Unveiled by Paul Sweeney on Thursday, 5 March at The Trades Hall in Glasgow, Leading a Co-operative Housing Renewal in Scotland urges the Scottish Government to work in partnership with communities to reclaim governance of housing systems and end policies that prioritise real estate as a financial asset over homes as a social good.

The manifesto seeks to build on Scotland’s proud tradition of housing co-operation — from Robert Owen’s pioneering work at New Lanark, to modern fully mutual housing co-operatives such as West Whitlawburn Housing Co-operative and Edinburgh Student Housing Co-operative.

According to its authors, housing co-operatives empower tenants to control their homes, strengthen communities and deliver lasting social value. Yet without stronger national support, the sector remains constrained at a time when Scotland is pursuing Community Wealth Building.

The Confederation of Co-operative Housing has urged the government to begin by implementing the 2002 Recommendation 193 of the International Labour Organization, creating a clear framework for co-operative growth.

To rebalance Scotland’s housing market and enable co-operative and community-led housing to flourish, the organisation calls on the Scottish Government to:

• Legislate for a bespoke co-operative tenure, recognising the unique legal form of co-operatives, as seen in many European countries
• Enable sector-wide asset pooling and leveraging, supporting the development of new homes, retrofitting existing properties, and repurposing redundant office and retail premises
• Extend the remit of the Scottish National Investment Bank to:
          - Support community land trusts purchasing homes and holding them in perpetuity for community benefit;
          - Provide capital market support — including guarantees and asset-backed endowments — enabling co-operative developers to build at scale.
• Extend land tax exemptions to co-operative and community-led housing liabilities under Scotland’s Land and Buildings Transaction Tax, mirroring provisions in England.
• Promote cohousing and mutual home ownership as alternatives to unaffordable home ownership and commercially driven retirement developments.
• Enable student housing co-operatives, giving students affordable and democratic alternatives to exploitative landlord models.
• Reform taxation, regulation and planning, restoring housing as a social good rather than an investment product, and create a presumption in favour of co-operative and community-led initiatives in public land disposal and planning.

The CCH argues that while Scotland has led the way in community land reform, progress has plateaued over the past decade. Public support for further land transfer remains strong, it added.

It therefore calls on the Scottish Government to:

• Embed a public interest test for all land transfers and prioritise co-operative and community-led initiatives in public land disposal.
• Update the Community Right to Buy, implementing the 2025–26 review and tackling vacant and derelict sites, including underused high-street and office premises.
• Invest in capacity building, education and international knowledge exchange, enabling communities to shape land-based outcomes.
• Require local authorities to identify and transfer underused land for housing, food growing, energy generation and employment, while streamlining planning processes for co-operative housing projects.
• Enhance the Scottish Land Fund, maintaining its real value as land prices rise.
• Create a dedicated retrofitting fund for older buildings in rural and urban Scotland.
  Increase protections for local residents through stronger regulation of second and holiday homes.

Paul Sweeney, Labour and Co-operative MSP for the Glasgow Region and convener of the Cross-Party Group on Co-operatives in Scotland, said: “The Confederation is calling for clear deliverable reforms… and I stand by every one of them. They are practical demands, they are common sense, evidence-based steps that would unlock community power, tackle the housing crisis, and build long-term economic resilience.”

Blase Lambert, chief executive officer of the Confederation of Co-operative Housing, said: “People across Scotland want co-operative and community-led approaches to be available to them to meet their housing needs. Now they need their government to get behind them and support them in shaping a better housing future for all.”