AFFORDABLE HOUSING CRISIS UNDER SNP
Affordable housing approvals is down 16% and starts down 19% in year to September 2022. Worse, comparing July-Sept 2021 & 2022 reveals approvals collapsed by a stunning 37%
Affordable housing is rarely subject-matter to get the heart racing, but is nevertheless vitally important. According to the ruling Scottish National Party’s 2022 manifesto, their councillors would work tirelessly in coordination with the Scottish Government led by Nicola Sturgeon to deliver more affordable homes1.
Nothing wrong so far, in fact I always welcome any pledge from any political party to coordinate where possible with other levels of governance to deliver for us small-fry constituents. And unless you’re emerging from a long term coma, you also recognise Scotland has a serious problem with affordable homes, homelessness and cost of living.
So it’s with a weary groan that I discover - reading the statistics published on the Scottish Government website on Housing Statistics Update - that we can already see where future problems will begin to emerge.
“SNP councils will work with the Scottish Government to meet our target of 110,000 more affordable homes by 2032”
Officially the key takeaway most people will spot before yawning and turning their eyes to the television instead is the welcome news that
“the numbers of affordable homes completed has increased on an annual basis over the latest year to end September 2022”2
But you should keep on reading since this would give you a false impression of the true realities. Whilst it is true that the number of affordable homes completed has been increasing, it won’t be for much longer.
You see, the number of affordable homes being granted approved status going forward has been dropping. In fact there has been a staggering decrease of 16% (1,414 homes)3 getting approved for future construction. What is worse, there is a simultaneous drop off in regards to the number of these new affordable homes where construction has started. Specifically, 8,256 were started which represents a decrease of 19% (1,877 homes)4.
So while the SNP can boast about the “numbers of affordable homes completed” going upward over the course of last year ending September 2022, looking forward things are likely more ropey. Scotland faces a situation where the number of homes approved and started have dropped.
The more you read the worse some of these details get. The statistics mentioned above refer to the decrease in approvals and completions over the course of the year to September 2022. But things get even worse when we compare July-September 2021 with July-September 2022.
When we do this, we discover the number of approvals is lower than in the same period in the previous year. Specifically a whopping 37% lower5. And if there are fewer approvals of new affordable homes, then there will be a reduced future supply of them. This let me remind you is happened at the same time as the Scottish Government is failing to even ensure that it increases construction starts of those (fewer) new affordable homes being granted approval.
The only silver lining here is that completions is up 5% comparing July-September 2021 with July-September 2022. But that only means they are successfully completing more of a diminishing number of affordable homes securing approval. Hardly much to write home about.
It is with all of these objective facts in mind that my eyebrows are raised when I read the words of a Scottish Government spokesperson who has insisted
““Scotland has led the way in delivering affordable housing across the UK and has some of the strongest homelessness legislation in the world.”
Now politics has always involved an element of spinning a line to conceal or misdirect, but dishonesty is just dishonesty. The undeniable truth is, the SNP has failed to meet its own target to build 50,000 affordable homes on time. And that comes amid a Scottish Government decision to slash £170 million from the 2023/24 housing budget. Additionally to all of that, the number of affordable homes securing approval and where construction starts has fallen over the course of the year to September 2022. Comparing the same time periods 2021 and 2022 also reveals the collapse in affordable home approvals isn’t just restricted to 2022 either, with a 37% drop time period to time period.
Scottish Conservative Housing Spokesperson Miles Briggs spoke at Holyrood to point out the sheer scale of this housing crisis gripping Scotland
“It’s completely unacceptable that there are 47,000 people currently registered as homeless, and a third of a million Scots on social housing waiting lists, including close to 100,000 children and more than 24,000 disabled people.”6
Mr Briggs isn’t alone in criticising the Sturgeon government for failing to deliver on affordable housing. In fact here in Glasgow the SNP-led administration is also beginning to - at long last - start putting pressure on the First Minister. The SNP Glasgow led administration has now officially called for an additional £535 million to build 6500 affordable homes over the next five years7 to help prevent homelessness and address a shortage of properties crippling the city.
Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP government she leads nationally has not replied. Given she continues to struggle to decide if a bodily male rapist belongs in a woman’s prison perhaps she is otherwise distracted with other matters? Meanwhile Scotland faces a growing housing crisis while the current administration is more focused on ensuring biologically male individuals can gain access to female-only spaces.
South African writer Mitta Xinindlu once said, “Plant what you love, and it will grow”. I take her point, and reckon it’s time we should be planting a new Scottish Government
https://www.snp.org/snp-manifesto-2022-what-you-need-to-know/
‘Housing Statistics for Scotland Quarterly Update: New Housebuilding and Affordable Housing Supply (published 24 January 2023)’, ‘Main Points’, ScotGov Publication, https://www.gov.scot/publications/housing-statistics-scotland-quarterly-update-new-housebuilding-affordable-housing-supply-published-24-january-2023/pages/2/
‘Housing Statistics for Scotland Quarterly Update: New Housebuilding and Affordable Housing Supply (published 24 January 2023)’,, ‘6. Affordable housing supply’, ScotGov Publication
ibid
ibid, see table 6
Grant, Alistair, (2023, Jan 25), ‘SNP accused of presiding over 'national housing crisis’’, Scotsman, https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/snp-accused-of-presiding-over-national-housing-crisis-3999852?r=1527
Paterson, Stewart, (2023, Jan 12), ‘Council wants government cash for thousands of new homes in Glasgow’, Glasgow Times, https://www.glasgowtimes.co.uk/news/23244628.council-wants-government-cash-thousands-new-homes-glasgow/