GEORGE TOWN, Oct 1 — Penang state executive councillor Jagdeep Singh Deo is hoping the federal government will have a bigger budget next year for the People’s Housing Project (PPR).
The housing, local government and town and country planning committee chairman said it is the government’s responsibility to allocate part of the taxes it collected for public benefit.
“Housing is the basic fundamental rights of the people so the government must continue to build PPR units for the poor who could not afford to buy their own homes,” he said in a press conference here this morning.
He said previously when the federal government was under Barisan Nasional (BN), there were PR1MA housing and PPR units, but that Penang did not get any of the projects.
“Now, we no longer have PR1MA and the ministry has said they will not be building PPR anymore, what will happen to those who can’t buy even low-cost housing? This is a basic need that the government must provide,” he said.
He said the state government has been building low-cost and low-medium-cost housing units for the people all these years.
“The private sector has also been building low-cost and low-medium-cost housing. We are very tired, the private sector is also tired; it is time that the federal government step in to provide housing for the people,” he said.
He said it is one of his wishlist for Budget 2020 from the federal government to set aside a portion of taxes for housing, especially PPR.
He also called on the government to look into the high loan rejection rates especially for first-time home buyers of affordable housing.
”Buyers of the affordable housing units are earning below a certain level of income and the banks have termed them as risky so they could not approve their loans,” he said.
He said this is a catch-22 situation as only applicants earning below RM2,500 can qualify for low cost housing and this was set by the state government but banks refused to release loans to them because of their low income.
“This is why I’m telling Bank Negara to relax its lending rules to first time home buyers of affordable housing, otherwise they will never get to buy their own homes,” he said.
He said the banks have the option of foreclosing on the property if the buyers default in their loan repayments.
“They will get more if they foreclose on and sell the property because property prices have increased,” he said.
He said banks should be giving 100 per cent, even 110 per cent, loans to affordable housing buyers.
“They should be given priority and if they are worried they can’t pay, give them longer tenure loans so that they can pay up over a longer period of time,” he said.
