Stamp Duty Extension? Petition Will Be Debated in the Commons

With 100,000 signatures secured, the topic of a stamp duty extension will now be discussed in Parliament.

The House of Commons has confirmed there will be a debate about stamp duty after a petition on the UK government’s website for the current stamp duty holiday until September 2021 secured enough signatures for it to be considered for debate in Parliament.

The petition, called “Extend the Stamp Duty Holiday for an additional 6 months after 31st March 2021”, now has more than 110,000 signatures. he government said last month that it “does not plan” to extend the temporary relief offered to property buyers via the stamp duty holiday.

A spokesperson for HM Treasury said: “The SDLT holiday was designed to be a temporary relief to stimulate market activity and support jobs that rely on the property market. The government does not plan to extend this temporary relief.” However, the chancellor Rishi Sunak is under growing pressure to extend the stamp duty holiday beyond 31 March, amid concerns that thousands of buyers could fail to complete before the deadline.

Parliament considers all petitions that get more than 100,000 signatures for a debate.

Dominic Agace, chief executive of Winkworth, said: “Insisting on a hard deadline seems crazy in a world where everything is changing all the time. People in the middle of selling their house, through no fault of their own, now face significantly higher costs than they agreed when they went under offer. No one envisaged a second and third lockdown when the stamp duty holiday initiative was launched. A one month extension to the end of April would help all of those currently progressing their sale."

This article was adapted from a Property Industry Eye article, published January 18th 2021.