Seòmar agus comataidhean

Colleagues, I hope that you will bear with me as I go through the fairly lengthy and technical list of amendments in this group.

I do not need to quote the Competition and Markets Authority’s conclusion that there was a “significant consumer detriment” in the private management of housing estates in Scotland to illustrate the point that I am attempting to make with my proposals to amend factoring legislation in Scotland. Nor do I need to raise the petitions that have been lodged in the Parliament by frustrated members of the public. I am sure that, in order to understand the situation, members need only look at their inboxes—if they are anything like mine, they will show that members have been contacted by many private housing estate residents who are entirely frustrated and deeply unhappy with their relationship with their factor. We have known for a long time that the balance of power in factoring relationships is skewed in favour of corporate interests. Back in 2011, my colleague Patricia Ferguson introduced a member’s bill, which is now the Property Factors (Scotland) Act 2011, to regulate factors. Fifteen years later, with more than 350 factors on the register and only three ever having been removed for a breach of the code of conduct, it is clear that although the 2011 act was a good start, much still needs to be done to bring more fairness to those relationships.

The Government has agreed that that is the case, and, going back as far as 2013, has been promising a code of conduct for land maintenance companies. The reason why the code has never been produced is not that there are too many legal complications or that the arguments for the code have been found to be wrong; it is, the Government has said, that it has other things to prioritise. Therefore, while constituents and colleagues have been living with these expensive and unfair factoring relationships, the Government has deprioritised work in the area, which is why I lodged my amendments. The factoring system in Scotland is not fair, and we should not wait another 15 years to look at further change. Through the Housing (Scotland) Bill, I have therefore proposed a number of substantive changes to the 2011 act, which, along with changes that my colleagues propose in their amendments, would rebalance the power in the relationship towards home owners.

I appreciate the work that you have done, convener, to ensure that home owners will be able to remove factors more easily, and I intend to support your amendments in this group if you move them. I also support the Government’s amendments in this area, and I acknowledge its attempt to make removal of a factor from the register easier.

I ask colleagues to support the amendments in the group that have been lodged by Sarah Boyack and Pam Duncan-Glancy, which will allow home owners to take a group action against factors to the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland housing and property chamber in order to stand in solidarity with one other against corporate interests. That will also allow local authorities to adopt amenities on public housing estates. I have included an alternative to that approach, which would make adoption by local authorities mandatory, as was recommended by the CMA.

My amendments in this area all deal with increasing transparency and power for home owners. I would require all factors to publish their written statement of services with the home owners they are acting on behalf of. I would also require them to publish information about how much the services that they provide cost, and how much they have charged for services that they have carried out in previous years. I am also asking factors to let home owners know if they intend to sell their contract of services to another company. To me, it seems like a fairly base-level requirement of any contract of service that you are able to see what you have signed up for, what you are being charged for, who you have a contract with and what the services cost.

As the amendments are about rebalancing power away from the factor towards the home owner, I have also lodged amendments that provide more enforcement powers for the First-tier Tribunal against factors that have been found to be in contravention of the code of conduct. My amendments would allow the tribunal itself to remove factors from the register and to provide home owners with monetary compensation for the bad service that they have received.

I have set in place mechanisms for gathering data on the performance of factors, which, apart from anecdotal information from home owners across Scotland who have contacted me with their stories, is currently extremely scarce. It is important that there should be a record of the performance of factors, not least in order for ministers to carry out a proper review of factoring legislation, which is clearly overdue for reform.

I have listened to my constituents and to the many home owners who have been in touch with me to set out their issues with factoring in Scotland. I know that the law needs changed and that the regulation of factors needs to be tightened up to ensure that home owners in Scotland get a fairer deal.

Through amendment 415, my colleague Sarah Boyack highlights the fact that the Property Factors (Scotland) Act 2011 is now almost 15 years old. It has become clear that there is still an imbalance of power between factors and the home owners on whose behalf they work. Citizens across Scotland have worked hard to bring factors to account, and they face odds that are stacked against them. One way of evening the odds is to make a slight change to the legislation to allow home owners to bring, as a group, rather than individually, complaints against factors that are suspected of breaches of the code of conduct. It is common knowledge that people become more powerful against corporate interests when they are enabled to work together, supporting one another. Amendment 415 allows groups of home owners to stand together and take collective action against the corporate interests that may well be balanced against them. It is meant to be part of a package of measures set out in the bill, updating the 2011 act and ensuring that factors’ interests are strictly regulated while home owners’ rights are protected where relationships go wrong.

I am aware of the length of time that it has taken for the Government to take action to bring forward changes to factoring legislation, following a petition that was lodged a few years ago. Ms Boyack acknowledges the Government’s assurance that action will be taken to strengthen the legislation, but she points out that those assurances have been heard repeatedly and we are still waiting for action. Ms Boyack fully intends to work in good faith with the Government to ensure that legally competent change can take place, but she asks colleagues to give due consideration to the length of time that we have already waited for change to happen.

My colleague Pam Duncan-Glancy lodged amendment 476 because it is important to be able to hold existing property factors to account. It is also vital that, when a factor has pulled out or been dismissed and a suitable alternative cannot be found, residents should not be left in limbo. It can be difficult to source an alternative property factor in Glasgow because fewer factoring companies operate in some areas, especially when older tenement buildings or smaller developments are involved.

What is more, when an alternative property factor is available, because there is little competition, some factors may increase prices due to having a monopoly. There is no legal cap on how much money a property factor can charge although, under Scottish property law, they must justify their cost as reasonable.

Amendment 476 would amend the Title Conditions (Scotland) Act 2003 to obligate local authorities to take responsibility for land when a factor has pulled out or been dismissed and a suitable alternative cannot be found. The amendment stipulates that a local authority would be able to charge a “reasonable” fee, which could be set out in regulations by the Scottish ministers. The amendment would ensure that home owners are not left in limbo without a factor and that they would not be subjected to extortionate prices through no fault of their own.

The entire suite of amendments in the property factors grouping speak to home owners’ difficulties in being able to challenge service, costs and competition in relation to the provision of grounds maintenance and other issues that exist in common areas around their properties. I have supported groups of residents who have had to jump through a myriad of legal hoops to kick out an underperforming factor and find a replacement, either from their local authority or another alternative.

It is long overdue that we look at this area of law and make it easier for home owners to take control over the common areas that they are responsible for through their title deeds, and to challenge the factors that, in some cases, provide a substandard service.

I move amendment 507.

Amendments 270 and 277 would, together, require the Scottish ministers to define what “a housing emergency” is by regulations to be published and laid before Parliament within six months of the bill being enacted. The regulations must also define what

“evidence of exit from a housing emergency”

would be, and they would require the Scottish ministers to report to Parliament every six months, from the date on which a housing emergency begins, on the progress of the strategy to end the housing emergency.

A couple of weeks ago, the First Minister helpfully pointed out that I spend my life talking about the housing emergency. He used the word “moan” at the time, but I think that he was having an off day, so I forgive him for that.

Before May 2024, I urged the Government to take notice of the uncomfortable fact that something was going badly wrong with homes in Scotland and that it was leaving thousands of our fellow Scots in need of a permanent safe, warm home. When the Government finally acknowledged that by agreeing to declare a housing emergency, I—along with organisations in the housing sector—asked it to give the term “housing emergency” meaning by taking decisive action to end that emergency.

I cannot help but wonder whether, if I and others had not pushed on the issue, we would still be waiting for the Government to acknowledge that there is a problem. Nothing in its statements or actions has convinced me that it thinks that emergency action is needed to increase the supply of homes in Scotland.

The bill is a case in point. We are dealing with 40-plus pages of provisions and upwards of 650 amendments, including more than 100 from the Government itself. The bill is being scrutinised by two committees; I do not know how many stage 2 meetings there have been across those two separate committees. There has been a Government minister, and there is now a cabinet secretary, to guide it through. However, there is nothing at all from the Government in the bill that will make one more house available to the 700,000 people who are in housing need.

The amendments in this group are the only ones in the entire bill process that even start to acknowledge that we need more houses. I will not rehearse the arguments on whether the Government is taking meaningful action to end the housing emergency in Scotland; that is not the purpose of these amendments. The purpose is to ensure that no future MSP or Parliament has to force the Government to acknowledge and take responsibility for the human catastrophe that is reflected in 40,000 homelessness applications being made in Scotland in a single year.

A housing emergency should not be dictated by political expediency and then quietly forgotten after the news cycle has moved on. The Government has a moral imperative—as does any Government—to end the emergency before more children wake up in houses that are not safe, warm or dry and that are, fundamentally, not their home.

