Rishi Sunak targets first-home buyers

Rishi Sunak has put tax cuts and help for first-home buyers at the heart of the Tory manifesto.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak during his BBC interview on Monday. Picture: Getty Images

Rishi Sunak has put tax cuts and help for first-home buyers at the heart of the Tory manifesto, saying it is “morally right” that people are rewarded for working hard.

The British Prime Minister was to revive his flagging campaign on Tuesday night AEST with a series of retail pledges, saying the Tories would cut taxes for “earners, parents and pensioners”.

His manifesto includes plans for more than £13bn ($25bn) worth of tax cuts, funded by overhauling the welfare system and a crackdown on tax avoidance.

He is expected to unveil plans for another cut to national insurance as he attempts to position himself as the heir to Margaret Thatcher and Nigel Lawson.

Mr Sunak will also announce a package of support to help people to get on to the housing ladder after admitting it had become harder to buy a home under the Tories.

A £1bn scheme would help first-home buyers with government-backed mortgages to allow them to buy a home with a 5 per cent deposit. The plan could be used for all home purchases of less than £400,000.

Mr Sunak will also announce that the Tories will permanently abolish stamp duty for first-home buyers purchasing a house up to £425,000, as part of the Conservatives’ plans to build an “ownership society, where more and more people have the security and pride of home ownership”.

“We will enable working people to keep more of the money you earn because you have earned it and have the right to choose what to spend it on,” Mr Sunak was to say. “Keir Starmer takes a very different view. He says he’s a socialist, and we know what socialists ­always do: take more of your money.

“We … have had to take difficult decisions because of Covid, but we are now cutting taxes for earners, parents and pensioners.

“We are the party of Margaret Thatcher and Nigel Lawson, a party, unlike Labour, that believes in sound money. In this party, we believe that it is morally right that those who can work do work, and that hard work is rewarded with people being able to keep more of their own money.

“We will ensure that we have lower welfare so we can lower taxes.”

In other developments:

● The Liberal Democrats have pledged to tackle Britain’s healthcare crisis from “top to bottom”, announcing an £8.4bn-a-year package for the National Health Service and social care paid for by additional taxes; and

● Labour has again refused to rule out raising capital gains tax or corporation tax.

In a BBC interview before the manifesto launch, Mr Sunak ­rejected comparisons with former prime minister Liz Truss, insisting that his tax cuts were fully funded.

He admitted that it had “got harder” for people to own their own home in recent years, saying he wanted to “make sure that it’s easier”.

“What we will do is not just build homes in the right places, but make sure that we support young people into great jobs so they can save for that deposit,” he said.

Under what the party is ­describing as a “new and improved” Help to Buy scheme, first-home buyers would be offered a 20 per cent government equity loan towards a new-build property, enabling them to buy their first home with a 5 per cent deposit.

The scheme would run for three years and the party claimed that it would enable hundreds of thousands of families to access mortgage finance immediately on “terms they can afford”.

Interest would not be payable for the first five years on the government equity part of the loan. The scheme would be backed by developers, who will contribute a quarter of the equity loan costs.

“We Conservatives want to ­create a society in which everyone has a chance to own,” Mr Sunak was to say.

“We will abolish stamp duty ­entirely for first-time buyers purchasing a house up to £425,000 and introduce a new help-to-buy scheme to get more people on the property ladder.

“[It is] all part of our plan to build an ownership society, where more and more people have the ­security and pride of home ownership.”

The Prime Minister said he was the right person to lead the country for the next five years, adding: “If you are someone who wants lower taxes, if you want your pension protected, if you want ­migration reduced, if you want a sensible approach to net zero that prioritises our security and reducing people’s bills, that’s what I will offer you in this election.”

Labour has also put forward plans to help first-home buyers, saying it would make the current mortgage guarantee scheme permanent. Under the measure, which is due to end next June, the government will act as guarantor for part of a home loan to encourage lenders to offer low-deposit deals.

The party has said that its plan would help more than 80,000 young people to get on to the housing ladder over the next five years.

The Times