Paul Smee, the director general of the council of Mortgage Lenders (CML), has urged the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to be patient in the aftermath of the Mortgage Market Review (MMR).

The CML’s annual lunch, which took place at the Lancaster Hotel to an audience of 570 mortgage industry professionals last Friday, also saw the Financial Secretary to the Treasury Sajid Javid MP make comments on the industry.

Smee said: “With under a month to go, the industry does not anticipate major problems with the MMR implementation, but there is still a potential for unintended consequences due to the complexity but not due to the inattention of the regulator or industry. We hope the regulator understands the scale of the change and exercise a degree of patience regarding unintended technical breaches in the beginning.

“We welcome the increased activity in the housing market and the success of the Help to Buy shared equity scheme not least because it stimulates what the UK has needed for so long – sustainable house building. But risk management is still core to lender behaviour and the industry will remain diligent in not stroking a housing boom, but instead meet the needs of those that wish to own a home.”