Meeting of the Parliament 08 January 2026
That is a different housing market, and it is an area where the Government has not declared a housing emergency. Ivan McKee’s Government has declared a housing emergency in Scotland. We are in a materially different place from the rest of the UK.
The committee could not get clarity from the Government and has asked for updated figures and a sensitivity analysis. Homes for Scotland wrote to the minister and the committee last night to challenge the Government’s figures, saying that the figures that were used to calculate the value of the new-build housing market in Scotland were wildly inaccurate and overestimated by 44 per cent. Those are figures from industry experts, who I would listen to before I listened to the Government, which has sleepwalked into the housing emergency in which we find ourselves.
As I said, we accept the principle that organisations have profited from the installation of dangerous cladding, and it is right that they should bear the cost of putting it right. That is a question of fairness and restitution, and I think that it commands broad support across the Parliament. However, the bill does not deliver that in a clear or credible way. The polluter-pays principle is sound, but there is no guarantee through the bill that the polluter would actually pay. Many organisations involved in the installation of dangerous cladding are not covered by the bill; meanwhile, some companies that had no involvement at all will be liable for that burden. That is a disproportionate burden on the wrong businesses, which undermines confidence in the levy’s fairness.
Analysis also suggests that the levy could add around £3,500 per home and would have a disproportionate impact in rural areas. The Government needs to address that.
We are not opposed to a mechanism that makes those who profited from unsafe cladding help to fix it. However, there is not enough evidence that the levy will achieve that aim. A levy without a clear evidence base or a coherent strategy is a bad levy. Therefore, we echo the committee’s finding that significant further work is required, particularly in relation to the impact on the house-building industry in the context of the housing emergency. For those reasons, we will not support the bill today. If it passes at stage 1, we will seek substantial amendments, but we cannot vote for it in its current form.
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