Lord Flight
Main Page: Lord Flight (Conservative - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Flight's debates with the HM Treasury
(9 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Newby
The noble Lord knows that 1.7 million households are waiting for social housing in the UK, and the spare room subsidy is intended to help move people into accommodation in those circumstances. I think that he would agree with me that the fundamental challenge that we in all parties face is how to increase the flow of housing, not just in aggregate but so that it is designed to meet the different requirements of different groups, including the elderly.
Lord Flight (Con)
My Lords, other than a few of the more enlightened ones, banks are now refusing to provide mortgage loans to anyone over 70. It is very well to say that banks can exercise discretion here, but when they are told by the regulator that that is what the regulator wants, not surprisingly they want to protect themselves, so they say, “Well, we’ll do what we’re told”. If they do otherwise, they put themselves out on a limb if something goes wrong. Basically, the regulator needs to be advised to make it clearer that it wants to see banks use their initiative.
Lord Newby
My Lords, as I said earlier, many lenders appear to be approaching the rules in a way that is against the spirit set out by the FCA. The FCA is reviewing the way the mortgage market review rules operate, and I hope that there will be some movement there. A number of banks and smaller building societies, in particular the Family Building Society and the Bath Building Society, of course do not have any age limits in their lending policies.