Chamber and committees

Annual New Supply Shared Equity (NSSE) sales are published as part of the attached Affordable Housing Supply Programme Out-turn Reports.

More homes: Affordable Housing Supply Programme - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

The number of NSSE sales with a golden share attached and retained are included in the following table by local authority.

Shona Robison: There is no central source for this information, however some of this information is held by local authorities and the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS).

In November 2019, the Scottish Funding Council published a call for information to Scotland’s Colleges and Universities to seek assurances on fire safety in their respective estates. All Universities and colleges advised they had collated up to date information on the cladding types used on their buildings. All but one of 28 institutions reported satisfaction that all reasonable steps have been taken to ensure that where cladding is present, it is safe. The Scottish Government relayed this information to SFRS.

The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) are the enforcing authority for most non-domestic premises that are covered by Scottish fire safety legislation i.e. Part 3 of the Fire (Scotland) Act 2005, as amended and the Fire Safety (Scotland) Regulations 2006. SFRS have a risk-based audit programme which targets activities and resources at premises which offer the greatest risk to the safety of relevant persons in the event of fire. SFRS enforcement activity is about promoting and enabling sustained compliance with the law. It also ensures that actions are taken to deal promptly with serious risk and that duty-holders who fail in their obligations are held to account. Confidential information on fire safety and to some extent, building construction, is therefore collected and evaluated as part of a SFRS enforcement audit.

Building warrant applications are checked by local authority verifiers for compliance with the building standards (including fire safety as set out in Section 2 of the Technical Handbooks). During construction, a Reasonable Inquiry process allows for assessment of the works in accordance with the approved (compliant) building warrant drawings. Only after a new building’s completion certificate is accepted by the verifier can the building be occupied. Local Authorities keep building standards registers, including building warrant records.

Our records show that 178 properties have been purchased with golden share and 171 properties retain golden share through the Open Market Shared Equity scheme.

The First-tier Tribunal for Scotland (Housing and Property Chamber) features within the Scottish Tribunals Annual Report. In addition to this the Housing and Property Chamber has recently published a statistical report which provides information including; the jurisdictions of the Chamber, the application process, case volumes and outcomes. Both of these reports can be found using the following link:

https://www.housingandpropertychamber.scot/who-we-are/annual-reports

The First-tier Tribunal for Scotland Housing and Property Chamber (Procedure) Regulations 2017 section 26.-(10) requires that a decision of the First-tier Tribunal with a statement of reasons must be published. The Housing and Property Chamber has developed searchable databases of all decisions, from each jurisdiction, which can be found using the following link:

https://www.housingandpropertychamber.scot/apply-tribunal .

In accordance with Section 78 of the Tribunals (Scotland) Act 2014, the President of Tribunals is to prepare an annual report about the operation and business of the Scottish Tribunals. To draft this report, the President of Scottish Tribunals requests that each chamber president within the First-tier Tribunal provides details as to their chamber's business and any important changes or projects within their respective chambers. This information is collated by the Judicial Office for Scotland and then presented to the President of Scottish Tribunals for consideration and approval. S78(3) provides the statutory basis for the information that is to be contained within the report, primarily that the annual report must explain how the Scottish Tribunals have exercised their functions during the financial year, as well as any other information that the President of Scottish Tribunals deems appropriate. The report is approved by the Lord President and sent to the Scottish Ministers in advance of publication.

A copy of this letter will be placed in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (bib number 63213) and published on the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service website.

We have introduced a range of targeted measures to support people experiencing homelessness who are affected by the rising costs of living. We have committed £52.5 million since 2018-19 to support local authorities to implement rapid rehousing approaches, including Housing First. We are allocating £79 million in 2022-23 for Discretionary Housing Payments to support those struggling to meet housing costs.

As part of a wider package of funding to tackle the cost of living crisis, in 2022-23 we have committed a further £10 million to continue our Fuel Insecurity Fund, which has been helping households with energy costs since late 2020.

No-one should go hungry or have to rely on charitable food provision. That is why we published a consultation on a plan to end the need for food banks. We will continue to work with partners to strengthen cash-first responses to hardship to ensure people have sufficient income to meet their needs and reduce the need for food banks. In line with this approach, we provided local authorities with £25 million of flexible funding from our Winter Support Fund to tackle financial insecurity over the winter.

For those experiencing the most acute forms of homelessness, we have provided over £690,000 of funding to support the introduction and operation of rapid rehousing welcome centres in Glasgow and Edinburgh. We have also made over £51,500 of flexible emergency funding available to third sector homelessness organisations for personalised budgets.

The £10 million Tenant Grant Fund, launched last September, is being administered by local authorities who are best placed to target and deliver the funding to vulnerable tenants who are facing potential eviction and homelessness within their local area.

We are aware that local authorities are proactively raising awareness of the Tenant Grant Fund, with many establishing links with local housing advisory services such as Citizens Advice Bureaus and Law Centres. Some local authorities are also raising awareness of the fund directly with private landlords, encouraging them to get in touch if they have a tenant who has fallen into rent arrears as a direct result of the pandemic and requires support.

The Scottish Government also continues to promote the Tenant Grant Fund across social media platforms and we are working with key stakeholders to identify any further opportunities to raise awareness of the fund, particularly amongst private rented tenants.

The Housing to 2040 strategy and the New Deal for Tenants Draft Strategy consultation both encourage professionalism in the housing industry. The consultation particularly seeks views on how to drive up standards in the private rented sector, including around training.

Private sector landlords in Scotland are subject to the same regulatory requirements, irrespective of the number of properties they let.

Most private landlords are required to apply for registration with their local authority under Part 8 of the Antisocial Behaviour etc. (Scotland) Act 2004 . The applicant must provide information to help local authorities assess whether they are a fit and proper person to let houses.

The fit and proper person test is intended to provide a level of assurance that the owner of a let property is a suitable person to let privately rented property. It is a standard that all private landlords are required to uphold throughout the time that they operate as a private landlord.

In addition, where the property in question is a House in Multiple Occupation (HMO), the landlord must apply for a licence. The HMO owner or their agent is subject to the fit and proper person test, and the property is subject to inspection by the local authority and the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service.

Local authorities are responsible for administering Landlord Registration and Houses in Multiple Occupation licensing.

From 1 December 2017, new tenancy agreements for most privately rented properties would be Private Residential Tenancies and tenants will also therefore be afforded the rights and protections flowing from that regulatory framework (as set out in Private Housing (Tenancies) (Scotland) Act 2016).

Our New Deal for Tenant's consultation, which runs until the 15 April, makes clear that all tenants should live in properties where quality and standards are high, and people have clear rights. It also seeks views on our vision for the future regulation of the rental sector - setting out that regulation should seek tenure neutral outcomes for tenants in all sectors, empowers tenants through routes to redress failures and support good standards across the rented sector.

In this Parliament we will review the role of taxation in supporting our Housing to 2040 vision for both new and existing homes and our communities.

Housing to 2040 commits the Scottish Government to developing options for tax reform. As part of that, we will consider how changes to existing local and devolved taxes could help deliver the Housing to 2040 Vision, within the context of our overall approach to taxation.

The Scottish Government do not have a remit in relation to the training and skills of the housing sector workforce, social landlords have a duty to train their staff appropriately and this includes the upcoming delivery of any Housing to 2040 outcomes, and private landlords must meet the legal standards required, but specific professional training is not essential.