I ask the committee to put that responsibility in the bill and to push the Government to state what it means when it talks about a housing emergency. If we ever find ourselves in the same untenable situation again, I want to force any future Government to make clear, and be measured against, the actions that it will take to end the housing emergency.

I appreciate the cabinet secretary’s comments that the timescale might be restrictive, but residents who have been experiencing unsatisfactory factors have had a Government commitment previously. There have not been any updates to the voluntary code or legislation since 2013. How long should we expect that work to take before recommendations are seen and felt by residents?

We have heard clearly from the cabinet secretary and other members that this is a common problem across Scotland. As the convener said, a quarter of properties across Scotland have some kind of factoring arrangement. The difficulty that has arisen is that, where home owners are not getting the level of service that they expect—where they are paying for an entirely substandard service—the customer service is deplorable to the point that, in response to complaints, home owners are either stonewalled and met with silence or factoring companies, acknowledging the power imbalance, just say, “Well, there’s nothing you can do about it”. That is a direct quotation that constituents with a bad experience of factoring arrangements have heard from poorly performing factoring companies, which know that, in legal terms, it is so hard for residents to remove a factor that they just do not care. It cannot be fair that a factoring company can give up a contract and have an alternative factor appointed with no consultation or even awareness on the part of residents who pay for it.

Pam Duncan-Glancy raised an example in Cambuslang, where the first time that residents found out that a new factoring company had been appointed to maintain the common areas was when they received their first bill from that company. It cannot be fair that the factoring companies can be changed with no limit, but residents need to get together, hold a public meeting, and get agreement through a vote of more than 50 per cent of residents before a factor sits up and take notice.

I do not intend to press amendment 507 at this point, but I plan to bring a suite of amendments at stage 3. I hope that the Government has heard loud and clear from members around the table the real desire for change to factoring arrangements. The status quo is simply not an option. Residents have waited for a long time for change from the Government, but it has not been forthcoming. I therefore hope to work with the Government between stages 2 and 3 to give residents a more solid list of the changes that we would like to see to support them.

I seek the committee’s agreement to withdraw amendment 507.

Amendment 507, by agreement, withdrawn.

Amendment 387 moved—[Shirley-Anne Somerville]—and agreed to.

Amendment 508 not moved.

Amendments 388 to 392 moved—[Shirley-Anne Somerville]—and agreed to.

Amendments 509 to 512, 415, 513, 504 to 506, 514 and 476 not moved.

Section 51 agreed to.

After section 51

Amendments 456 and 423 work together to make a small practical change to how RSLs are required to give notice of rent increases to tenants. If agreed to, the amendments would allow notices to be delivered by normal post as well as by hand, email or tracked mail. Currently, associations are obligated to use tracked mail, email or hand delivery in order to meet the existing legal requirements under the Housing (Scotland) Act 2001. Housing associations agree that hand delivery of notices is unnecessarily resource intensive and wasteful, that email delivery does not offer a guarantee that all tenants would receive a notice, and that tracked mail is too expensive.

In Scotland, existing legislation sets out that documents can be delivered only in one of three ways: personal delivery, delivered through a method of post that can be recorded, or delivery by agreed electronic transmission. However, the general law can be overruled by the specific terms of a statute, so I am confident that my amendments are legally competent. My amendments would allow landlords to deliver notices by different delivery methods, as they state that standard post can be used without any legal implications, which would lessen the burden on RSLs to comply with housing legislation and would allow them more time to support tenants in other ways and deliver a strong supply of housing in Scotland.

Amendments 457 and 457A would ensure that, when their current accommodation does not meet families’ needs, social landlords cannot prevent them from moving to more suitable accommodation because they have outstanding house arrears and housing-related debts. The amendments do not prevent debt recovery action. In many cases, people who are on low incomes and in unsuitable accommodation can be trapped in a cycle of debt. If they are in social housing, the opportunity to move to more suitable accommodation can be denied by the organisation if they have built up arrears. That can leave families trapped in debt and in housing that is either too big, not safe or overcrowded.

