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Over the past five years, 11 properties have been purchased in Argyll and Bute with support from the open market shared equity scheme. In addition, 80 properties were purchased with support from the first home fund in the last financial year. The Scottish Government currently offers a range of schemes to assist first-time buyers and priority groups to access affordable home ownership. The first-time buyer relief for land and buildings transaction tax means that an estimated eight out of 10 first-time buyers continue to pay no tax at all.

The short answer is yes. The annual review of the open market shared equity scheme threshold prices is under way. We expect to publish new threshold prices by the end of the year, which will reflect the most recent house price data that is available to the Scottish Government. Early indications are that a high number of threshold prices will be increased.

We are keen for more people to access support. The open market shared equity scheme is an affordable housing scheme, and the threshold prices reflect that. That is why we ask applicants who are offered a passport letter to be as flexible as possible about the areas that they will consider and the properties that they will consider purchasing.

Yes, I agree. I am struggling to understand the Home Secretary’s remarks yesterday, which are extremely disappointing. Over the years, we have constantly made that point to the UK Government, but it has fallen on deaf ears. Scotland has more than played its part. Of all authorities in the UK, Glasgow City Council takes the most asylum seekers as part of the dispersal programme. Therefore, the comments that the Home Secretary made are not correct and do a great disservice to local authorities and the efforts that they are making.

Most of all, the comments attempt to use asylum-seeking children, and asylum seekers more generally, as something of a political football, and to attack the Scottish Government. The issue is too important for that. We want to reach a sensible agreement with the UK Government and the Home Office. My plea to them is that they listen not just to what the Scottish Government is saying but to what local authorities are saying. We want to give asylum-seeking children in particular the best support. I ask the UK Government to allow us, please, to provide support in a way that we know will work best for those children.

There have been a number of pressures on temporary accommodation, not least of which has been Covid, which has seen temporary accommodation usage increase, for understandable reasons. We are working with local authorities to address the unsuitable accommodation order issues, as the member is aware.

We want children to be in accommodation that is suitable for children. Perhaps the member’s first port of call should be his colleagues in the UK Government, in order to tell them that we have in Scotland a system that is made for the needs of Scotland in receiving children who need to be supported because they are very vulnerable.

All that we are asking the Home Office is that it allow the Scottish rota to continue. We play our part, and we will take our share of those very vulnerable children, but I ask the Home Office, please, to let us do that in a managed and proper way, rather than in the way that it says it will do it, which in theory could mean children being passed from one local authority to another around Scotland. We do not want that to happen, so I hope that the member will support us in lobbying the Home Office to do the right thing.

First of all, we share COSLA’s and local government’s concern that the national transfer scheme constitutes a new financial responsibility on local authorities, so the first call is on the UK Government to provide the additional funding that is required.

The higher daily rate of £143 for funding contributions to local authorities applies to children who are transferring through the national transfer scheme. That is a small step in acknowledging some of the costs. However, the money is available only once the child is in the care of a local authority, so it does not recognise the steps that a local authority requires to take in advance of providing a placement.

The Scottish Government has already provided half a million pounds to local authorities to help with care of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children who are arriving in Scotland. We will continue to speak with local authorities and COSLA about that. However, as I said, the first call is on the UK Government to step up and meet the full costs.

The issue is of major concern to the Scottish Government, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities and local authorities. In July, the Home Secretary wrote to all local authorities asking for more placements to be made available, and Scotland answered that call by creating a Scottish rota, which is supported by the vast majority of councils and COSLA. The rota has been in operation since October and is working well. It is ensuring that Scotland meets the targets that have been set by the Home Office, and does so in a manner that prioritises the welfare of children, supports their needs and provides them with the best possible chance to integrate into our society.

The proposals that have been set out by the UK Government are a retrograde step that will create needless bureaucracy and will do little to support the welfare and wellbeing of those highly vulnerable children. In a short call with the minister, I made my views known to the UK Government, which I will follow up in writing later today.

I have spoken to COSLA, which is as concerned as I am about the way in which the matter has been badly handled by the UK Government.

I will write to Maggie Chapman on the specific point about the Scottish guardianship service. The third sector more generally has always been important for asylum seekers and refugees. It is through the third sector that they receive most of their support; we are keen to support the third sector in that. Yesterday, in response to the Home Secretary’s comments, some strong voices from the third sector portrayed the Home Secretary as not giving a proper account of the experience of asylum seekers who come to Scotland. The third sector is pretty clear in its views on the matter.

I will write to the member on the specifics of her question.

Paul Sweeney has raised a number of issues. One of the reasons for the rota was the recognition that some Scottish local authorities are very small and do not necessarily have the infrastructure to support unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, which would put at risk the support that such vulnerable children would have. Therefore, there are good reasons for having the rota, which was put together so that children arriving in Scotland go to the most appropriate place.

If the rota had been allowed to continue, 45 out of every 650 children arriving in the UK would have come to Scotland, which is one more than the UK Government is mandating Scotland to take. On my call yesterday, I was told that local authorities would be mandated to take 44 children. Therefore, we would already have been more than meeting the requirement, and doing so in a way that supports the children.

Since October, when participation by Scottish local authorities commenced, 19 placements have been made, which is in addition to the 22 children who arrived under the national transfer scheme between January and September. Furthermore, around 200 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children are already cared for by Scottish local authorities.

The member asked about the type of accommodation that will be used, which is an important issue. The children will be here for a long time, so we want them to become settled and to be put in settled accommodation as quickly as possible. It is in no one’s interests for people to stay in hotels—we recognise the challenges of that. The Scottish rota is so important because it is the best way of ensuring that appropriate accommodation is made available for the children who arrive here.

Naeem, has there been any assessment of that?

Thank you for inviting me to present the draft Relevant Adjustments to Common Parts (Disabled Persons) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2021 for your consideration.

If they are approved, the amended regulations will enable disabled people who live in housing with common areas, such as communal access or gardens, to make relevant adjustments to those areas with the agreement of the majority of owners and within clearly defined timescales for each part of the process. The legislation is the first of its kind in the UK.

On 21 February 2020, legislation came into effect that enabled disabled people to make adaptations to the common areas in a property with the consent of a majority of the owners, rather than the consent of all owners. Since the regulations came into force last year, feedback from stakeholders prompted us to revisit the regulations and amend them to include more structure around timescales for each stage of the process.

The amendment regulations that are presented today have specific timescales for each stage of the process, providing clarity for the owners and the disabled person. It is of primary importance that the regulations provide disabled people with a clear and workable method of securing the agreement of other owners to reasonable adjustments that are being made in common areas. Amending the principal regulations ensures that the legislation is aligned to our original policy intent that the disabled person can carry out adjustments to the common parts of a property in which they have an interest, provided that they make an application to all owners of the common parts and obtain the consent of a majority of those owners.

I am happy to answer questions on the instrument.