KEZIA Dugdale’s flagship housing policy is under fire after it emerged her own party denounced a similar scheme proposed by the SNP.
Labour branded a cash grant for first-time home buyers “ill-conceived” and “either a cynical attempt to win votes or undeliverable" when it was an SNP idea in 2007 and 2008.
Despite the past criticism, Dugdale kicked off Scottish Labour’s election campaign last week by announcing a manifesto pledge for a grant of up to £3000 for first-time home buyers.
The money would go to individuals who had already saved £3000 towards a deposit using George Osborne’s new first-time buyer ISA, with couples getting up to £6000.
The Labour leader said her scheme would help those struggling to get on the property ladder.
She said: “It’s big and it’s bold. But the challenges Scotland faces deserve nothing less.”
However when the SNP proposed a similar scheme in their 2007 manifesto - a £2000 grant for every first-time buyer - Labour said it was a mistake.
Johann Lamont, then Labour’s communities spokesperson, called it an “ill-conceived pledge to give a £2000 first-time buyers grant”.
Responding to an SNP government consultation on the plan, Labour-run Glasgow City Council said: “The effect of grants to first-time buyers may be to further increase house prices (through increased demand) therefore defeating the purpose for which they were introduced. Resources would be better used... increasing the housing supply.”
Labour-run North Lanarkshire Council also said funds should be “properly targeted to areas where there is a lack of supply at the lower end of the housing market, rather than.. help people meet their aspiration of new build housing.”
And the Edinburgh Labour group wrote: “The proposal for cash grants... is rejected as it would make little difference in Edinburgh and is poorly targeted.”
While Unison said it feared “such payments will do little to alleviate the current housing problems and may in fact make the problem worse by contributing to house price inflation”.
The consultation found almost no support for the grants, with the main criticism that they would increase house inflation and were not targeted at those most in need - criticisms which now also apply to Dugdale’s plan.
When the SNP scrapped the grants idea in May 2008 in favour of more shared-equity schemes, Lamont commented: “Yet again, the SNP have failed to deliver on a manifesto pledge that was either a cynical attempt to win votes or undeliverable.”
SNP MSP Clare Adamson MSP said: “Given everything Labour said in the past about first-time buyers, it seems strange to say the least that they are now determined to pursue a policy which will push up house prices and do nothing to boost housing supply.
“Labour had a notoriously poor record in all areas of housing policy while in office – and this latest announcement shows that nothing has changed.”
LibDem housing spokesman Jim Hume said: “On the one hand we have Labour, with a proposal of a sort they rubbished in the past. On the other, we have an SNP government who will not admit that they have broken their promise to build 30,000 homes for social rent.”
Green co-convener Maggie Chapman said: “While Kezia Dugdale is right to highlight the austerity trap Scotland's young people have been left in, her plans to dish out cash for first-time buyers seems nothing but a rushed, irresponsible attempt to outbid the SNP.
“Labour's scheme would do little to give security to those who are struggling the most - young people who simply cannot find work or are forced to live on poverty wages.”
A Labour spokesman insisted the party’s new plan was not the same as the SNP’s old one.
He said: “The SNP scheme was to give people money. Our scheme is to reward savings.”
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