Chamber and committees

The Government’s in-principle agreement states:

“Single Building Assessments will help us understand the scope and scale of cladding issues across Scotland.”

I am not sure that we will achieve that if we do not include those buildings. I think that most people would imagine that any building in which people sleep will be part of the review process. I understand that hospitals are public buildings and they will have 24-hour waking watches, if you like, as part of their management, but I think that hotels are a special case.

Where is the Government on that? You talked about discussions with colleagues across the rest of the UK. They are taking this work forward. It would be concerning if Scotland did not include hotels and we were then an outlier because we had not had that work done. Is there potential to review that to make sure that we are not in a very different position compared with the rest of the UK?

Maybe you could keep us updated on that area as well, as we have concerns about it.

The Building Safety Act 2022, which applies in England, has been mentioned a couple of times. You have committed to legislation potentially being brought forward. Is there anything in that act that you believe could be brought in as emergency legislation to move us forward? I asked you how long it could take for this to be resolved and for people in Scotland to have peace of mind. I do not think that anyone wants to commit to that, but, if we are talking about 105 buildings and then a potential 5,000, it could be decades before we can genuinely say—

Yes. Thank you, convener. I have a couple of questions.

Quite a depressing picture is being painted of where we are at in Scotland. It is for the Government to get a grip of the situation.

Why do you think, or are you concerned, that other buildings have not been included in Scotland that have been included in England—for example, hotels, office buildings, hospitals and schools? Obviously, those are not all buildings that people sleep in, but why are we taking a different approach in Scotland to buildings that, clearly, the public would think would be captured?

[Inaudible.]—want to talk about, but that is a significant issue.

Thanks.

Good morning. It was concerning to hear from the first panel the thought that, in recent years, we have seen a lack of political leadership on the matter. I hope that you will try to change that, minister, and ensure that there is progress. As an Edinburgh MSP, I have individual constituents who have had to use freedom of information requests to get any information. I hope that your commitment to communication will move forward at pace, because many people across Scotland feel that they have just been left. They are understandably waiting for developments, but they are not getting any updates. I think that it is important to put that on the record.

Ivan McKee made a couple of points about orphan properties. What is the current number of orphan properties that have been identified among the buildings?

On that point, we heard from the previous panel that the Scottish Government is responsible for the procurement and reporting around SBAs. Would you consider reviewing that such that known developers did that work? Concerns have been highlighted to us in previous meetings that we are asking developers to take someone else’s workings and provide a solution. Is there an opportunity within the agreement to change that to make it easier and increase capacity?

Finally, do you have an assessment of how many orphan buildings we are talking about and what cost might be associated with them?

That is helpful. It is important to understand where liability lies and to take into account companies merging and things like that. Of the 105 buildings, you do not have a linked builder for half. Is that correct?

Okay. I think that the committee would like to be kept up to date on that. There has been a lot of secrecy around this. We understand the situation that home owners are in, and having more public accountability and information is really important.