Speeches by Hillier.

“The Prime Minister has spoken about repatriating British citizens in the region. Will that be through the Ministry of Defence? If so, who will foot the bill: the MOD, the Treasury or those being repatriated?”

“6. What its planned timetable is for starting major works on the Palace of Westminster.”

“My constituent Isabel Rose suffered a horrendous event in Hong Kong almost exactly two years ago. She was sexually assaulted and violently raped. She went to the authorities in trust to report this, but it was not properly investigated. Given the Government’s support for tackling violence against women and girls here i…”

“In modern times, this issue has been discussed since 2016; we are on our 10th anniversary of discussing what has actually been an issue for 40 years. I disagree with the hon. Member for Bridlington and The Wolds (Charlie Dewhirst) about going back to the drawing board again. Does my hon. Friend have any idea of when th…”

“5. What steps he is taking to improve access to mental health services.”

“The NHS’s work on this is vital, but I also draw the Minister’s attention to Mind in Hackney, which is pioneering a new approach to make sure that people get two sessions of mental health support within two weeks. They can get more later on, but that is what they get, rather than waiting in a queue for six months for l…”

“Is that by type of property, as well as just raw numbers?”

“Is there any analysis in the Treasury of the long-term public policy impact of the fact that people will be indebted longer and sometimes, if they are buying only in their 30s, well into retirement? Is the Treasury looking at that to make sure that we are guarding against any unintended consequences in the future?”

“You are not collecting data on how the mortgage guarantee scheme is working.”

“I think there is work that we may want to dig into further there, Chair, but thank you, Ms Barber.”

“It seems that there might be dead-weight here. You have a guarantee scheme where they are already being provided but—I hear what the Minister says about future scenarios—we have a situation in many of our constituencies where the properties are blocks of flats, often leasehold, and there is a reluctance to lend at high…”

“That is an average. Have you done any analysis of whether new purchasers’ mortgage terms are significantly higher than those of people already on the ladder or people who were doing this 10 or 20 years ago?”

“Under the PSNFL rules and so on that we have talked about on the Treasury Committee, was there, or is there likely to be, any discussion to allow councils to borrow more? Obviously, borrowing is high, and we know there are challenges, but is that a prospect?”

“Are you concerned that there might be a reluctance to lend on new build flats at the 95% rate? If that is the case, how are you going to assess whether the mortgage guarantee scheme is working, because it would surely then increase the chance of a 95% or higher loan-to-value rate on leasehold flats?”

“Okay. Thank you very much.”

“Are you doing any analysis of the length of mortgage terms? I am thinking of people—young couples—with 37 or 40-year mortgages. Is that something the Treasury is analysing?”

“But it is at a lower rate, isn’t it?”

“The other challenge here is that you have this mortgage guarantee scheme, but it does not apply to a lot of private leasehold flats. They are the new builds that are going up, in a lot of inner-city areas in particular. Why is that? Is that something you are going to consider changing?”

“That is helpful. This has made mortgages more accessible, but has it done anything about affordability? You can get more mortgage, but does that mean that you are just over-indebting to buy the same property?”

“They have all got that cue now from you. In response to Mr Dean, Minister Rigby, you could not answer some of the detailed questions, but the Chancellor has been very clear that she wanted to borrow to invest in infrastructure. One of the best value-for-money bits of infrastructure is social housing, according to MHCLG…”