Chamber and committees

Thank you.

Thank you for that.

To return to the data question, are you aware of any data? In Engender’s written submission, there was a specific question about understanding how women experience eviction. Do councils or the Government hold any data, for example from the housing first programme, on when tenancies fail, or has any data been recorded by councils on families and children in temporary accommodation? Maybe you can also answer on the wider question about how family units experience homelessness.

Provisional licences will be available for new-build properties but not buildings that are undergoing conversion. Why has that approach been taken, rather than including all buildings?

I think that we all agree on the principle, but I want to discuss an issue that has been raised with me and the committee, which is how the guidance can cover student accommodation. For example, there could be a situation in which someone moves into student accommodation not knowing that a fellow student will be in that shared space with their pet tarantula. How should policy be defined to cover such situations? We have spoken about dogs and cats, but other pets will be covered by the policy. Should there be a complaints process for university accommodation, or would that become burdensome for the institutions? The idea of the bill including a defined list of pets has been raised with us, but could that become problematic, given that there are different types of accommodation, including shared accommodation? What are your views on that?

As the bill goes through Parliament, we will have opportunities to open up more, and there is potential for amendments on that, as well.

Earlier, we touched on evidence of the need for a wider scheme of tenant support and enforcement within the private rented sector; the committee has heard about that in evidence from a number of people. Do you share that view, and what, specifically, do you think is missing from the bill on that, which could be included?

We have spoken about a tenants’ charter in the social rented sector, for example. There has been a call for that in relation to the state that properties are in before people actually move in. Does the panel have any views that they want to add on that issue?

Finally, councils have told the committee that the order’s commencement date will not give sufficient time to update policies or administrative and information technology systems, and it has been—quite rightly—suggested that that might lead to possible misinterpretation and the sorts of problems that we have seen across councils, especially here in Edinburgh. What assurances can you offer councils that there will be sufficient time to update systems, given that the order will come into force on the day that it is made?

I agree with that, but I would just note that the regulations were put in place for health and safety reasons, not for planning and licensing purposes. You might be saying now that the decisions are about reducing the size of the festival—or about looking at that, even—but that is not where the regulations originally came from.

I am not sure about having the transitional phase four weeks before the festival starts and then looking at it afterwards, given the damage that it will potentially have caused. We know from many people—Jason Manford being one of them—that the scheme has seen prices rocket such that people on a budget who want to come and showcase their talents in the festival just cannot. Statistically, we will need to see, but the damage will be done. I have made those arguments to you already.

I, too, thank the minister for an advance copy of his statement. A month ago, the Scottish Government declared a housing emergency, but what we have heard today does not sound or feel like a response to an emergency. We need to see more from the Government, and the fact that the minister mentioned children only twice in his statement tells us a lot. Every day, 45 children become homeless in Scotland. Under this Scottish National Party Government, 9,860 children are living in temporary accommodation and some have been in such accommodation for years. That is an increase of 138 per cent over the past decade, while the SNP and the Greens have been in power.

The minister mentioned the letter that has been sent to the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister. I agree with the key ask in that letter about children living in temporary accommodation, which is an issue that I have consistently raised in this chamber during this session of Parliament. In the time remaining in this session, we have the opportunity to make a difference in line with the First Minister’s policy of eradicating child poverty, but we need a single-minded focus on reducing the harm that children living in temporary accommodation experience. How many children does the minister expect will be living in temporary accommodation in Scotland by the end of this parliamentary session?

I agree with Ash Regan. The Government needs to understand the facts of what people are experiencing. The minister mentioned a figure of 9 per cent, but in Edinburgh it is much higher. People are being mixed together in unacceptable situations: families, single men, and women who are experiencing homelessness. Often, those women have fled domestic abuse but are put into those situations, and they then leave them to become homeless, because they feel safer on the streets. Will the minister look at reviewing the situation, and get the third sector to be part of that? In so many options out there, we do not use the third sector, and it wants to be part of a solution.