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Lord Rooker: My Lords, I have waited eight weeks for a housing question to come along, but the Question turns out to be about the euro, not about housing. The issue raised in the Question is not the responsibility of my department—the Government do not give mortgages. All I can say to the former Chancellor is that I am armed with lots of statistics, including the levels of repossessions and mortgage interest rates when he was in office.

For people buying homes, the market remains affordable. To give an example, the mortgage payments for households that have bought a house in the first quarter of 2002 amount to only 16 per cent of their income; the comparative figure in 1990 was 27 per cent.

Lord Strathclyde: My Lords, how could the Minister possibly have been briefed on this Question, given where it came from, without the possibility being raised that it might be about variable and fixed interest rates compared with those in Europe? Surely, when he returns to his department, he should complain at the highest level about the quality of his briefing, so that when he comes to answer Questions in this House he is properly briefed. If a government Minister does not have the answer to the questions raised by my noble friend Lord Lamont, he should re-examine his brief very carefully.

Lord Rooker: My Lords, there is no problem. I am fully briefed on the situation, but I thought that it might be a genuine question about the housing needs of people in this country. As has repeatedly been made clear from this Dispatch Box, mainly by my noble

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friend Lord McIntosh, the Government are not going to give a running commentary on the five economic tests, and that is that.

Baroness Maddock: My Lords, is the Minister aware that the take-up of mortgage payment protection insurance among flexible rate borrowers is below average? Is he further aware that very few people with flexible mortgages make regular over-payments or one-off payments explicitly to guard against future health problems or unemployment? What plans do the Government have to assist home owners to be more secure? Have the Government considered introducing a mortgage benefit to help those who own their homes with housing costs, in the same way as housing benefit helps those who rent homes in the public and private sectors?

Lord Rooker: My Lords, the noble Baroness is right. We now have flexible mortgages. Recent research sponsored by my department and the Council of Mortgage Lenders was published only a few days ago. It is true that flexible mortgages represent a rapidly growing share of mortgages in certain sectors of the market—particularly among those in the A-B economic class and those who have owned more than one property in the past. It is now known to people that mortgage flexibility can be used, for example, to avoid possible repossession in the future. Therefore, it is highly unlikely that in the future we shall face the kind of situation that occurred previously, when repossessions by lenders were running at 60,000 to 70,000 a year. At present, the figure stands at about 18,000 a year. So interest rates are a lot lower and there is a great deal more flexibility to pay more in good times and less in bad times. That evens out the situation, making it less likely that the threat of repossession will ever return to this country. We shall do what we can to push the idea of flexible mortgages.

Lord Lamont of Lerwick: My Lords, since the Minister has given me more or less the same reply on mortgage finance as he gave me the other day on the European arrest warrant, perhaps I may ask him another question about mortgage finance. Will he at least confirm that, despite the fact that official interest rates are higher in this country than in Europe, mortgage rates in this country—because of our competitive market—are lower than they are in Europe in many cases?

Lord Rooker: My Lords, present mortgage rates, even without the benefit of tax relief, are lower than they ever were in the early 1990s with tax relief. So they are a bargain. As the former Chancellor tempts me even further, I shall repeat what he himself said in his Mansion House speech in June. It is on the record. He said that, under the convergence tests, one of the supporting analyses will be concerned with assessing the behaviour of the housing market and its impact on consumption—and beyond that there is no need to go. That is all it is about—a running commentary on the five tests. Well, I am not doing it.

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National Stadium

3.15 p.m.

Lord Corbett of Castle Vale asked Her Majesty's Government:

    What progress has been made on completing agreements for the financing and construction of the proposed national stadium.

Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, the Football Association, whose project this is, made it clear on 22nd May that it would take up to 10 weeks from signing heads of agreement to reach financial close. Officials remain in close contact with the Football Association and Wembley National Stadium Ltd and we understand that good progress is being made by the FA on its commercial negotiations.

Lord Corbett of Castle Vale: My Lords, does my noble friend understand that those of us who want to see a modern national stadium have little remaining faith in the ability of the FA to deliver it? Will he acknowledge that all that has really happened in the past six years is that the Wembley turf has been dug up? Are there not lessons to learnt here from the strength of the regions and their ability to deliver projects on time and on budget, as shown by the city of Birmingham in the case of Millennium Point and the world indoor athletics championships to be held next May, and, superbly, by the city of Manchester where the Commonwealth Games open tonight? Will my noble friend now blow the whistle on the Wembley fiasco and honour earlier undertakings to consider seriously the bid for the much better Birmingham Solihull site?

Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, fortunately, I do not answer for the Football Association from this Dispatch Box. Therefore, I can only say that my noble friend's comments will be communicated to the Football Association.

Viscount Falkland: My Lords, will the noble Lord tell the House whether it is now considered good practice in government circles, or more particularly in Sport England circles, not to commit lottery funds—in this case £120 million—to a project where the financing is not in place?

Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, Ministers from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport have made it very clear since last December that they set very stringent conditions for that part of the project which is in receipt of public money; namely, the £120 million contributed by Sport England for the site. Some of those conditions have been met. The condition for financial support, which is adequate and fully committed, has yet to be met. We shall see what happens when we come to the conclusion of that fourth condition.

Lord Tomlinson: My Lords, as my noble friend rightly insists, he does not answer for the Football

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Association. Will he therefore tell us why the Government became so involved in making statements in favour of Wembley in the first place?

Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, my noble friend wishes to go back a considerable way. I am not sure that that is fruitful. The contribution made by Sport England to the Wembley site has been £120 million, which is not enormously high by international standards for public funding of football stadia. Naturally, the Government are concerned that there should continue to be safeguards. That is why there is a staging agreement.

Viscount Bledisloe: My Lords, does the noble Lord have any idea how long it took and how much it cost to erect the superb stadia which we saw being used for the World Cup in Japan and South Korea? Can he explain to the House why those countries can do it so much more quickly and cheaply than appears to be possible here?

Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, I have figures for a number of the stadiums built in Japan and Korea. Generally, they were built more quickly and more cheaply than is proposed for Wembley. However, they are also much smaller than Wembley. For example, the Sapporo stadium, which has received much well deserved praised, seats only 42,000.

Lord Faulkner of Worcester: My Lords, are not a number of the Japanese stadiums now in the process of being dismantled, as the Japanese Government took the view that they should exist for the period of the World Cup only and that the sites would then no longer be available for sports?

On a separate issue, will my noble friend confirm the accuracy of reports in today's press that the Government will be making up their mind on whether to make a bid for the Olympics in 2012 on the basis of the experience with the Commonwealth Games, which we all hope and are confident will be a success? Does an Olympic bid depend on the success of the Commonwealth Games? Can he also confirm that if the Olympics come to Britain, the only site where they can be staged is London?

Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, those are two very different questions. First, a number of the Japanese stadiums were built in places where the population is not enough to sustain continuing spectator numbers. I think that some are being dismantled. I have not seen the reports in today's press about the Olympic Games in 2012, but it has been common knowledge that any bid for the Olympic Games in any year would have to be based on London.


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