Unaffordable, overcrowded and substandard housing conditions have an adverse impact on people’s ability to cope, physically and mentally, and on wider family wellbeing, and that can exacerbate the cycle of debt. Urgent and compassionate reforms to public debt management and recovery, including rent and housing arrears, are required to tackle child poverty, support families, uphold children’s rights and ensure that every child and family has the opportunity to thrive. We need to promote compassionate and supportive debt management approaches. It is imperative that public bodies and housing associations develop debt recovery policies that recognise the impact of domestic and economic abuse to prevent victims/survivors from being pursued for debt coerced in their name as a result of abuse.

My amendments will work to prevent families from being denied more suitable accommodation as a result of built-up arrears. They will create greater protections for families that are affected by domestic abuse and ensure greater consistency with statutory human rights, children’s rights duties, and equally safe commitments for protecting women and children from the impact of violence and abuse.

I accept that local authorities should be able to pursue arrears, but I do not believe that that is best done by preventing families from accessing more suitable accommodation when it becomes available.

Amendments 456 and 423 work together to make a small practical change to how RSLs are required to give notice of rent increases to tenants. If agreed to, the amendments would allow notices to be delivered by normal post as well as by hand, email or tracked mail. Currently, associations are obligated to use tracked mail, email or hand delivery in order to meet the existing legal requirements under the Housing (Scotland) Act 2001. Housing associations agree that hand delivery of notices is unnecessarily resource intensive and wasteful, that email delivery does not offer a guarantee that all tenants would receive a notice, and that tracked mail is too expensive.

In Scotland, existing legislation sets out that documents can be delivered only in one of three ways: personal delivery, delivered through a method of post that can be recorded, or delivery by agreed electronic transmission. However, the general law can be overruled by the specific terms of a statute, so I am confident that my amendments are legally competent. My amendments would allow landlords to deliver notices by different delivery methods, as they state that standard post can be used without any legal implications, which would lessen the burden on RSLs to comply with housing legislation and would allow them more time to support tenants in other ways and deliver a strong supply of housing in Scotland.

Amendments 457 and 457A would ensure that, when their current accommodation does not meet families’ needs, social landlords cannot prevent them from moving to more suitable accommodation because they have outstanding house arrears and housing-related debts. The amendments do not prevent debt recovery action. In many cases, people who are on low incomes and in unsuitable accommodation can be trapped in a cycle of debt. If they are in social housing, the opportunity to move to more suitable accommodation can be denied by the organisation if they have built up arrears. That can leave families trapped in debt and in housing that is either too big, not safe or overcrowded.

Unaffordable, overcrowded and substandard housing conditions have an adverse impact on people’s ability to cope, physically and mentally, and on wider family wellbeing, and that can exacerbate the cycle of debt. Urgent and compassionate reforms to public debt management and recovery, including rent and housing arrears, are required to tackle child poverty, support families, uphold children’s rights and ensure that every child and family has the opportunity to thrive. We need to promote compassionate and supportive debt management approaches. It is imperative that public bodies and housing associations develop debt recovery policies that recognise the impact of domestic and economic abuse to prevent victims/survivors from being pursued for debt coerced in their name as a result of abuse.

My amendments will work to prevent families from being denied more suitable accommodation as a result of built-up arrears. They will create greater protections for families that are affected by domestic abuse and ensure greater consistency with statutory human rights, children’s rights duties, and equally safe commitments for protecting women and children from the impact of violence and abuse.

I accept that local authorities should be able to pursue arrears, but I do not believe that that is best done by preventing families from accessing more suitable accommodation when it becomes available.

Amendment 417 addresses a gap in the current landlord registration framework under the Antisocial Behaviour etc (Scotland) Act 2004. As it stands, the act requires registration of those who own and lease residential property, but it does not clearly capture those who rent a property and sublet it to others. The amendment clarifies that individuals who rent or sublease properties—who, in practice, are landlords—must also register. The amendment would ensure that intermediate landlords could no longer operate outside the regulatory regime, thereby avoiding scrutiny, safety checks and compliance obligations.

That is particularly relevant in cases of rent-to-rent schemes, in which someone rents a flat and then re-lets it to others at a profit, without the necessary oversight. Tenants in such arrangements are especially vulnerable. Amendment 417 would strengthen tenant protections, close a legal grey area and ensure consistency and accountability across all rental arrangements.

Amendment 418 seeks to improve the transparency of the landlord register by requiring the inclusion of key property information. Specifically, it would ensure that the register included the rent charged, the size of the property—including the number of bedrooms and floor levels and the floor area—the maximum number of occupants and, where relevant, the current number of occupants for each property.

