Chamber and committees

Ministers are required by the Community Empowerment Act (2015) to review the National Outcomes within five years of their previous publication, and the next review is currently underway. The Scottish Government intends to lay the statutory document in Parliament in early 2024. This will outline the work undertaken during the review, including any proposed changes to the National Outcomes.

Under the current constitutional arrangements in the United Kingdom the application process for all immigration routes is fully reserved to the UK Government and is dealt with by the Home Office. If a displaced person from Ukraine has been issued a visa, including under the Scottish Super Sponsor Scheme, they are free to travel anywhere within the UK or to leave and re-enter the UK when they wish, as long as they are meeting the conditions within their visa. The cross border geographical movement, within the UK, which includes that between Scotland and England is not monitored and the data requested is therefore not available.

The Scottish Government has allocated £6 million from the City Centre Recovery Fund 2021-22 to the member cities of the Scottish Cities Alliance in support of City Centre recovery, to take forward the priorities identified by the City Centre Recovery Task Force. Funds were divided between the cities based on city centre population and paid directly to each local authority, rather than directly to the Scottish Cities Alliance.

The Scottish Government also contributes £196,000 per annum directly to the Scottish Cities Alliance. This is in addition to the £28,000 contributed by each of the 8 cities. It is from this contribution that any ongoing work undertaken by the Scottish Cities Alliance on City Centre Recovery is funded.

As the tax authority with responsibility for the collection and management of Scotland’s devolved taxes, Revenue Scotland publishes monthly and annual data on its website regarding the number of property conveyances and non-residential leases subject to the Land and Buildings Transaction Tax (LBTT) and the associated tax liabilities. These are available at https://revenue.scot/news-publications/publications/statistics .

Local authority level data is published on an annual basis, as part of Revenue Scotland’s Annual Summary of Trends in the Devolved Taxes. The report for 2021-22, which provides data for the period from 1 April 2015 to 31 March 2022, is available at: https://revenue.scot/news-publications/publications/statistics/annual-summary-trends-devolved-taxes-2021-22 . The report for 2022-2023 is due to be published in late 2023.

In particular, the figures and tables file of this publication at 'Figure 12' includes estimates of residential LBTT payable, broken down by year and local authority area.

For non-residential LBTT, 'Figure 17' sets out revenue data by year and by Nomenclature of Territorial Units (NUTS 2) areas. Local authority level data is not used for non-residential LBTT statistics to minimise the risk of disclosing protected taxpayer information.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-19106 on 29 June 2023. 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 .

Since October 2022 local licensing schemes have been operational in Scotland, and licensing authorities continue to accept and process applications, and issue licences.

In terms of the judicial review (JR), this was a challenge specific to aspects of the City of Edinburgh Council’s short-term let licensing policy and not the overall licensing scheme. While the Judge found in favour of some of the petitioners’ grounds for challenge, these relate to the Council’s application of the legislation and not the legislation itself. It remains our view 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. There is therefore no need to repeal the legislation for Short Terms Lets Licensing or for licensing authorities to reimburse application fees.

I understand the City of Edinburgh Council is considering the JR decision and its legal options. As I mentioned above, the JR challenge was specific to certain aspects of the Council’s policy, however, the JR decision does not stop the Council from operating its wider licensing scheme; the Council continues to operate this and applications are still being received and processed. The Council has advised us that it will update its website and information for applicants, regarding the JR decision, to ensure there is clarity for hosts who have applied, or need to apply, for a short-term let licence. Additionally, our Scottish Government short-term let licensing guidance documents are being updated and will be published shortly.

In early 2024 we will provide a more formal, detailed but still relatively preliminary update on licensing implementation. We are currently engaging with stakeholders to gain their views on how we do this to inform the scope and handling. I will keep Parliament informed and provide further detail once we’ve concluded discussions and made a decision about the format of next year’s update, as well as the frequency and format of future implementation updates. In the meantime, we remain committed to engaging with stakeholders about the implementation of licensing and continue to be responsive about concerns.

Scotland remains committed to ensuring the right homes are delivered in the right places and to working with local authorities in the planning and delivery of new homes. The Scottish Government has no plans to introduce a New Homes Bonus Scheme.

Scotland has led the UK in the delivery of affordable housing having delivered more than 122,000 affordable homes since 2007, of which more than 86,000 are for social rent. The 10,458 affordable homes delivered to end March 2023 is the highest figure since the start of the statistical series in 2000.

Since 2007, Scotland has seen over 40% more affordable homes delivered per head of population than in England, and over 70% more than in Wales. We have also delivered over three times as many social rented homes per head of population than England over this period.

The number of all-sector new build homes completed in Scotland was up by 9% in the latest year to end March 2023, the highest annual figure to end March since 2008.

The Home Energy Scotland (HES) Grant and Loan Scheme was launched in December 2022 and offers homeowners the option of a grant, interest free loan or a combination of both to support the installation of energy efficiency measures and zero emissions heating.

The launch of the HES Grant and Loan Scheme fulfils our commitment set out in the Programme for Government 2022-23 to replace the cashback element of HES funding with a standalone grant, and offers applicants a straight forward, flexible and accessible way to access funding for priority measures.

For zero emission heating measures, grant funding of up to £7,500 is available, with an additional £7,500 of funding available as an interest free loan. For energy efficiency measures, grant funding of up to 75% of the combined costs of measures up to a maximum £7,500 is available, with an additional £7,500 of funding available as an interest free loan.

There is a rural uplift of £1,500 for both the zero emission heating and energy efficiency grants for rural and island homes, meaning rural households can claim up to £18,000 in grant funding.

From the launch of the HES Grant and Loan Scheme in December 2022 to April 2023, 3606 applications for the scheme were received.

The Scottish Government HL1 data collection does not gather information relating directly to referrals under section 5 of the Housing (Scotland) Act 2001. This information is gathered by the Scottish Housing Regulator as part of the Annual Return on The Scottish Social Housing Charter and is published by local authorities in each year since 2013-14 on the their webpage .

The data for the latest year 2021-22 is available to download from the ‘Charter data - all social landlords dataset’ section, and section 5 referrals are found under indicator 24.1.

I refer the member to the question S6W-17702 on 19 May 2023. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx