There were round about 57,000 year on year in the time period that Minister Pennycook mentioned. With the FCA relaxing its rules following the mortgage review, 85% of the market have now adopted where the FCA suggests that they should be. On average, I think it is about 10% more that borrowers could borrow, which equat…”

“Ultimately, we are one Government. We are committed to addressing unregulated and unaffordable ground rents, so that is what we are doing.”

“There is variation in different areas of the country, not least because house prices are different in different areas. Indeed, what constitutes affordability is disputed, or there are different measures of that. There is also obviously a difference between mortgage affordability and housing affordability, but on housin…”

“Yes; that is what Mr Pennycook is saying.”

“As Minister Pennycook noted earlier, we have seen, over the course of the last year, more first-time buyers getting on the ladder.”

“Arguably, it can be both. From an institutional investor point of view—and as I said, we did plenty of engagement with that point of view—the important thing is the certainty of the investment environment. That has been the chief concern, and was the point being made to me. As I said, we had those discussions and came …”

“There are plenty of safeguards in place to make sure that lenders have to act in consumers’ best interests, not least the consumer duty. The flow limit is important here, as is the work that has been going on by the PRA, the FPC and the FCA. There are plenty of safeguards in that area, but it all links back to the prev…”

“As to exact figures, I am not sure. We engaged, as you would expect us to. In my role as City Minister, I particularly did so with institutional investors, who made their views known on the extent and nature of this policy, where they thought it should land and all the rest of it. As you would expect us to, we had disc…”

“You have just set out exactly the decision that has been made in this area. Both groups that you mentioned, including institutional investors and leaseholders, are important. From an institutional investor point of view, there is an extent to which you want to have certainty of income, and indeed everything else. We ha…”

“Just to add to that, one additional point that I should have mentioned is the added SDLT for non-UK residents.”

“It is important to emphasise the fact that there continue to be very important restrictions on how much consumers can borrow, and indeed how much lenders can lend. We are not talking about anything that resembles deregulation. As many have acknowledged, mortgage lending has been tightened at the same time as house pric…”

“I am not aware that we have any plans to, but I can follow up. There was one tax point that I wanted to interject with in relation to what Minister Pennycook was saying earlier, which I think is important. Minister Pennycook was talking about how, when new properties are built, they get hoovered up by people other than…”