Lunchtime news May 4

The Today programme on Radio 4 and Radio 5 Live both follow up ROOF’s revelations that sub-prime lenders are behind a surge in repossession actions in the courts. The research at Kingston-upon-Thames county court found that repossession actions at the court nearly doubled between 2003 and 2006 . More than half of the people facing repossession had mortgage contracts with sub-prime lenders. For the full story, see Howard Springett’s article in this issue of ROOF.

Writing in the Mirror, Paul Routledge calls on Gordon Brown to build more social housing when he finally his hands on the keys for number 10

The Times traces the Blair’s housing history from a scruffy terrace in Dalston, East London to a £3.65 million mansion in Connaught Square. The paper also reports that, with three successive interest rate rises, house prices should now be on the slide

Thermal images of homes have been taken by a light aircraft fitted with army spy technology to record the heat escaping from people’s houses reports the Times

The Lib Dems have uncovered statistics that reveal there have been nearly 200,000 complaints from service personnel over the past year about the dire state of army accommodation

The Express predicts ’housing misery’ for homeowners if interest rates increase again, plus the usual daily rant about HIPs

Insolvency Service reports there were 30,075 individual insolvencies in England and Wales in the first quarter of 2007 on a seasonally adjusted basis. This was an increase of 23.9 per cent on the same period a year ago