Limp action on housing criticised

Posted: 07 Dec 2006 11:00:32 GMT

The government has announced that it is to double the number of people able to apply for its shared-equity home ownership scheme

The government has announced that it is to double the number of people able to apply for its shared-equity home ownership scheme.

The number of people who will be able to apply for the housing assistance programme, offering special rates and zero deposit mortgages, will rise to 160,000 by 2010.

The announcement, revealed in the pre-Budget report, followed a pledge from Gordon Brown that the number of homes built on surplus land would rise to 130,000.

The housing industry has criticised the chancellor for ducking some of the key issues facing the market however, including a failure to address stamp duty and inheritance tax.

The chancellor had failed to move decisively enough on key issues, said the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics).

"Government ambitions for house building released in the pre-Budget report show that they still do not grasp the level that is necessary," said Rics economist David Stubbs.

The number of homes promised "does nothing to address the backlog of housing demand that has been built up due to persistent undersupply in the past 15 years", he said.

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