Reports.
Through campaigning, parliamentary debates and meetings with relevant organisations it has been vital to produce our own reports to show evidence of the detrimental effects mortgage prisoners have been through and still are having to live with. Through surveys posted on the UK Mortgage Prisoner Facebook page we are able to obtain lived experiences from a wide range of mortgage prisoner members from across the UK.
UK Mortgage Prisoners: Support for Mortgage Interest (SMI), a review into the Government support for homeowners, May 2022.
Support for Mortgage Interest was first introduced back in1948. During the global financial crisis in 2008 the Government implemented 3 schemes to alleviate the pressure on homeowners who fell into arrears on their mortgages. These schemes were the Preventing Repossessions Fund, the Mortgage Rescue Scheme, and the Homeowner Mortgage Support Scheme. These schemes were put in place alongside the existing Support for Mortgage Interest (SMI) scheme which provided additional financial support for homeowners in receipt of certain means-tested benefits to cover the interest element on their mortgage payments.
UK Mortgage Prisoners: Response to the FCA Review on Mortgage Prisoners, March 2022.
In November 2021 the FCA Mortgage Prisoners Review was presented to Parliament by the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, John Glen MP. This Review was announced by the Minister during the debate on the amendments proposed to the Financial Services Bill on 26th April 2021. The Review announced was to be of FCA data on mortgage prisoners, "to ensure that we have further detail on the characteristics of those borrowers who have mortgages with inactive firms and are unable to switch despite being up to date with their mortgage payments"
UK Mortgage Prisoners: Response to the FCA Paper, Mortgage Prisoner Review, Terms of Reference
This paper has been produced in response to the FCA paper Mortgage Prisoners Review: Terms of Reference published on 20 July 2021, and to support UK Mortgage Prisoner Action Group (UKMP) during their stakeholder meeting with the FCA to be held on 16 August 2021.
UKMP have consistently challenged the age and accuracy of the FCA data reported to date. We have produced several reports and surveys that provide a more accurate reflection of the numbers of people involved and the harm and detriment caused to them and their families.
Alongside the response UK Mortgage Prisoner Action Group has produced a factsheet to highlight the previous rhetoric that has been generated off the back of previous FCA assumptions which we expect to now be put right and stamped out as a result of this review.
UK Mortgage Prisoners: Setting the Record Straight.
For over a decade, Mortgage Prisoners have been confronted with insurmountable barriers that prevent them from escaping from extortionate interest rates, severe financial restrictions and mobility, and mental and physical issues caused by this Government made scandal. During this time, despite the relentless efforts of campaigners, the Government has not shown it has the will to solve the problems that it created, and the modified affordability criteria introduced by the FCA has helped only a handful of the 250,000 prisoners.
Hidden Voices: Growing up as the child of a mortgage prisoner.
This is one of many previous thematic reports on UK Mortgage Prisoners and the impact on them after paying crippling high interest rates for over a decade. Mortgage prisoners have paid for the iniquity of the banks after the global financial crash of 2008. While bankers were bailed out, mortgage holders were sold out and, ultimately, had their mortgage rates hiked and sold off to inactive vulture funds who are not regulated and do not pay tax in the UK. Many others have been exploited by active lenders too; however, this report shifts the lens onto the experiences of children and young people.
Download a copy of the report here
Report on the impact on the mental health of mortgage prisoners.
Early last year, the FCA launched a consultation on mortgage prisoners and in August 2019 it announced new rules, a relative test, that could be applied by lenders for new borrowing. Effectively, this should have meant the end to people who pay extortionate interest…
Read the full report here..
Report on the impact of COVID-19 on mortgage prisoners.
In March 2020, UK Mortgage Prisoners submitted a COVID-19 report to Government and subsequently to the Treasury Select Committee as evidence of the additional financial hardship and emotional stress mortgage prisoners would incur by the recent pandemic and financial...
A Thematic Report on Mortgage Prisoner Key Workers
Our Key Workers Kelly Gynn is what we would refer to in this present climate as an NHS Hero……she is a Nurse. Kelly is also a Mortgage Prisoner. We asked Kelly to tell us what life is like for her working on the front line on a COVID NHS hospital ward and as a Mortgage...
Poverty Premium Report - It costs more to be poor
The UK Mortgage Prisoners Facebook group now has over 3400 members. These members all have their own individual stories of being a mortgage prisoner but, over time, it has become clear that there are many similarities both in how they have been treated and their experiences – particularly when it comes to their finances.