NewsArticle-17-11-2008

Ahead of next Monday’s keenly anticipated pre-budget report by the Chancellor, the  Scottish home building industry has reiterated the case for a substantially funded UK-wide economic reflation package - emphasising that Scotland must not be ignored.

In an open letter to the Prime Minister, Jonathan Fair, Chief Executive of Homes for Scotland (right), the organisation which represents companies building 95% of the country’s new homes, said:

“It is imperative in considering such a series of measures (as has been widely reported and speculated upon over recent days), that these will have direct consequential benefits for Scotland with corresponding application and effects here."

Believing that any reflation package should have the central themes of proactive new public investment aligned to wider private taxation incentives, Fair went on to detail the sort of measures which would be most appropriate and effective for the home building industry.  These include:

• Hugely increasing socially affordable housing investment 
• Massively accelerating the provision of publicly funded roads, transportation, schools, health and community facilities without which development cannot proceed 
• Abolishing Stamp Duty on house purchase transactions in their entirety for at least a year 
• Reintroducing “Mortgage Interest Tax Relief” to inject new capital back into the market 
• Substantially reducing VAT on any transactions associated with the repair, renovation and refurbishment of a home.

Ends

Enquiries to:

Beth Hocking, Homes for Scotland – 0131 455 8350
Jennifer Kennedy, Homes for Scotland – 0131 455 8350 / 07763 240694

Notes to Editors:

1. Homes for Scotland represents the country’s home building industry which:

-  is the largest source of private investment in Scotland
-  is the largest user of the planning system in Scotland
-  last year built 20,000 new homes, contributed £6bn to the economy and directly impacted the employment of 100,000 people

2. Click here to read the full text of Jonathan Fair’s letter.