Moving home is one of the most stressful experiences in life, yet Gordon Brown has persisted in introducing expensive Home Information Packs against the better judgement of both consumers and housing experts.
Commenting on the introduction of HIPs, Location, Location, Location presenter Kirstie Allsopp said: "An Englishman's home may once have been his castle, but under Labour you have to get the state's permission and pay a state-sponsored inspector, before a prospective buyer can cross the threshold.
“The country's solicitors, surveyors, estate agents, builders, banks and building societies are all asking Ministers to go back to the drawing board.
“Hopes and dreams are tied up in bricks and mortar. Yet the Government, in their inability to admit they’re wrong, appear determined to play politics with people’s property.”
Locally, Mark Clarke is particularly worried at the impact HIPs are having following the publication of figures from the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) that show there has been a 37% fall in the number of homes with three or more bedrooms put on the market since the introduction of Home Information Packs.
In response to this Shadow Housing Minister Grant Shapps has written to the Association of Home Information Pack Providers and the Department for Communities and Local Government to give them advance warning that a future Conservative Government will scrap HIPs.
Shadow Housing Minister Grant Shapps said: “All the early evidence is that, as predicted, the introduction of HIPs is having a negative impact on homebuyers and sellers. Gordon Brown should have scrapped this pointless and costly bureaucracy long ago rather than risking the health of the property market when it is needed least.
“Experts, the industry and the public have long opposed this unnecessary piece of red tape. We want to give clarity to the industry that HIPs have no future under a Conservative Government.”