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Labour makes first-time buyer stamp duty pledge

Cherry Reynard
Written By:
Cherry Reynard
Posted:
Updated:
27/04/2015

Labour would make first-time buyers exempt from stamp duty for purchases under £300,000, Ed Miliband is due to announce.

The Labour leader said: “We will be setting out proposals to make life easier for first-time buyers.”

The move comes at a cost of £225m to goverment, which should save 90 per cent of first-time buyers up to £5,000.

The BBC reports he will attack the coalition for the “lowest level of housebuilding for almost 100 years and the lowest rate of home ownership for a generation.”

Labour, the report said, would begin work on a building one million new homes by 2020.

However, the Conservatives said the idea was not fresh as the coalition government had already cut stamp duty for the majority of home buyers since 2010.

The BBC reports Miliband will say: “There’s nothing more British than the dream of home ownership and home ownership is out of reach for so many people in our country.

“It’s the right thing to do to enable people to get back on the housing ladder and that’s what a Labour government will do.”

Miliband also announced Consumer Price Index inflation-linked caps on rent yesterday, partnered with three-year tenancies. The party then promised to cut 10 per cent tax incentives offset against falls in value of furniture and appliances.

In response to the fear of UK or foreign property investors ramping up prices all over the UK and edging local people and first-time buyers out, Labour announced First Call.

Developers would be obliged to advertise to local, first-time buyers first and foreign property purchases would be levied at a higher rate of tax.