News01.09.23by Ella JesselScotland’s housing associations expect to build 15% fewer homes over the next five years, the Scottish Housing Regulator (SHR) has revealed.Picture: AlamySharelinesScotland’s housing associations expect to build 4,500 fewer homes over the next five years #UKhousing The cut-backs to landlords’ development programmes could lead to the loss of 4,500 new affordable homes, according to the SHR’s national report on the Scottish Social Housing Charter for 2022-23.
The report also revealed that social landlords are planning to reduce or delay investment in existing homes, with an aggregate figure of more than £15m being cut from expenditure plans in the next five years.
The SHR’s new figures echo the findings of another report released this week on the UK’s scaled-back building, and come as landlords grapple with increasing costs of materials and labour, staff, energy and borrowing. In Scotland these challenges, in addition to the cost of living crisis, have contributed to a dip in tenant satisfaction and to rent arrears rising to the highest level since the charter was introduced, the SHR report said.
As of March 2023, social landlords had total arrears of rent of £189m or 6.9% of total rent due, the highest level since the introduction of the charter (up from 6.3% last year).
But despite these difficulties, the SHR maintained that the performance of social landlords against the standards and outcomes of the charter continued to show “positive signs”.
George Walker, chair of the SHR, described last year as “another challenging year for social landlords”.
He added: “The increased levels of rent arrears highlight the financial strain on many tenants and today’s report shows that landlords are working hard to ensure that rent levels are affordable while they are still able to deliver services to their tenants,” he added.
The regulator’s data shows that last year landlords let a total of 50,993 homes, down 3.6% (1,901) on the previous year, and down nearly 8% on 2019-20. Despite this overall reduction, there was a 47% increase in the number of lets made to households from ‘other sources’ not on the housing list, existing tenants and people assessed as homeless.
Some landlords told the SHR this was because of homes they allocated to Ukrainian refugees as part of the Scottish government’s commitment to support those displaced by the war.
Rent-setting presented a difficult challenge for landlords in 2023, and many housing associations set rents at levels below those in their business plans and financial projections.
The report also highlighted how the sector is coping with rising homelessness, as the latest statistics show record highs in both open homelessness applications and the number of children in temporary accommodation.
The SHR report highlighted the “acute pressure” on temporary accommodation, with the data revealing that there were 445 occasions where local authorities did not meet their statutory duty to offer it.
There were more than 3,500 breaches of the Unsuitable Accommodation Order, and households with children continue to spend on average the longest time in temporary accommodation.
Mr Walker added: “It is vital that local authorities and their partners continue to work effectively to address these challenges and always meet their statutory duties. We’ll continue to engage with all local authorities, with a particular focus on temporary accommodation, during 2023-24.”
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