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England

In England, the May data shows on average, house prices have risen by 0.3% since April 2018.
The annual price rise of 2.9% takes the average property value to £243,583.

The regional data for England indicates that:

• East Midlands experienced the greatest monthly price rise, up by 1.7%
• the North East saw the most significant monthly price fall, down by 0.5%
• London saw the lowest annual price increase, down by 0.4%

Price change by region for England

Region	Average price May 2018	Monthly change % since April 2018
East Midlands	£190,216	1.7
East of England	£288,808	0.2
London	£478,853	0.1
North East	£128,680	-0.5
North West	£157,531	0.1
South East	£322,096	0.0
South West	£251,877	0.1
West Midlands	£192,322	0.2
Yorkshire and the Humber	£158,966	1.0

Repossession sales by volume for England

The lowest number of repossession sales in March 2018 was in the East of England.

The highest number of repossession sales in March 2018 was in the North West.

Repossession sales	March 2018
East Midlands	43
East of England	11
London	50
North East	83
North West	160
South East	66
South West	40
West Midlands	61
Yorkshire and the Humber	78
England	592

Average price by property type for England

Property type	May 2018	May 2017	Difference %
Detached	£370,143	£353,461	4.7
Semi-detached	£227,310	£218,918	3.8
Terraced	£195,982	£190,021	3.1
Flat/maisonette	£225,465	£227,417	-0.9
All	£243,583	£236,727	2.9

Funding and buyer status for England

Transaction type	Average price May 2018	Annual price change % since May 2017	Monthly price change % since April 2018
Cash	£229,187	2.8	0.4
Mortgage	£250,840	3.0	0.3
First-time buyer	£204,140	2.2	0.2
Former owner occupier	£276,751	3.5	0.4

Building status for England

Building status*	Average price March 2018	Annual price change % since March 2017	Monthly price change % since February 2018
New build	£300,538	4.8	-2.3
Existing resold property	£236,750	3.8	-0.3

*Figures for the two most recent months are not being published because there are not enough new build transactions to give a meaningful result.

Sales volumes for England

The most up-to-date HM Land Registry sales figures available for England show:

• the number of completed house sales in March 2018 fell by 21.8% to 58,203 compared with 74,386 in March 2017

Month	Sales 2018	Sales 2017	Difference %
February	54,733	60,662	-9.8
March	58,203	74,386	-21.8

London

London shows, on average, house prices have risen by 0.1% since April 2018. An annual price fall of 0.4% takes the average property value to £478,853.

Average price by property type for London

Property type	May 2018	May 2017	Difference %
Detached	£906,154	£890,430	1.8
Semi-detached	£580,930	£571,569	1.6
Terraced	£495,066	£487,874	1.5
Flat/maisonette	£421,438	£430,111	-2.0
All	£478,853	£480,902	-0.4

Funding and buyer status for London

Transaction type	Average price May 2018	Annual price change % since May 2017	Monthly price change % since April 2018
Cash	£502,988	-0.1	-0.1
Mortgage	£471,466	-0.2	0.1
First-time buyer	£418,735	-1.0	0.1
Former owner occupier	£540,622	0.2	0.1

Building status for London

Building status*	Average price March 2018	Annual price change % since March 2017	Monthly price change % since February 2018
New build	£493,055	0.9	-2.5
Existing resold property	£469,811	-0.9	-0.5

*Figures for the two most recent months are not being published because there are not enough new build transactions to give a meaningful result.

Sales volumes for London

The most up-to-date HM Land Registry sales figures available for London show;

• the number of completed house sales in March 2018 fell by 28.6% to 6,180 compared with 8,659 in March 2017

Month	Sales 2018	Sales 2017	Difference %
February	5,880	7,108	-17.3
March	6,180	8,659	-28.6

Wales

Wales shows, on average, house prices have fallen by 3% since April 2018. An annual price rise of 1% takes the average property value to £148,894.

Average price by property type for Wales

Property type	May 2018	May 2017	Difference %
Detached	£225,804	£221,407	2.0
Semi-detached	£144,379	£141,980	1.7
Terraced	£114,329	£113,598	0.6
Flat/maisonette	£105,580	£109,576	-3.6
All	£148,894	£147,428	1.0

Funding and buyer status for Wales

Transaction type	Average price May 2018	Annual price change % since May 2017	Monthly price change % since March 2018
Cash	£143,896	0.1	-3.6
Mortgage	£151,866	1.5	-2.6
First-time buyer	£128,339	0.6	-3.2
Former owner occupier	£172,940	1.5	-2.7

Building status for Wales

Building status*	Average price March 2018	Annual price change % since March 2017	Monthly price change % since February 2018
New build	£208,824	7.9	0.6
Existing resold property	£151,650	4.6	1.0

*Figures for the two most recent months are not being published because there are not enough new build transactions to give a meaningful result.

