Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the Answer of 20 November 2017 to Question 112340 on Owner Occupation, if his Department will take steps to ensure that lenders take into account (a) council tax and (b) rental payments when assessing a borrower's creditworthiness.

The Government believes that it is right that a history of paying rent should be recorded and recognised in tenants’ credit scores and in affordability assessments.

That is why, at the Autumn Budget 2017, the Government announced the Rent Recognition Challenge, a £2m competition challenging the UK’s world-leading technology firms to develop innovative new applications to enable rental tenants to share their rent payment data with lenders and credit reference agencies. The winning applications will be announced shortly.

Data on individuals’ council tax payments are not currently made available to lenders or credit reference agencies by local authorities.