Under a new proposal unveiled by the Chancellor Gordon Brown, thousands more first-time buyers will be helped on to the property ladder via government-backed, cut-rate mortgages.

The "shared equity" scheme, will allow up to 100,000 people to buy a home, by taking out a mortgage for between half and three-quarters of the price of a property, with the rest of the equity shared between the taxpayer and mortgage lenders. Buyers would then pay rent - capped at 3% - on the proportion of the home they do not own.

Speaking to the BBCs Breakfast with Frost programme, the Chancellor said: "I think over the next parliament, with 100,000 benefiting from the shared equity scheme, we could probably have a million more home owners in Britain as a whole. And basically we are moving on to the next stage of our economic policy.