Sales volumes for Wales

The most up-to-date HM Land Registry sales figures available for Wales show:

• the number of completed house sales in March 2018 fell by 13.8% to 3,368 compared with 3,909 in March 2017; and
• there were 57 repossession sales in March 2018

Month	Sales 2018	Sales 2017	Difference %
February	3,085	3,225	-4.3
March	3,368	3,909	-13.8

Access the full UK HPI

UK house prices have risen by 3.0% in the year to May 2018, down from 3.5% in the year to April 2018. This is the lowest UK annual rate since August 2013 when it was also 3.0%

The UK Property Transaction Statistics for May 2018 showed that on a seasonally adjusted basis, the number of transactions on residential properties with a value of £40,000 or greater was 99,590. This is 0.5% lower compared to a year ago. Between April and May 2018, transactions increased by 0.8%.

Looking at the regional level, the East Midlands was the fastest growing region with an annual house price growth rate of 6.3%, up from 5.1% in the previous month. London was the slowest growing region, falling by 0.4% in the year to May 2018, down from -0.3% in the previous month. This is the fourth consecutive month that London house prices have fallen over the year.

See the economic statement.

Notes to editors

1. The UK House Price Index (HPI) is published on the second or third Wednesday of each month with Northern Ireland figures updated quarterly. The June 2018 UK HPI will be published at 9.30am on Wednesday 15 August 2018. See calendar of release dates.
2. We have made some changes to improve the accuracy of the UK HPI. We are not publishing average price and percentage change for new builds and existing resold property as done previously because there are not currently enough new build transactions to provide a reliable result. This means that in this month’s UK HPI reports, new builds and existing resold property are reported in line with the sales volumes currently available.
3. The UK HPI revision period has been extended to 13 months, following a review of the revision policy (see calculating the UK HPI section 4.4). This ensures the data used is more comprehensive.
4. Sales volume data is also available by property status (new build and existing property) and funding status (cash and mortgage) in our downloadable data tables. Transactions involving the creation of a new register, such as new builds, are more complex and require more time to process. Read revisions to the UK HPI data.
5. Revision tables have been introduced for England and Wales within the downloadable data. Tables will be available in csv format. See about the UK HPI for more information.
6. Data for the UK HPI is provided by HM Land Registry, Registers of Scotland, Land & Property Services/Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency and the Valuation Office Agency.
7. The UK HPI is calculated by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) andLand & Property Services/Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency. It applies a hedonic regression model that uses the various sources of data on property price, in particular HM Land Registry’s Price Paid Dataset, and attributes to produce estimates of the change in house prices each month. Find out more about the methodology used from the ONS and Northern Ireland Statistics & Research Agency.
8. The UK Property Transaction statistics are taken from HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) monthly estimates of the number of residential and non-residential property transactions in the UK and its constituent countries. The number of property transactions in the UK is highly seasonal, with more activity in the summer months and less in the winter. This regular annual pattern can sometimes mask the underlying movements and trends in the data series so HMRC also presents the UK aggregate transaction figures on a seasonally adjusted basis. Adjustments are made for both the time of year and the construction of the calendar, including corrections for the position of Easter and the number of trading days in a particular month.
9. UK HPI seasonally adjusted series are calculated at regional and national levels only. See data tables.
10. The first estimate for new build average price (April 2016 report) was based on a small sample which can cause volatility. A three-month moving average has been applied to the latest estimate to remove some of this volatility.
11. Work has been taking place since 2014 to develop a single, official HPI that reflects the final transaction price for sales of residential property in the UK. Using the geometric mean, it covers purchases at market value for owner-occupation and buy-to-let, excluding those purchases not at market value (such as re-mortgages), where the ‘price’ represents a valuation.
12. Information on residential property transactions for England and Wales, collected as part of the official registration process, is provided by HM Land Registry for properties that are sold for full market value.
13. The HM Land Registry dataset contains the sale price of the property, the date when the sale was completed, full address details, the type of property (detached, semi-detached, terraced or flat), if it is a newly built property or an established residential building and a variable to indicate if the property has been purchased as a financed transaction (using a mortgage) or as a non-financed transaction (cash purchase).
14. Repossession sales data is based on the number of transactions lodged with HM Land Registry by lenders exercising their power of sale.
15. For England, this is shown as volumes of repossession sales recorded by Government Office Region. For Wales, there is a headline figure for the number of repossession sales recorded in Wales.
16. The data can be downloaded as a .csv file. Repossession sales data prior to April 2016 is not available. Find out more information about repossession sales.
17. Background tables of the raw and cleansed aggregated data, in Excel and CSV formats, are also published monthly although Northern Ireland is on a quarterly basis. They are available for free use and re-use under the Open Government Licence.
18. HM Land Registry’s mission is to guarantee and protect property rights in England and Wales.
19. HM Land Registry is a government department created in 1862. It operates as an executive agency and a trading fund and its running costs are covered by the fees paid by the users of its services. Its ambition is to become the world’s leading land registry for speed, simplicity and an open approach to data.
20. HM Land Registry safeguards land and property ownership worth in excess of £4 trillion, including around £1 trillion of mortgages. The Land Register contains more than 25 million titles showing evidence of ownership for some 85% of the land mass of England and Wales.
21. For further information about HM Land Registry visit www.gov.uk/land-registry.
22. Follow us on Twitter @HMLandRegistry, our blog, LinkedIn and Facebook

