After a week in office, the new coalition government today announced that the requirement for home sellers to provide home information packs will be suspended pending primary legislation to abolish them entirely.

The suspension of the controversial sellers packs will take effect from midnight on Friday 21 May 2010.

Sellers will still be required to commission an energy performance certificate before marketing their property.

The move follows election manifesto commitments from both the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties to scrap the packs.

Communities secretary Eric Pickles said he had taken the action swiftly to avoid any uncertainty and prevent a slump in the already fragile housing market.

He said: ‘The expensive and unnecessary HIP has increased the cost and hassle of selling homes and is stifling a fragile housing market.

‘HIPs are history. This action will encourage sellers back into the market and help the market and the economy recover.’

Housing minister Grant Shapps said: ‘This is a great example of how this new government is getting straight down to work by cutting away pointless red tape that is strangling the market.’

He said there would be no substitute packs to replace HIPs when they are ultimately abolished by legislation later in the year, but there will be nothing in the legislation to prevent people from marketing other products like exchange-ready packs. The market would decide whether the public thought they were needed, he said.