Chamber and committees

Residents and community councils are voicing their concerns over plans for battery energy storage systems, due to emergency crews not having the right equipment to deal with potential fires. I recently met a developer regarding that matter and I have raised issues over fire safety. A lot of those developments are in close proximity to residential areas, leaving many communities, including those in my region, very concerned.

To reassure residents and communities, there needs to be clear guidance on fire safety to improve the policy and procedures of battery energy storage systems. The guidance is dated, so will the minister commit to looking at existing legislation and guidance to improve fire safety standards for those particular types of energy storage development?

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions the net zero secretary has had with ministerial colleagues regarding mitigating fire risk from battery energy storage systems, in light of the role that battery storage can play in the future energy mix of Scotland. (S6O-03993)

We want to ensure that the empty homes service in councils can thrive. Is the minister worried that, if local government is not given a good payment settlement, more services could be disrupted, which could disrupt the number of empty homes that we are trying to bring back into use?

I begin by congratulating Gordon MacDonald on securing this debate on the Scottish Empty Homes Partnership.

There are tens of thousands of abandoned homes across Scotland, and bringing empty homes back into use is essential to tackling our housing emergency. That is why, like all members, I applaud the success of the Scottish Empty Homes Partnership in bringing almost 11,000 long-term empty properties back into use since its establishment in 2010. That is potentially 11,000 families or single persons rehomed, thanks to the hard work and efforts of Shelter Scotland, local authorities and—credit where it is due—the Scottish Government.

Bringing empty homes back into use is not only good for people living in the area; it is good for local economies. In rural communities, it helps to address issues such as depopulation. However, we will not tackle the housing emergency without investment. As I will go on to explain, there are other policies that we need to consider to ensure that we are tackling the housing emergency.

It would be right to point out that the empty homes scheme is not so straightforward, as Gordon MacDonald mentioned in his opening speech. There are local authorities that do not have an EHO in their own services for the public—an officer who would help to bring more empty homes out of the state that they are in and into use. Moray Council, for example, had to take a difficult decision to cut its empty homes service, due to budget pressures. That re-emphasises the need to support local government and ensure that the Government funds local government properly. Otherwise, these vital services will need to be scaled back and we will therefore not tackle the housing emergency.

It will be interesting to note how council budgets this year balance the need to grow the housing supply with juggling the millions of pounds-worth of cuts that could be administered by the Government. That is especially relevant as the Government has introduced its Housing (Scotland) Bill, which will add a £5.5 million burden on to overstretched councils.

The motion perhaps looks at the housing situation in Scotland through rose-tinted glasses. When we scrape beneath the surface and take out all the spin, we find that the Scottish Government’s target of achieving 110,000 affordable homes by 2032 is, at this stage, unachievable at best. At present, only about 22,800 homes have been completed. If we do the maths, we find that, even if the Government manages to speed up house building without driving away investment due to its intention to bring in rent controls, it will not reach its own target until 2035. If we combine that with the recent cuts to the housing budget, it is easy for us to understand why the Scottish Government is struggling to fulfil its own targets.

I am not the only one to have highlighted the issue of unachievable targets in the house-building strategy that is in place. Shelter has commented on the matter, as have other sector bodies.

I again raise the issue of the Housing (Scotland) Bill. Although the bill has “Housing” in its title, it does not build one single home. Instead, the rent controls aspect will drive away investment—roughly £3.2 billion of developer investment so far.

Having declared a housing emergency, the Scottish Government must now back its words with significant actions. Although we of course welcome the success of the Scottish Empty Homes Partnership in managing to bring so many properties back into use, we need to deliver more affordable homes, and we need to tackle the housing and homelessness emergency in Scotland.

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions its ministers have had with their United Kingdom Government counterparts regarding the changes made to agricultural property relief on inheritance tax. (S6O-03970)

Homes for Scotland has warned that the SNP’s proposed changes to housing legislation will increase the cost of a new home by £30,000 through changes to rent controls. Previous changes to the rent cap stalled £3.2 billion-worth of housing development. Reckless rent controls are not just driving away investment; they are harming our economy. With the SNP miles off from meeting its 110,000 affordable homes target, why is the Government failing to tackle the housing emergency, and why is the Parliament considering a housing bill that does not build a single home?

Last night, the Parliament sent a clear message to the Labour Government by backing a Scottish Conservative motion calling for the family farm tax to be scrapped. I congratulate my colleague Tim Eagle on his efforts in that regard.

Rather than having any sympathy with our farmers, especially those who are recovering from cancer, Labour’s response has been to tell farmers to get their affairs in order. With the majority of the Scottish Parliament against the new tax, in his next meeting with his Labour counterparts, will the minister use his authority to demand that the family farm tax simply has to go?

Will the minister take an intervention?

The Housing (Scotland) Bill was a golden opportunity to address Scotland’s housing emergency, yet the bill that the Government introduced does not even mention the building of homes. There is a severe lack of spades in the ground at a time when communities right across the country are in desperate need of new housing developments.

The Scottish National Party promised that it would deliver 110,000 affordable homes by 2032, but it is miles off meeting its target. Its anti-house-building agenda has undoubtedly caused the market to stagnate. The SNP has exacerbated the problem through rent controls and by cutting £200 million from the housing budget. It is no wonder that half of Scotland’s population now lives in a local authority area that has declared a housing emergency, including the Minister for Housing’s backyard.

We are in the midst of a deepening housing crisis. More than 15,000 children are homeless; the number of applications from households that are assessed as homeless is at its highest level since 2012; hundreds of thousands of people are stranded on local authority waiting lists; and more than 10,000 children are in temporary accommodation.

The solution to the housing emergency is to build more mixed-tenure homes, but we have a bill that is fundamentally flawed. Parliament is due to debate the bill at stage 1 by the end of November, but given the serious concerns that stakeholders and developers have raised, we are calling for the bill to be rewritten. We do not take that decision lightly, as there are sections of the bill that we support in principle—those around homelessness prevention and the duty to act. However, given the issues that I have just outlined and the number of people, especially children, who are without a safe and secure home, why did the SNP not introduce a stand-alone bill on homelessness? That would have shown that the SNP is serious about ending homelessness for good, instead of attaching the issue to other housing-related matters.

The main reason for my party’s opposition to the bill relates to rent controls. Studies going back decades, from those on New York in the 1980s to more recent ones on Berlin, show that rent controls have serious unintended consequences with reduced supply and increased costs. Rent controls in Scotland have been described as “ruinous” and likely to damage a part of our economy that has suffered at the hands of the Government’s meddling in recent years. They will do much more harm than good.

Recent figures show that around 70 private housing providers are leaving the property market every single month, according to data from the Scottish Landlord Register. That is no coincidence—it is a direct consequence of the SNP’s policy on rent controls.

Does the cabinet secretary understand that the policies that her Government is trying to push through the Parliament have stalled roughly £3.2 billion-worth of housing developments in Scotland? How does she reconcile that with the housing emergency that we are trying to tackle?