Rt. Hon. John F. Spellar MP

John Spellar MP welcomes more Government help for struggling homeowners

Warley MP John Spellar has welcomed today’s announcement of more help for homeowners facing repossession. The Government has announced a doubling of extra funding for free, on-the-spot, legal advice for homeowners facing court proceedings . Since last summer, extra Government cash for an additional 76 court desks has meant there is free on-the-day legal advice for people facing repossession or eviction available in all parts of England. This is just one of a range of measures introduced by Government to protect people’s homes during the recession and it has a proven track record in preventing repossessions.

The announcement came as the Council of Mortgage Lenders revised their forecast of repossessions for 2009 downwards from 75,000 to 65,000. They believe a range of Government and industry initiatives mean that more people are getting the help they need to avoid repossession and stay in their homes.

John Spellar MP said:

 “Ministry of Justice figures for the first three months of 2009 show a 40% drop in lenders bringing repossession claims to court. These figures show that help from government is helping people to avoid losing their home. This is in sharp contrast to when the country was last in recession and the Conservative government did nothing to help homeowners.”

For people in immediate danger of losing their home the Government is providing help by:

·        Providing free help at Courts – universal access to advice desks is now available in Courts across England, providing free, on-the-day legal advice and representation to people facing repossession or eviction hearings.

·        Providing debt advice – the Government has invested over £130 million in free face to face debt advice between 2006 and 2011.

·        Making sure they are treated fairly – FSA regulation of lenders and safeguards through the Courts ensure that customers are treated fairly and repossession is only ever a last resort.

For people in different circumstances, the Government is providing targeted support schemes to help them reduce mortgage payments to a level they can afford. These include:

• Support for Mortgage Interest (SMI) - 220,000 households benefited from SMI in 07/08. We expect up to 10,000 extra household to benefit from changes to SMI rules introduced in January 2009 over the next two years.

·        Homeowners Mortgage Support (HMS) - We know that more that 17,000 households have looked at information on HMS and other advice on preventing repossessions in the last three weeks.

·        Mortgage Rescue (MRS) - By end of April, over 130 households had benefited from action through the MRS to stop the immediate threat of repossession, with a further 240 in the assessment stage. Every month since launch in January, over a thousand households struggling with their mortgage have received free advice from their local authority. We are now focussing intensively on ramping up take-up and accelerating processing times

·         Help from local authorities – £20m fund is now with local authorities to enable them to offer households small loans to help prevent repossession or eviction.