Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee 04 June 2025
I want to highlight just a few statistics. There are currently upwards of 47,600 listed buildings on the HES register. When the buildings at risk register was paused, it had 2,214 buildings on it—I am checking my notes; I have written that down. Historically, 22 per cent of buildings that have been on the buildings at risk register have been demolished, which suggests, statistically, that there are currently around 500 buildings at risk of demolition in Scotland.
The buildings at risk register presents opportunities to recognise buildings at risk, but BEFS believes that we need more than just a list of those buildings. There needs to be an action plan with regard to—as has been mentioned—what might be possible and what might be needed.
BEFS has long advocated for the right skills in the right place at the right time, especially as policies and legislation are put in place through the proposed heat in buildings bill. We have talked about the skills that will be required to deliver that. I do not want to focus too much on investment, but modest investment in specialist training and skills is needed now to avoid even bigger costs to the public purse arising from those buildings in the future in relation to heritage and climate.
I will use retrofit as an example. With retrofit, including of our existing building stock, the skills gap will become more and more apparent, as is currently the case with conservation restoration and maintenance. As part of that, therefore, training and accreditation will be essential. We emphasise, however, the need to ensure that undue burdens are not placed on already stretched local authorities. Without longer-term investment in local authority planning and built environment specialisms, we do not envisage a situation any time soon in which each local authority has, or is required to have, such specialisms in-house.
One way to look at that might involve the provision of a shared resource. The recently launched national Scottish Building Standards Hub, which provides expertise at a regional level, could be repurposed to deal with cases of potential demolition for those local authorities that do not have access to the specialisms that are required to inform decisions. However, to avoid getting to that point in the first place, we need wider recognition of the importance of the skills that are required for appropriate repair and maintenance of all buildings that are traditionally constructed, including listed buildings.