Seòmar agus comataidhean

We will close the petition, and I note that one of its principal aims has been achieved, which is good news.

PE1946, lodged by Sean Antony Clerkin, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to use general taxation to pay for all charges for homeless temporary accommodation, including writing off the £33.3 million debt owed by homeless people to local authorities for temporary accommodation.

We last considered the petition on 7 February, and we asked COSLA about its work on recommendation 14 of the temporary accommodation task and finish group’s report, which calls for a benchmarking process for temporary accommodation and greater transparency on charges.

COSLA’s response states that its shared understanding with the Scottish Government is that the Association of Local Authority Chief Housing Officers would have to lead on that as housing practitioners and experts, as it was clear COSLA would not have the resource for that type of discrete project.

The Scottish Government’s recent written submission to the committee outlines the duty of local authorities to help people who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless. The Scottish Government notes that it established a housing affordability working group, which conducted focus group research and is developing a shared understanding of housing affordability. The group was due to send recommendations to ministers before the summer recess.

The petitioner’s recent written submission points to the housing and homelessness emergency and the cost of living challenges in Scotland. He points to the temporary accommodation debt from 2022, which sat at £33.3 million, and believes that that figure will have increased substantially since that time.

Do members have any comments or suggestions for action?

Thank you. That explains it for those following along who might have been wondering what it meant, as we were.

We will move straight to questions, as we have done on the other occasions. Please feel free to add anything that you want to say, and there will be an opportunity later for you to mention anything that you feel that we have not touched on.

I invite Maurice Golden to lead on the initial theme of our questioning.

The advantage of the national park designation is the authority that comes with the structure of a national park. Is that, in essence, the case?

Earlier, we heard a similar analogy about many constituents who find themselves in a David and Goliath situation in which they are up against quite insurmountable odds when dealing with such matters.

There are still issues to explore, but I am not sure that doing so in writing will advance us any further. It would be right to invite the minister to come to the committee to give evidence, so that we can explore the issues directly and see whether we can make some progress and understand why progress has not been forthcoming. Is the committee content with that?

Members indicated agreement.

We will hold the petition open and seek to have that evidence session with the minister, at which Sarah Boyack will be more than welcome. Sarah, we will find scope to allow you to contribute and put a question or two to the minister at the end of the evidence session.

Foysol Choudhury will take us on to the next section, which is on the forthcoming legislation.

I have a final question, which relates to the evidence that we heard last week. There was some comment that although the new national park might be the called Galloway national park, it runs into South Ayrshire and other territory, too. There was a feeling that, because that is a much more populated area where there are established concerns, it is quite distinct from the Cairngorms or wherever else. In addition, there was a concern that the thinking would be that a similar arrangement would be developed, which would really not work for that area, because it would interfere and potentially undermine quite a bit of what was there.

I think that you said earlier that the consultation is about developing a proposal that will meet those challenges. Eileen, will you confirm for the record that that is your view?

Thank you. As there are no further questions from the committee, is there anything further that you want to add to the narrative that we have perhaps not touched on this morning?

Thank you for that and for the evidence that you have given us this morning, which has helped to build up our profile of the issue.

We will continue our consideration of the petition at our next meeting on 27 November, when we will hear from the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Land Reform and Islands.

Are members content to reflect on the evidence that we have heard in our private session later?

Members indicated agreement.