About 45 per cent of the 17,856 homes sold by Barratt in the year to the end of June were bought with the support of the Help to Buy loan scheme

The debate about who is really benefiting from the taxpayer-funded Help to Buy scheme has been reignited by record profits for Britain’s biggest housebuilder.

Barratt Developments made a £14,053 pre-tax profit per house before the equity loan scheme was introduced in 2013. That has risen to £50,952 per house in the year to the end of June, when about 45 per cent of the 17,856 homes it sold were bought with the support of Help to Buy.

During that period it has increased its volume of annual completions from 13,663 to 17,856. However, its volumes have been close to flat in the past four years as operating margins have improved.

More than 2,000 developers participate in Help to Buy, through which the government offers buyers