That would be a crucial step forward, because it would give local authorities a clear picture of what the private rented sector looked like in their area and would enable better enforcement of overcrowding provisions, rent controls and property standards. It would also enhance the value of the landlord register to tenants, who should have the right to know basic details about the homes that they are considering, especially rent levels and occupancy conditions. Amendment 418 would modernise the register and ensure that it reflected the real conditions of the housing market.

Amendment 419 proposes to reduce the duration of a landlord’s registration under the Antisocial Behaviour etc (Scotland) Act 2004 from three years to one year. The current three-year cycle allows too much time to pass before registration is reviewed, during which time property standards may deteriorate, landlord circumstances may change or breaches may occur without any follow-up. A yearly cycle would strengthen transparency, keep records current and support better enforcement by local authorities.

Amendment 419 would ensure that information relating to monthly rent was kept up to date and would bring that information into line with the frequency with which landlords outwith rent control areas are currently able to increase monthly rents for private rented tenancies. The amendment is not about increasing bureaucracy; it is about raising standards and closing gaps that allow neglect or non-compliance to persist unchecked for a number of years.

Amendment 420 seeks to impose a new duty on the Scottish ministers to collate and publish rent data drawn from local authority landlord registers. It would require the Scottish ministers to prepare and publish statistics that would be based on the information collated on rent levels in the register, and to break it down by local authority area. That would be a vital step towards transparency and accountability in the housing market, and it would allow local authorities to use the information from an area to consider whether a rent control zone was necessary.

Amendment 421 would introduce a new duty on the Scottish ministers to promote the use of the landlord register to support tenants. It would require the Government to take steps to raise awareness of the register and to ensure that it was actively used to help tenants to understand their rights, to verify landlord registration and to seek redress where necessary. The Scottish Government should use the data gathered in the Scottish landlord register to encourage and support local authorities to communicate with private tenants on their rights via their details as recorded in the register. The amendment would place an obligation on the Scottish Government to ensure that tenants had information about their rights and responsibilities as tenants of rented properties in Scotland.

Amendment 455, which seeks to amend part 8 of the 2004 act, would ensure that the landlord register was accessible and searchable, and it would place obligations on the Scottish Government to enable that. It would require there to be a central, searchable interface, which would make it easier for tenants to access information. In placing that obligation on the Scottish ministers, the amendment would provide consistency and would ensure that local authorities did not face additional expenses. It would support transparency and empower tenants to verify the legitimacy of the landlord or letting agent before signing a lease.

Amendment 488 seeks to improve the landlord registration system significantly, by requiring those who register to provide detailed standardised information about the properties that they let, including information on property classification, number of rooms, heating systems, energy performance certificate—EPC—ratings, past repairs, safety features, accessibility adaptations and known hazards, such as damp or flooding. It also covers compliance with legal standards, such as the repairing standard and electrical installation condition report—EICR—certification, along with clarity on shared spaces and insurance cover.

Amendment 488 would turn the landlord register into a genuinely useful resource for tenants. It would allow councils to make informed choices, it would target enforcement, and it would help national policy makers to address housing quality and climate goals. The data in question would not be burdensome to collect—we are talking about information that responsible landlords already have. The information that would be collected would form part of the information to be shown as part of a home report for any prospective buyer. The proposal supports transparency and balances the need to provide genuinely useful information with the need not to overburden landlords.

Taken as a package, all the amendments in the group speak to what I see as a significant failing of the landlord register as it stands. They provide a real opportunity to amend and update the information that we collect and to gather the data that the committee has spoken about, and has said that we would require, almost every year of the session.

I look forward to hearing the Government’s response to my proposals and—regardless of whether it supports the amendments—hearing about how we can ensure that the landlord register collects the crucial information that we, as legislators, and the Government need in order to make policy decisions and to support tenants to make informed choices about the tenancy agreements that they enter.

I move amendment 417.

On the point about cost recovery, is the level of fees in the new system designed to cover full cost recovery?

Did the initial consultation not make it explicit that it would not be aiming to achieve full cost recovery?

I appreciate the point about the public finance manual and public finances in general. However, do you accept that, if you consult on the principle that you are not seeking full cost recovery and then lay regulations that, as you have just said, seek full cost recovery, there is a disparity? There is clearly an issue with the consultation and how the Government has set out the principles of what it intends to do.