By John Lamont MP
The dream of home ownership should be available to everyone in the Borders who is willing to work hard.
Buying your own property gives people a real stake in society and helps to create more cohesive communities.
Sadly, over the last few decades, not everyone has had the opportunity to purchase their own home, even if they sacrifice and put in a real shift.
The housing market needs to change, so that current and future generations of aspirational people can once again have the chance to own a house of their own.
My party has put forward a bold new proposal to bring about the necessary changes. At our recent UK conference, the Scottish Conservatives called for the SNP government to abolish LBTT, Scotland's version of stamp duty, on personal homes.
This positive new proposal would encourage aspiration and help people get onto and move up the property ladder.
It's a move that makes economic sense too. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has warned that stamp duty is one of the more harmful taxes. They said: "More importantly, in a crowded field, stamp duty has a claim to be the most economically damaging tax in the UK. It makes both housing and labour markets less efficient, acting as a drag on growth. It should be reduced or – even better – abolished, and certainly not increased."
The proposals are also fully funded, as the UK Conservative party recently announced proposals to make £47 billion of savings by reducing spending on areas such as social security benefits and foreign aid.
So, if enacted, this proposal would make the housing market fairer, make our economy stronger, and give people the opportunity to own their own home.
It would benefit young people who are renting at the moment and looking to get on the first rung of the property ladder. But it would also help families who want more space for their children. And it would also be beneficial to elderly people, too, by allowing them to downsize or move to a more manageable size of home without being penalised with a tax for doing so.
I believe this policy could be a game-changer for the housing market and I hope to see it introduced by the SNP and Labour governments at the earliest opportunity.
We must give people back the chance to strive and achieve the dream of home ownership.
