Meeting of the Parliament 06 October 2022
The part of the world that I can tell the member about is this part of the world, where people are worried about having to make a choice between feeding their kids and turning on the heating: this country—where people are struggling through the worst cost of living crisis in living memory.
It is only right to propose measures to give people security—security of tenure over the course of the winter and security that their rents will not continue to rise and make them have to choose between paying their rent or putting food in their kids’ mouths.
I cannot for the life of me understand why the Tories would not want to support people at this time of crisis.
As we did on the windfall tax and on freezing energy prices, and as we now do on freezing rents, Scottish Labour is—as Miles Briggs has pointed out—setting the agenda from opposition. We welcome the Government’s change of heart over the summer in introducing the rent freeze, which we think was the right thing to do. For every renter who is struggling to figure out how they will make ends meet, the freeze will serve as a temporary, but badly needed, relief. The moratorium on evictions, too, should give many people enough breathing space to enable them to keep a roof over their heads this winter.
I want to raise yesterday’s spectacle of the Tories’ defence of landlords suffering from rising mortgage interest rates. They somehow expect the public purse to pick up the bill for their colleagues’ complete economic incompetence, which has led to waves of chaos—including rising costs for tenants and home owners alike—that will make this winter much longer and more difficult than we would have expected before what has been described as the mini fiscal event.
We are pleased that we have been able to find common ground with the Government, but there were areas in which we could not find agreement—in particular, on what is meant by “substantial” arrears, the balancing of rights between landlords and tenants, and the implementation date for the bill.
Rents will continue to rise between now and 5 December. We regret that that is the case. It is in black and white—it is in the Official Report—that on 6 September the First Minister announced that the practical effect of her statement was that rents would be frozen from that day. That is not what the bill does, it is not what the policy memorandum states and it is not what the Minister for Zero Carbon Buildings, Active Travel and Tenants’ Rights has told members in the chamber. The minister has said that he regrets my interpretation of the First Minister’s statement, but that is surely how tenants would interpret her words. I think that as she said that the policy’s practical effect would be that rents would be frozen from that day, that is what tenants would expect.
There has also been overwhelming concern—from Government and Opposition members alike—about the risks to the social house-building programme and the maintaining of the freeze in that sector, particularly if it were to go beyond next March. I lodged amendments that would have at least assessed the impact of the financial effect on business plans and sought to remedy the position. The numbers, and therefore the risk to investment, are substantial. The Scottish Parliament information centre has said that it will be to the tune of £30 million. Housing associations in my region have spoken of suspending entire capital investment plans because of the freeze. The regulator puts the costs to the sector at £50 million next year, growing to £230 million by 2027. That is why we need to think long and hard about any extension beyond 31 March, particularly for the social rented sector, if we want building of affordable houses to continue to increase at pace.
Scottish Labour supports the rent freeze and the ban on evictions, but we also know that they are not long-term solutions to the housing crisis. Investment in vast numbers of sustainable affordable houses is a solution, and that must be protected.
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