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Are we all content with those suggestions?

Members indicated agreement.

You would be ripping the sod, to extend your current penchant for ripping into things. Out of interest, Mr Ewing, in your experience, is peat traditionally extracted from the crofters’ own land? Where do crofters take the peat from for domestic use?

Are members content with the suggestions that have been made?

Members indicated agreement.

PE1946, which was lodged by Sean Clerkin, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to use general taxation to pay for all charges for homeless temporary accommodation, including writing off the £33.3 million debt that is owed by homeless people for temporary accommodation to local authorities.

Since our previous consideration of the petition, the Scottish Government’s temporary accommodation task and finish group published its report on 30 March this year. The group made two recommendations about charges for temporary accommodation, and those are available in the clerk’s note. In response to our recent correspondence, the Scottish Government stated that

“provisions to prohibit local authorities from charging individuals for the provision of temporary accommodation have not been considered for inclusion”

in the housing bill, and that it has

“no plans to pay for homeless temporary accommodation nor waive the outstanding debt owed”.

Shelter Scotland’s written submission outlines a number of issues, including its view that a change in the financing of temporary accommodation is overdue. The petitioner’s recent submissions highlight concerns about the repossession of family homes resulting in record amounts of homelessness in Scotland, and his submission outlines information that has been received through a freedom of information request to Glasgow City Council. He states that the system is “unworkable and broken now” and that means that thousands of people need help immediately.

I invite colleagues to suggest any way in which we might proceed.

I am slightly unsure what to do. The Scottish Government said it was open to representations, but it is not our responsibility to make those. We could ask the Scottish Government what it thinks of all this in practice, but that is not really taking forward matters, so I am uncertain. I have to say that, on this occasion, I am minded to close the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders, but I am open to other suggestions.

Yes. It is not that I do not see an issue at the heart of the petition but that I am uncertain as to what productive opportunity there is for the committee to take forward the petition. Therefore, we are reluctantly minded, on this occasion, to close the petition. Are we agreed?

Members indicated agreement.

Okay. Do we agree to write to the organisations that Mr Stewart and Mr Ewing have identified?

Members indicated agreement.

PE2004, which was lodged by Line Kikkenborg Christensen on behalf of Jubilee Scotland, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to abolish the use of public-private partnerships—PPPs, as they are affectionately known—and to commit to a new model of financing and managing public infrastructure in Scotland that has safety, quality, value for money and accountability to the taxpayer at its heart. The petitioner argues that public-private partnerships have left Scotland’s public sector with high levels of debt, poor service provision, lack of accountability and unsafe buildings.

In responding to the petition, the Scottish Government acknowledges that the use of private finance for infrastructure projects is more expensive than conventional public borrowing, and it shares concerns about the flexibility and value for money that historical private finance initiative contracts have offered.

The Scottish Government has stated that, as part of its national infrastructure mission commitment, a new approach to revenue finance, which includes the mutual investment model, has been announced. That follows a decision in 2019 to stop using the non-profit distributing model that was originally adopted in 2010. The Government highlights its view that current borrowing powers are limited and insufficient to deliver the ambitions of the national infrastructure mission, but adds that, should additional powers become available, it will examine all options to ensure that the lowest-cost financing route is utilised.

We have also received a submission from the petitioner offering comment on the Scottish Government’s response, with reference to Audit Scotland’s 2020 report “Privately financed infrastructure investment: The Non-Profit Distributing (NPD) and hub models”. The petitioner calls on the Scottish Government to act on Audit Scotland’s recommendations and to rethink the way in which infrastructure is managed and financed in Scotland.

That is all quite technical but nonetheless important and of considerable financial consequence. Do colleagues have any comments or suggestions on how we might proceed?

I am happy to agree with that.

I wonder, too, whether there are any bodies that are representative of home owners rather than factors. When the Scottish Government says that the current regulations require factors to provide home owners with clear information on the dismissal process, I would like to know whether there is anybody who can illustrate that that actually happens. That sounds like one of those vague provisions that I suspect exists in writing but not in practice. That is just from my experience.