Lords Economic Affairs Committee to question Bank of England and lenders on economics of the housing market

On Tuesday 1 March the Committee will take evidence in Committee 1 of the House of Lords from:

3:35pm:

• Mr Brian Berry, Chief Executive, Federation of Master Builders
• Mr Chris Carr, Carr and Carr builders

4:35pm:

• Mr Paul Smee, Director General, Council of Mortgage Lenders
• Mr Stephen Noakes, Director of Mortgages, Lloyds Banking Group

On Wednesday 2 March the Committee will take evidence in Committee Room 2 from:

2:05pm:

• Sir Jon Cunliffe, Deputy Governor for Financial Stability, Bank of England.

In the first session the Committee will cover the decline in the number of small and medium sized builders, how small and medium sized building firms can be helped to access development finance and whether local authorities are too heavily focused on large building companies to develop new housing.

In the session with the Council of Mortgage Lenders and Lloyds questions will cover how bank's lending to builders has changed since the financial crisis, whether they would lend to local authorities to assist in housing building and what obstacles exist to that lending, and the impact of government schemes such as Help to Buy on lending and in particular the ability of first time buyers to access mortgages.

With Sir Jon Cunliffe the Committee's questions will focus on the Bank of England's assessment of the stability of the housing market and the risk of large collapse in house prices, the level of UK household debt, and the income to house price ratio in the UK and impact of the Help to Buy scheme on house prices.