Hansard

My amendment 385 is on withholding rent. Scotland has a severe quality problem with its private housing stock. Some private landlords and their agencies seem to think that it is okay to take their tenants’ rent without maintaining their properties to a habitable, good-quality standard. Serious issues such as damp and mould, holes in floors and walls, and broken furnishings are left to fester, despite those who rent out homes having a legal obligation to ensure that the housing meets the existing tolerable and repairing standards. In any other sector, if a customer received such sub-standard services, there would be major uproar. Why should the private rental market be treated any differently?

Not all landlords act in that way, but if you have the misfortune of being the tenant of a landlord who acts in bad faith, it is a miserable experience that could have a significant impact on your health, wellbeing, social life and work life. People who are in that situation need more legal protections. The status quo puts the onus on tenants to go to the tribunal in order to get the issue fixed. Meanwhile, they have to live with the problem in their home for what could be months or even years and are expected to pay their rent on time and in full each month. In any other walk of life, such a situation would be unacceptable. If your train gets delayed, the situation is resolved with a delay repay in just one click. If you buy something faulty from a shop, you are entitled to a refund. If a business receives a substandard service, it withholds money from the supplier there and then. Why should it be any different for renters, especially when housing is a human right?

The message that we need to send to landlords, particularly to those who seek to abuse the system, is that they must provide good-quality housing if their tenants are to pay for it. My amendment 385 is backed by Living Rent and Consumer Scotland and would give tenants the right to withhold rent if the landlord has not fixed serious issues within 30 days of them being raised. That would create a fairer situation than what we would get from amendments 249 and 444. Those amendments do not set an adequate timeframe, meaning that tenants could face months of distress before their homes are put right.

My amendment would guarantee that major repairs are sorted out in a timely manner. It would discourage bad actors in the sector from not fulfilling their legal obligations. Where a landlord believes that they have done enough to resolve the issue, they would be able to go through the tribunal process to unlock the withheld rent. That way, the burden of having to go through the tribunal process would be shared more evenly across the board between landlord and tenant. Good landlords would be encouraged to keep up the good work, while those who have no interest in their tenants’ welfare or in the reputation of their sector would find it hard to remain in business.

My amendment 489 is related to damp and mould inspections. All members of the committee will be aware that there is a major damp and mould crisis in Scotland. I know that my office is not alone in receiving harrowing stories of renters who are living in homes where the walls are black with mould, the carpets are riddled with spores, and they cannot escape the putrid smell of damp. As well as being horrible to live with, mould is a slow, silent killer. Perhaps that is why it has not received the same attention as other issues, such as the cladding crisis, but it needs to be urgently addressed. By taking action, we can improve the lives of people across our country and take some of the strain off our overloaded health services.

My amendment 489 would help to tackle Scotland’s damp and mould epidemic. Where a tenant has raised their damp and mould issues with the housing tribunal, the tribunal would have the power to commission an independent, competent expert to inspect the accommodation. That would mean that the tribunal and all parties involved could get a fair and impartial view of what is causing the damp and mould and what could be done to fix it, to make sure that landlords, tenants and the tribunal are getting good advice.

I have included a provision that would allow ministers to set out what a competent person would be in that context. I would like that to lead to a situation in which we have enough damp and mould expertise in the housing sector to ensure that tenants and landlords can keep their properties free of this blight.

My amendments 538 and 539 relate to inspections for local authorities. Although I recognise that local authorities have those powers, inspections are not taking place for some reason. Too many privately rented homes in Scotland do not meet the required standards. Although the majority of landlords work hard to ensure that their tenants are in well maintained homes, they are being let down by a small minority of people who own a large number of properties and who view their portfolios as piggy banks instead of homes, which is what they are. That small number of landlords have been able to get away with that because the overburdened regulatory system cannot cope with the sheer scale of wrongdoing.

The legislation that we work on in the Parliament should always have a reasonable balance of carrot and stick. Given the concerning deterioration in standards in the private rented sector, we need to pursue the latter rather than the former. We need to make it crystal clear to all landlords that they have to meet certain standards or run the risk of being hit in the pocket. That is why I am proposing in my amendment 538 that local authorities should be given the power to undertake inspections of rented accommodation every three years, and my amendment 539 would mean that they could carry out spot checks when they suspect that a registered landlord is not following the letter of the law.

When inspections find that housing does not meet basic habitable standards, the landlord faces being hit by a large fine. I have opted for a £10,000 fine in this instance, because it would incentivise rogue landlords to fix problems instead of running the risk that they will be fined a sum far exceeding the cost of repairs. It is also important to note that that is a power and not an obligation. We on the committee know that local government finances are under immense strain, which has impacted on their staffing levels and the services that they can deliver. I hope that having such a large fine on the table will incentivise more action on substandard housing. Furthermore, from a tenant’s perspective, it would provide another logical avenue through which they could raise concerns about the quality of their home and would give them another layer of protection against rogue landlords.

My amendments 557 and 558 would require regulations on local authority inspections to be subject to affirmative procedure.

My amendment 254 is on farm workers’ accommodation. Every year, thousands of workers from Europe and Asia come to Scotland to work on farms. They do back-breaking work, picking the fruit and vegetables that we see on supermarket shelves, but all too often they are exploited, whether that be through not being paid properly, exposure to dangerous conditions or having their movements restricted.

Those workers also face being housed in terrible conditions. The Worker Support Centre recently reported that it received 100 complaints about poor living conditions in 2024, including issues with overcrowding, damp, black mould and broken furniture. Those reports are likely to be just the tip of the iceberg, given that seasonal workers are often afraid to raise their concerns lest they lose their job or, worse, have their visa revoked. Many are also unaware of the support that is available to them and have a limited grasp of English.

It is unacceptable that people who perform such a vital role in putting food on Scotland’s tables are treated like that. That is why I lodged amendment 254, which would require officers to inspect accommodation that has been provided for workers to ensure that it meets legal habitable standards for housing in Scotland. If the housing does not stand up to scrutiny, the officers would have the power to order improvements to be made within a certain timeframe and they would be backed by their local authority.

Those workers can and should have their human rights respected, because, without them, crops would rot in our fields and few people would have access to healthy local food.

I call the minister to speak to amendment 231 and other amendments in the group.