David Ruffley this week backed new plans to extend home ownership in Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket. New Conservative policies would mean extra support for 'shared ownership' schemes, allow social tenants to buy a stake in their home, and make it easier for housing associations to build more affordable housing. This will help those who currently cannot afford to get on the housing ladder.

David Ruffley explained:

'It is now increasingly difficult for residents in Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket on modest incomes to buy their own home. Labour once promised they had 'no plans to raise tax at all'; but their property taxes- such as council tax and stamp duty- have hit first time buyers. The average first time buyer in East Anglia now pays an extra £1,226 in stamp duty compared with 1997. Soaring council tax bills are a financial drain on top of that.

'Social tenants have also lost out. Where council housing has been transferred to housing associations, tenants lose the same Right to Buy. It seems the Government's only policy on housing has been to be to concrete over Suffolk's green fields, whilst missing the opportunity to regenerate our existing towns and cities. On housing, as on everything else, Labour are all talk.'

Under the Conservative plans for Action on Housing:

• Conservatives will promote and extend support for shared ownership schemes. Shared equity helps people buy their home of choice without having to fund 100 per cent of the value.

• We will extend the Right to Buy to over a million housing association tenants, and reinvest the receipts from sales in new social housing (while recognising the need for some exemptions in small rural areas). There are 7,455 housing association tenants in St Edmundsbury and 828 in Mid Suffolk.

• We will help social housing tenants purchase a home, not just their present property, via transferable discounts and also allowing them to build up a stake in their equity of their home.

• We will reduce Labour's disproportionate and excessive regulation and inspection of housing associations, and make it easier for them to work with private sector developers to build more affordable housing to buy and rent.

David Ruffley concluded:

'Conservatives want the dream of home ownership to come true for more and more people, so that they can benefit from the security and independence which home ownership conveys.'