Investment consultants advise pension trustees, who oversee companies’ pension schemes, on how to invest their funds. Some pension schemes delegate investment decisions to fiduciary managers.
These firms have influence over half of all UK households’ retirement savings and work with pension scheme assets worth at least £1.6 trillion. Good investment management helps ensure people receive the pension they expect upon retirement.

In September last year the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) launched a market investigation into this sector, at the request of the Financial Conduct Authority, and the CMA’s provisional decision has today been published.

While pension schemes can choose from a range of different firms, the CMA has identified competition problems within both the investment consultancy and – to a greater degree – the fiduciary management markets. Its provisional findings include:

• Around half of pension schemes choose the same provider for fiduciary management that they use for investment consultancy. Their current investment consultant can steer them to do this. This means companies which offer both services have an advantage over other firms, when it comes to getting this business from existing clients.
• A number of pension trustees have low levels of engagement with providers in the sector when choosing their first fiduciary manager. Only a third of trustees ask firms to compete for their business through a tender process, meaning no competitive pressure is put on their existing investment consultant or fiduciary manager to offer the best terms or highest performance.
• Pensions trustees often do not have sufficient information on the fees or quality of these services to be able to judge if they’re getting a good deal from their existing investment consultant or fiduciary manager, or if they could do better elsewhere.

As part of today’s report, the CMA has proposed a number of changes to these markets to deal with its concerns, including:

• Pension trustees selecting their first fiduciary manager must run a competitive tender. Trustees who have already appointed a fiduciary manager without doing this must also put the role out to tender within five years. This would increase competition in the market and reduce the competitive advantage held by the incumbent investment consultant when it comes to getting the new business.
• Fiduciary management firms must provide clearer information on fees and how they have performed for other clients, so that pension trustees have the information they need to make meaningful comparisons between different providers.
• The CMA is also making recommendations for new guidance from the Pensions Regulator, which would provide trustees with more advice on how to choose and scrutinise providers. It is also proposing that the government broadens the Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) regulatory scope, to ensure greater oversight of the industry.

John Wotton, Chair of the CMA’s Investment Consultants Market Investigation, said:

We’re concerned that pension schemes are not currently putting pressure on the market to get the best value for money on behalf of their members. They may lack the information they need to compare competing offers and so could be sticking with their existing investment consultant or fiduciary manager when there are better options available.

This is an extremely important sector that influences how well millions of people’s pension savings are invested, and it’s therefore vital we take steps to make sure that competition is working properly. That’s why we’re proposing a number of important reforms to the sector, including requiring pension trustees to run a competitive tender when they choose a fiduciary manager and ensuring that trustees have much better information about fees and investment performance.

The CMA is inviting feedback on the provisional decision report by 24 August 2018. You can find out how to submit this, as well as further information on the market investigation, here. The statutory deadline for the CMA’s final report is 13 March 2019.

Notes to Editors

1. The CMA is the UK’s primary competition and consumer authority. It is an independent non-ministerial government department with responsibility for carrying out investigations into mergers, markets and the regulated industries and enforcing competition and consumer law. It has functions under the Enterprise Act 2002, as amended by the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013.
2. As set out in the FCA’s terms of reference, the investigation covers investment consultancy services, which provide advice to institutional investors (mainly pension funds) and employers on their pension schemes; and fiduciary management services, where the provider makes and implements decisions for the investor (for example, to select a fund in which to invest).
3. The CMA appointed an independent group of panel members to carry out the investigation and make decisions in this case, which is chaired by John Wotton, one of the CMA’s designated inquiry chairs. The other panel members are Lesley Ainsworth, Bob Spedding and Tim Tutton. All the appointees are chosen from the CMA’s expert independent panel members, who come from a variety of backgrounds, including economics, law, accountancy and business.
4. Enquiries should be directed to the CMA’s press team, press@cma.gov.uk, or 020 3738 6191.
5. For more information see the CMA’s homepage, or follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Sign up to our email alerts to receive updates on the markets cases.

FCO spokesman said:

We note with concern the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government plans to prohibit the continued operation of the Hong Kong National Party. The rights to stand for election, of free speech and of freedom of association are enshrined in the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and the Hong Kong Bill of Rights.

