One year ago, Scotland declared a housing emergency, yet we are still nowhere near tackling this challenge. It’s a stark assessment but not a surprising one for those of us working at the heart of housing delivery.

It’s not just a challenge for the homebuilding industry but one that affects everyone. Having a safe and warm place to call home has a direct impact on educational attainment, physical and mental health. Recent statistics from Shelter report over 10,000 children are living in temporary accommodation, the highest level since records began in 2002, which has detrimental implications that can last a lifetime.

Additionally, the sector supports over 79,000 jobs in Scotland and contributes more than £3bn to our economy while every home that is built contributes towards critical infrastructure including schools and community facilities.

The housing emergency is widely acknowledged, as are the far reaching benefits of changing this, so if we’re serious about turning the tide, it’s time for a radical intervention in how homes are planned and approved in Scotland.

As a senior land and planning manager for AS Homes and Briar Homes, I have seen first-hand the mounting barriers developers, of all sizes, face in progressing sites through the planning system. For over 15 years, our business has built a trusted reputation delivering high-quality, energy-efficient homes across the west of Scotland and beyond, for both social housing and the private market. Yet despite our track record and expertise, it has never been harder to get an application through planning, and the wider consenting process, than it is today.

The planning system in Scotland is chronically slow. Even straightforward applications are often caught in lengthy delays, inconsistent feedback, and resource bottlenecks within local authorities. These delays don’t just hold up housing, they create ripple effects across communities, supply chains, and the wider economy.

As a result, developers are often forced to bring homes to market under entirely different and sometimes unfavourable conditions than initially planned. Competing sites may have come forward in the interim, interest rates could have shifted, or material costs increased. All of this places immense pressure on viability, particularly in areas where land values are tight and competition is fierce.

This is especially challenging for smaller builders and SMEs like us. In many parts of Scotland, the rising cost and complexity to deliver new homes compared to the achievable selling price means that developing certain sites doesn’t stack up anymore. This isn’t just a commercial problem for the developer, it also impacts the local communities by restricting supply, placing immense pressure on the availability and affordability of homes in the area. This is particularly evident in more peripheral settlements outside the core central belt.

And yet, we persist because our mission to build much-needed homes that strengthen communities remains unchanged. At AS and Briar Homes, we may be small, but we are mighty. We have the capacity, expertise and commitment to lead residential developments across Scotland. But our growth as a business, and our ability to meet Scotland’s urgent housing needs, is being strangled by a lack of deliverable land and an often sluggish and overly complex consenting regime.

We need bold intervention that reinvigorates the planning process to provide clarity, consistency and capacity. We need an ambitious national housing target that filters down into local delivery frameworks and for the next local development plans to allocate enough deliverable land. Above all, we need to recognise the vital role housebuilders of all sizes play in delivering the homes that will shape Scotland’s future.

At the upcoming Homes for Scotland Awards and Scottish Home Awards we’ll see countless examples of what’s possible when planning, design and community-building align. From innovative affordable housing schemes to sustainable and well-landscaped private developments, these showcase what Scotland’s housing sector can achieve.

It’s time to match ambition with action. A functioning planning system is not a “nice to have”, it’s a cornerstone of solving the housing crisis. Let’s work together at pace, to get Scotland building more, and critically, enough new homes.

• Liz Hamilton is senior land and planning manager at AS Homes and Briar Homes