Home Ownership: First-Time Buyers

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Thursday 23rd April 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

Shared ownership has a very important role to play in supporting households into home ownership that would otherwise struggle to purchase a property on the open market that meets their needs. We are aware, of course, that some people who have entered shared ownership have faced challenges. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Young, for his work during the passage of the Renters’ Rights Bill to introduce the measures to help with that. We have introduced new expectations for landlords to improve the customer experience. These include giving greater consideration to long-term customer affordability and increasing transparency and fairness on costs. Shared owners will also benefit from the wider leasehold and commonhold reforms in a variety ways. We will debate the commonhold and leasehold reform Bill in due course—but the Act of 2024 grants shared owners the right to statutory lease extensions and makes it easier for them to challenge unreasonable service charges.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, stamp duty is a huge drag on those wishing to have their own home. In London, for the average first-time buyer, stamp duty is £15,000—a huge sum for those seeking to get a deposit. It also makes climbing the housing ladder extortionately expensive and prevents those wanting to downsize, thereby freeing up family homes, from being able to afford to do so. Does the Minister recognise that stamp duty is a bad tax, and it should be abolished so that people can afford to buy and to move?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

That is a bit rich coming from someone who was in the government party for the past 14 years. First-time buyers benefit from paying no stamp duty on up to £300,000, and they can claim relief on purchases up to £500,000.