Chamber and committees

The Innovative Finance Steering Group was established to support the delivery of 110,000 affordable homes by 2032 by providing strategic advice to the Scottish Government on opportunities for innovative finance models to support the affordable housing sector (Registered Social Landlords and Local Authorities) over the next 9 years. The Group convened at the end of 2022 to agree an approach to governance and its work. Members of the Group participate in horizon scanning to identify priority areas for further development and the group is expected to formally convene later in the year to discuss the opportunities highlighted and exchanged to date.

The group consists of members from ALACHO, SFHA, CoSLA, Wheatley Group, Link, Scottish Futures Trust, Scottish National Investment Bank, Glasgow West Scotland Forum, UK Finance and Scottish Government.

The Scottish Government will publish high level updates on the work of the Group on the Scottish Government’s websites as appropriate and recognising the commercial nature of this work.

A breakdown of the unsuccessful applications for the Social Housing Net Zero Heat Fund between August 2020 and May 2023 are given in the following table:

Councils are responsible for developing their licensing policies in line with powers and duties under The Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982 (Licensing of Short-term Lets) Order 2022, as amended in 2023, and they can add proportionate conditions to address local needs and concerns. We continue to work closely with COSLA, SOLAR and licensing authorities on the implementation and monitoring of the short term lets licensing legislation. We are therefore aware that the City of Edinburgh Council has acted on the Judgement made on 8 June 2023 to revise its local licensing policy and information for applicants. We remain confident that licensing of short-term lets can be operated effectively by councils so as to respect the rights of hosts and guests in short-term let accommodation, and is appropriate for the whole of Scotland.

Further to the answer to S6W-20732 on 6 September 2023, grant funding arrangements are expected to be agreed with grant applicants in advance of the conveyancing process.

All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

We already work with registered social landlords and local authorities to agree annual funding allocations to support the purchase of second-hand properties through the Affordable Housing Supply Programme. This streamlined approach is designed to allow these organisations to act upon opportunities as they arise.

UK Finance data, which is only available for the UK as a whole, shows that at the end of Q2 2023 there were 8,980 first-charge buy-to-let loans which were in arrears of more than 2.5% of the outstanding balance, a 28% increase from the previous quarter and a 59% increase from the previous year.

Oversight and regulation of mortgage lenders is a reserved matter; as a result the Scottish Government has no powers or authority to intervene in the operation of the mortgage market.

Tenants living in a property where a lender is seeking repossession due to mortgage arrears are afforded the same rights as any other tenant facing eviction, as the lender is required to go through the same eviction process that applies to private landlords.

Safeguards have been built in to the emergency rent cap measures to balance the rights of landlords and tenants in the context of the costs crisis. Private landlords can apply to Rent Service Scotland to increase the rent for a let property above the rent cap (up to 6%) in connection with defined ‘prescribed property costs.’

In the following table, the number of resignations and retirements within More Homes Division over the requested period is shown, subject to the following restrictions:

1. Where a value relates to fewer than 5 individuals, that value has been suppressed for confidentiality purposes, represented by [c].

2. Resignations only includes those who resigned from the Scottish Government and its agencies, not those who moved internally.

The 81,900 first-charge homeowner mortgages in arrears of 2.5 per cent or more of the outstanding balance at the end of Q2 2023, as reported by UK Finance, represents an increase of 7% from the previous quarter, although it is 3% below the post-covid peak of 84,010 recorded in Q1 2021, and also 33% below the 122,610 recorded in Q2 2014, the earliest figure in this particular time series. UK Finance does not publish a breakdown for Scotland. We continually monitor UK Finance and Financial Conduct Authority data on arrears.

Oversight and regulation of mortgage lenders is a reserved matter, as a result the Scottish Government has no powers or authority to intervene in the operation of the mortgage market. We are doing all that we can with limited powers which is why, both last year and this, we have allocated almost £3 billion to support policies which tackle poverty and to protect people as far as possible during the ongoing cost of living crisis.

Our Cost of Living Support Scotland website provides information on the wide range of advice and support available, and we would also urge people concerned about their finances and mortgage payments to contact their lender as soon as possible.

Our More Homes area teams work closely with partners to deliver the programme. Capital spend capacity is reviewed regularly and can change throughout the year.

The Scottish Government engages with Homes for Scotland on a regular basis through a range of official and ministerial led meetings and fora.

We continue to collaborate with all our partners to achieve our shared goal of delivering more affordable homes for Scotland.