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Thank you.

Good morning. Callum Chomczuk, from the Chartered Institute of Housing said:

“if we have a system that comes into place in Scotland, we need to have at its heart data on and evidence of genuine rents. We do not have those, and it will require some time to build them up.”—[Official Report, Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee, 20 February 2024; c 47.]

Rent service Scotland and the First-tier Tribunal will consider comparable open-market data before decisions on the rent increase can be made. How reliable is that data in allowing rent officers and the tribunal to make informed decisions?

Thank you, minister. The absence of data was brought up last week in our evidence sessions on the housing bill. Data is key when decisions such as this are being made. Do you have any examples that you can share with us from elsewhere—if not around the country, around the world—that, in the absence of data and evidence, we can rely on the areas that you have mentioned?

Given that COSLA has raised that concern, are you doing any work to help councils with that additional administrative burden?

Does the Scottish Government believe that it would be worth its while to clarify the rules that relate to council capital loans and the economic assessments of the value and sustainability of such loans?

I am an MSP for the West Scotland region.

Thank you for that information. Last week, our witnesses highlighted that there would be an issue here, and there is an issue with people moving out of the market. You have referred to some stats, so I will go back and check them to see what has happened.

David Melhuish spoke about having diverse supplies of new homes on the market. In written evidence, the Scottish Property Federation wrote about the potential of emerging housing tenures such as build to rent. It wrote that there were around

“17,000 BTR homes in the ... pipeline, but there is no guarantee they will be delivered due to the uncertain policy environment.”

Will the Scottish Property Federation expand on the benefits of build-to-rent housing? What sort of action should the Scottish Government take to make Scotland a more attractive place to build homes of all tenures?

I was actually going to ask my main question, which is on the subject that the witnesses are talking about.

Last week, we heard that the changes to the regulations are viewed by many as confusing, and today we are hearing that missing data could cause a problem as well. The importance of data was also mentioned last week by Callum Chomczuk—I hope that I said his name right—from the Chartered Institute of Housing Scotland.

Today, we have heard views from the tenants’ side, but I now want to speak about landlords. First, should we go ahead with the regulations, given the confusion that exists and the missing data?

Secondly, will the regulations impact on the supply of housing? The policy is basically taking the investor out of the market, and we will have fewer houses available to rent. Will there be a greater shortage of homes? Should we strike a balance in the policy in the interests of tenants and landlords? Basically, my questions are, how could we strike that balance, and should we go ahead with the regulations? I invite David Melhuish to answer first.

Listening to everybody’s evidence is so important. Rhiannon, you said that the primary test was ensuring that everyone had a safe home, while Emma Jackson talked about citizens facing harm due to not having the right housing.

Although housing to 2040 commits to implementing and embedding homelessness prevention pathways for marginalised groups, a shocking number of victims are being left in limbo after leaving violent households, oftentimes accompanied by their children. On average, survivors of abuse are stuck in temporary accommodation for hundreds of days, despite the fact that the Domestic Abuse (Protection) (Scotland) Act 2021 was passed more than three years ago. Do witnesses agree that we are not seeing quick enough action to implement recommendations to improve housing outcomes for victims of domestic abuse and other marginalised groups?