Chamber and committees

I will try to be concise in looking at some personalisation issues.

You will have seen the evidence that was given by the Dogs Trust. I do not know what thoughts the minister might have had since we took that evidence, but we are looking at how we might flip things round so that it is for the landlord to say whether pets are allowed, rather than for the tenant to apply and go through a tribunal process.

The shift is almost towards a presumption in favour, but taking—

I had a follow-up to that question on eviction about grounds for eviction. The University of Glasgow and Marie Curie’s “Dying in the Margins” research has evidenced people having to move home—on average I think that they pointed towards 27,000 people a year being evicted from their home—due to their experience of dying and also of bereavement, such as through the death of a partner. What better protections in the bill do you think there should be for terminally ill people in Scotland?

We had some additional questions from talking to our expert panels of tenants and landlords—the convener has touched on that. The landlords pointed towards what they saw as unique circumstances in rural areas, specifically with regards to the Government’s island communities impact assessment screening. Is there anything specific within the bill’s proposals that you think is not going to meet the needs of rural and island communities? A lot of our conversations were about how businesses can be encouraged to bring properties forward and where there might be an impact. Rent control has clearly had that effect as well.

Thanks for that. I have a question about the potential to reform housing first, specifically extra supported accommodation and homes, as part of the bill. Several charities that I met with over the summer would like to see that addressed in the bill, specifically in relation to people for whom the housing-first approach does not work and who need a sustainable tenancy with supported living in respect of finance and often medication, too.

In the Social Justice and Social Security Committee, I asked the former cabinet secretary a question about how many people the housing-first approach does not work for and she picked a number of about 3,500 people in Scotland. What could be in the bill to establish a better framework or model to support the development of things such as live-in peer-support housing and other things that we need to see more of? In Edinburgh, for example, we have a waiting list of 50 people with alcohol-related brain damage who are looking to get into accommodation that does not exist. Those people often end up in our homeless sector. Is there a missed opportunity within the bill to do something bespoke around that?

Thank you for that.

To return to the data question, are you aware of any data? In Engender’s written submission, there was a specific question about understanding how women experience eviction. Do councils or the Government hold any data, for example from the housing first programme, on when tenancies fail, or has any data been recorded by councils on families and children in temporary accommodation? Maybe you can also answer on the wider question about how family units experience homelessness.

Provisional licences will be available for new-build properties but not buildings that are undergoing conversion. Why has that approach been taken, rather than including all buildings?

I think that we all agree on the principle, but I want to discuss an issue that has been raised with me and the committee, which is how the guidance can cover student accommodation. For example, there could be a situation in which someone moves into student accommodation not knowing that a fellow student will be in that shared space with their pet tarantula. How should policy be defined to cover such situations? We have spoken about dogs and cats, but other pets will be covered by the policy. Should there be a complaints process for university accommodation, or would that become burdensome for the institutions? The idea of the bill including a defined list of pets has been raised with us, but could that become problematic, given that there are different types of accommodation, including shared accommodation? What are your views on that?

As the bill goes through Parliament, we will have opportunities to open up more, and there is potential for amendments on that, as well.

Earlier, we touched on evidence of the need for a wider scheme of tenant support and enforcement within the private rented sector; the committee has heard about that in evidence from a number of people. Do you share that view, and what, specifically, do you think is missing from the bill on that, which could be included?

We have spoken about a tenants’ charter in the social rented sector, for example. There has been a call for that in relation to the state that properties are in before people actually move in. Does the panel have any views that they want to add on that issue?

Finally, councils have told the committee that the order’s commencement date will not give sufficient time to update policies or administrative and information technology systems, and it has been—quite rightly—suggested that that might lead to possible misinterpretation and the sorts of problems that we have seen across councils, especially here in Edinburgh. What assurances can you offer councils that there will be sufficient time to update systems, given that the order will come into force on the day that it is made?