Ed Balls MP, Labour’s Shadow Chancellor, responding to reports that the Bank of England will be asked to review the Help to Buy scheme, said:
“Instead of waiting a year, the Bank of England should review the details of the second phase of Help to Buy now before it goes ahead.
"For instance, it’s totally ill-thought through for George Osborne to decide that a scheme which should be about helping first time buyers will allow taxpayer backed mortgages for homes worth up to £600,000.
"And George Osborne is still failing to address the fundamental problem of the lowest level of house building since the 1920s. You can’t deal with the cost of living crisis without building more homes.
"Rising demand for housing must be matched with rising supply. Unless George Osborne acts now to build more affordable homes, as Labour has urged, then he risks making it even harder for first time buyers to get on the housing ladder. It’s no wonder that for millions of families this is no recovery at all.”
Ends
Editor’s notes
1. In his speech to the Labour Party Annual Conference this week, Ed Balls said:
“… Along with voices from the Bank of England and the IMF, we are right to be concerned that the Government is boosting housing demand – with a taxpayer mortgage guarantee on houses of up to £600,000 – while doing nothing about the supply of housing which has fallen to its lowest level since the 1920s.
"George, it’s basic economics. If you push up housing demand, but don’t act to boost housing supply, all that happens is that you push house prices up and up. And the end result is that the very people your policy should be helping – young first time buyers – will find it even harder to get on the housing ladder.
”… That is why we have consistently said, it is why the IMF have said, bring forward £10 billion of infrastructure investment right now, build 400,000 affordable houses over the next two years, create half a million jobs and thousands of apprenticeships. That is the way to secure an economy that works for all and is built to last.“