UK mortgages: trial to rule on deals that left people with huge debts

Bank of Scotland, which became part of Lloyds Banking Group in 2009, sold the mortgages at the centre of the case. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod/The Guardian

It was one of a list of “millennium products” lauded by the then prime minister, Tony Blair, as an example of “the very best of British innovation, creativity and design”.

But, almost 25 years later, the shared appreciation mortgage (Sam) is effectively going on trial at the high court, accused of ruining lives and leaving some people owing 10 or 12 times the sum they originally borrowed.