Chamber and committees

When an owner-occupier finds RAAC, the value of their home drops. How does that affect the prices that are being offered by a local authority when it comes to compulsory purchase?

My last question is about properties that can be remediated. I am thinking about properties that I have visited in terraced rows, where RAAC panels cross over property boundaries. Some are local authority properties and some are owner-occupied properties, and the local authority is proposing to remediate its stock. How can it remediate its stock where a panel crosses into an owner-occupier’s property, potentially leaving that property at risk of collapse, while not giving the owner-occupier the opportunity to participate in the remediation scheme or, seemingly, any involvement at all in the works?

Good morning. We have touched on some of the protected characteristics and accessibility challenges that people face, but I want to raise specifically the issues that are faced by people who have sight or hearing loss—in particular, those who are profoundly deaf or are deafblind and people who use British Sign Language. We heard a bit from Miriam Craven about the Social Security Scotland perspective, but I would like to know how the broader public sector caters to those who have the particular accessibility challenges that I highlight.

Jillian Matthew talked about equality impact assessments and how they ensure that people with accessibility challenges can access services. Is there any work to see whether assessments are fit for purpose and are not just box-ticking exercises, so that they can make a difference to accessibility in the public sphere?

The petition raises a few issues, but the real motivation behind it is a situation in which a rent increase was referred to the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland, which then raised tenants’ rents beyond the increase that had been requested by the landlord. That situation flagged up an issue that members of the Parliament should look at closely when considering the Housing (Scotland) Bill, which is the appropriate place to deal with it. It is good that the petitioners have raised the issue, but I would be happy to see the petition closed.

I make a voluntary declaration of an interest as a member of Unite the union and of the GMB union.

Although the petition confines itself to the issue of sport and cultural venues, it highlights broader issues in respect of public services that are provided by local government. To the public, sport and cultural services are probably the most obvious example, but a range of services that have changed significantly, including planning, regeneration and economic development, are not so obvious and do not have the same public profile.

Although it is probably right to close the petition, I think that we should consider taking a broader look, possibly in a wider piece of work, at the changing nature of local government over the past 10 or 20 years, or perhaps since the Parliament was re-established in 1999, and the change in local services since devolution. The petition highlights the need for us to do that broader work, which I hope that we can cover in the future.

Sorry—I will make some progress rather than address the member’s question. However, I agree with the point behind his intervention; he can listen to me respond to it or we can carry on this conversation later.

There is clearly an issue with the linking of gas and electricity. In particular, it is harmful to switch from gas heating to electric heating; when people switch to heat pumps, solar power or other forms of heating, it causes problems, and the Government should look at and address that.

Wholesale gas prices are around 15 per cent higher than they were in the period under the previous price cap. That situation has been made worse by the choices of the previous Conservative Government. Britain is now more reliant on gas than almost all our European neighbours, so that increase in wholesale gas prices has a bigger impact on us as consumers and businesses.

As the motion says, that has helped to contribute to the cost of living crisis faced by those who are most vulnerable. Following Liz Truss’s disastrous mini-budget, the annual rate of inflation peaked at 11.1 per cent in October 2022, which is a 41-year high. Over the three years between May 2021 and May 2024, food prices rose by 30.6 per cent. It had previously taken more than 13 years—from January 2008 to May 2021—for average food prices to rise by the same amount. Low-income households across the UK were hit hardest by those rising prices. Data from the Office for National Statistics shows that households with the lowest income experienced a higher-than-average inflation rate. That disparity is due to low-income households being more deeply affected by those rising costs.

It is stating the obvious to say that energy prices are high in the UK right now. This month’s energy price cap rise will mean an increase of around £9 per month for a typical household over the next three months. Liz Smith and a number of other speakers in the debate have talked about the reasons for that being well beyond the control of either the Scottish or the UK Government. A perfect storm of factors has driven up the price of gas since the start of 2025, and it has pushed British energy bills up with it. Because of the war in Ukraine, the pipeline delivering Russian gas to European countries through Ukraine was switched off at the start of the year.

As Meghan Gallacher said, dampness and mould in homes are damaging to the health of those—in particular, young children—who live in them. Far too often, when people raise issues of dampness and mould, their landlords simply blame it on the tenant and tell them to open a window in the middle of winter, as if that will solve the problem. Does the minister think that the non-statutory guidance that has been issued by the Scottish Housing Regulator is firm enough to deal with the problem, and has he spoken to landlords about the practice of blaming tenants for problems of mould in their homes?

I am not sure whether Kevin Stewart was listening to the points that I made. I was talking about the reasons for the price rises being outwith the control of the Scottish and UK Governments, as they are an impact of the war in Ukraine and the shutting down of the gas pipeline through Ukraine from Russia to Europe. I was talking about the fact that the factors that are affecting the price of gas and energy bills are outwith the control of both Governments.

Mr Kerr might want to reflect on the records of previous Labour Governments, particularly that of the Labour Government that took office in 1997, which slashed unemployment and fixed the Conservatives’ mess. The UK Labour Government has had to increase the burden on UK companies because of the mess in which we have found ourselves as a result of Liz Truss and the failures of a series of UK Conservative Prime Ministers. We have had to fix that mess, which is the reason why the burden on UK companies has increased. However, we are still listening carefully to businesses that have been affected, and we will try to work with them.

The budget that the motion praises is possible only because of the record investment for Scotland that the UK Labour Government delivered. The largest block grant in the history of devolution resulted in an additional £5.2 billion for the Scottish Government. That came about as a result of those tax decisions, and it has meant that the Scottish Government has been able to invest money in reducing the impact on families of the cost of living through proposals on the winter fuel allowance, which we proposed long before the SNP decided to include them in its budget.

Labour’s interventions in the energy market will mean that we will no longer be so vulnerable to international shocks to energy prices and that, as a country, we will be able to bring down bills for households and businesses for good. Labour’s work to deliver a record budget settlement for the Scottish Government and help half a million Scots with fuel payments demonstrates the difference that a Labour Government, with a new direction in Scotland, can make.