The UK does not support Hong Kong independence, but Hong Kong’s high degree of autonomy, and its rights and freedoms, are central to its way of life, and it is important they are fully respected.

Further information

• Follow the Foreign Office on Twitter @foreignoffice and Facebook
• Follow the Foreign Office on Instagram, YouTube and LinkedIn

The independent Advisory Committee on Business Appointments has today published its annual report for
2017-2018. The report records advice that the Committee gave on outside appointments which were advised on in 2017-2018 by former Ministers and senior Crown servants under the Government’s Business Appointments Rules.

The report shows that the Committee considered 93 applications from former Ministers and 137 applications from former Crown servants during the reporting period.

The report is available here.

All appointments listed in the report are published on the Committee’s website.

Notes to Editors

1. Media enquiries about the work of the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments should go to Maggie O’Boyle on 07880 740627.
2. The Advisory Committee on Business Appointments is a non-Departmental Public Body sponsored by the Cabinet Office. Members are appointed by the Prime Minister.
3. The Committee provides advice on applications from Ministers, Permanent Secretaries (and their equivalents) Directors-General (and their equivalents) for any new paid or unpaid appointment within 2 years of leaving ministerial office or Crown service. Applications from all other levels of Crown servant are handled by their employing departments.
4. Advice given by the Committee on appointments taken up or announced by former Ministers or Crown servants is published on the Committee’s website.
5. More information about the work of the Committee is available on its website.
6. The current members of the Committee are Baroness (Angela) Browning (Chair), Sir Alex Allan, Jonathan Baume, Lord (Michael) German, Terence Jagger, Dr Susan Liautaud, Baroness (Helen) Liddell, Richard Thomas and John Wood.

Taking on feedback from a consultation earlier this year Highways England has adjusted some of the design detail of the planned £1.6bn scheme which will improve journeys on the busy route and create a much-needed bypass for Winterbourne Stoke while preserving the Outstanding Universal Value of the World Heritage Site.

The changes, which seek to further enhance the famous landscape and reconnect the two halves of the 6,500-acre World Heritage site (WHS), include:

• removing the previously proposed link between Byways 11 and 12 in the Stonehenge WHS to avoid affecting the setting of the Normanton Down barrow group and tranquillity of the site in this area
• widening the green bridge proposed near the existing Longbarrow roundabout to improve the physical and visual connection between the northern and southern parts of the WHS
• moving the proposed modification of Rollestone crossroads to provide a more compact layout

Derek Parody, Highways England Project Director for the A303 Stonehenge scheme, said:

We had a great response to our earlier consultation and have acted on the feedback. We now want to get people’s views on our proposed changes to our original consultation.

The further feedback we get will allow us to make sure we have got the best scheme before we make our application later this year to build the scheme.

Meanwhile we continue to work with heritage groups including Historic England, English Heritage, the National Trust, and experts in the field, including the Stonehenge Scientific Committee – a body of leading independent archaeologists – to ensure a new route is built sensitively to the World Heritage site.

Highways England received more than 5,000 responses to consultation on improving the A303 route past Stonehenge, between Amesbury and Berwick Down, which includes a tunnel at least 1.8 miles long, a free-flowing dual carriageway and a much-needed bypass north of Winterbourne Stoke.

Consultation will run from 17 July to 14 August, with two public information events (details available on the consultation page).

During the consultation, Highways England will also clarify its public rights of way proposals accompanying the scheme, which will help people explore and enjoy the World Heritage site and enable them to walk or cycle unobstructed between Amesbury and Winterbourne Stoke.

As part of its £15 billion road strategy – the biggest investment in roads in a generation – the Government is committed to upgrading all remaining single carriageway sections of the A303/A358 between the M3 and M5 to dual carriageway standard.

The A303 at Stonehenge, the A303 between Sparkford and Ilchester, and the A358 between the M5 Taunton and the Southfields Roundabout on the A303 are the first three schemes in that strategy.

The A303 Stonehenge upgrade will deliver major benefits to the World Heritage Site by reuniting the landscape and restoring tranquillity to the setting of one of our most famous cultural icons. At the heart of many of Highways England’s proposed refinements to the scheme is the protection of the WHS and its Outstanding Universal Value.

The scheme will also support a major boost to the South West economy, currently lagging 24% behind the national economy, by providing an effective transport link, and reducing the traffic blight on local communities.

Further details of the proposed changes will be available during the supplementary consultation and in the meantime, anyone wanting further information on the scheme or anyone who wants to respond to the consultation visit the consultation page or the scheme web page, where they can sign up for updates about the scheme.

General enquiries

Members of the public should contact the Highways England customer contact centre on 0300 123 5000.

Media enquiries

Journalists should contact the Highways England press office on 0844 693 1448 and use the menu to speak to the most appropriate press officer.