As part of a much wider package of real help for homeowners, the recently announced Homeowner Mortgage Support Scheme will enable ordinary hard working households that experience a redundancy or significant loss of income to reduce their monthly payments to a more manageable level, by deferring a proportion of the interest payments on their mortgage for up to two years. The Government will guarantee to lenders they will get the payments back in return for them participating in the scheme.
We are not setting a limit or a target for the number of households this scheme can help—this is a consumer and lender-led scheme, backed up by a Government guarantee. We want to see this scheme help as many households as possible.