Chamber and committees

No external consultants were engaged to identify the spending reductions outlined in the fiscal statement of 3 September 2024. External consultants were engaged in the evaluation of the rail peak fares removal pilot. Their expertise supported the public survey component of the evaluation, informing understanding of the effects of the pilot which informed decision-making over the future of the pilot. This was an important part of the evaluation and would have occurred irrespective of the fiscal statement.

The ambition of Scottish Government is to publish the summary report from the Task & Finish Group sessions along with the agreed recommendations by end September 2024.

These publications will provide an overview of discussions held amongst the Task & Finish Group members and the recommendations for future progress of the Single Building Assessment.

The Housing to 2040 Strategic Board has met three times so far in 2024 - 8 February, 7 June and 22 August. The minutes of the February meeting are published on the Scottish Government website. The minutes of the latter meetings will be published within 12 weeks and once approved by the Housing to 2040 Strategic Board.

A total of £595.862 million has been allocated to the Affordable Housing Supply Programme for 2024-2025 which includes the previously announced additional £40 million. This has not changed following the fiscal statement.

The average time taken to determine applications for major housing applications for Q1 and Q2 of 2023-24 for each local authority can be found at: https://www.gov.scot/publications/planning-applications-statistics-2023-24-quarterly-april-2023-september-2023/documents/.

The planning application statistics for Q3 and Q4 and the annual statistics 2023-24 are due to be published on 1 October 2024. The statistics will be available on the Scottish Government website at: https://www.gov.scot/collections/planning-statistics/.

Details of impact assessments in relation to the measures set out in the Fiscal Statement will be published in the coming weeks on the Scottish Government’s website.

With the passage of the Housing (Cladding Remediation) (Scotland) Act 2024, work is now progressing to have pilot buildings on an SBA pathway. The first step in this work is to complete a pilot cleanse of the 107 developments on the pilot list to ensure they are within the scope of the legislation. This would be conducted by a suitable expert, likely a Fire Engineer to provide assurance the correct buildings are on a pathway.

Scottish Government are aware of 30 Pilot assessments that have been undertaken for of the pilot entries. A pilot assessment includes any assessment carried out prior to the publication of the Single Building Assessment specification on the 21 June 2024. These numbers relate to known pilot assessments only as developers, home owners or other organisations could have commissioned assessments without informing the Scottish Government and therefore the true numbers may be higher and could increase as further information becomes available.

Pilot works to mitigate or remediate risks have started for five of the pilot entries. Works in this context refers to any action taken to address known cladding-related risks, including Urgent Interim Measures.

For those within the scope of the legislation, homeowners and residents will be informed and they will continue on the SBA pathway with the aim of completing a SBA in line with the newly published specification as soon as possible after the commencement of the Act.

There is currently no projected underspend in the 2024-25 Affordable Housing Supply Programme.

Scottish Government officials are progressing the Affordable Housing Supply Programme review with a focus on deliverability. Ministers will consider the outputs, and update Parliament, once the review is complete.

The Scottish Government remains committed to delivering the 110,000 affordable homes target by 2032.