Insight

Andrew Cowie, a member of the Accounts Commission, discusses future reporting on the performance of Scotland’s housing benefit services. Every year, Scotland’s councils pay out £1.4 billion in housing benefit. Council benefit services are a lifeline service to many needing vital he

As social landlords gear up to calculate rent proposals for the year ahead, Glasgow and West of Scotland Forum of Housing Associations director David Bookbinder outlines why the post-lockdown landscape could be the most difficult yet. Grappling with the next rent increase is never easy, but thi

East Lothian Council leader Norman Hampshire outlines the local authority's reaction to the 4th draft National Planning Framework (NPF4). The draft NPF4 provides a spatial strategy and core planning policies to guide where development and infrastructure should go.

Paul Ellis, chief executive of Ecol­ogy Build­ing So­ci­ety Agenda, discusses how climate change can be fought on the homes front. COP26 has been described as "the last best hope for the world to get its act together" on climate change, and the science could not be clearer. Climate c

Jimmy Black writes about the latest episode of the Scottish Housing News Podcast, with Link Group’s finance director Nick Pollard. I used to sit on the committee of a local authority pension fund, and I made unpopular suggestions. I’d say “Let’s stop investing in tobacco,&rdq

Former Link Group chief executive Craig Sanderson responds to episode 1 of the Scottish Housing News Podcast and the corresponding Black's Blog via a conversation he had with an old school friend. Thanks Jimmy Black, Kieran Findlay, David Bookbinder and Teresa Bray for your recent podcast episode an

Catherine Hall, a member of the Policy and Practice Team at CIH Scotland before leaving to pursue a PhD in environmental law, discusses equality, diversity and inclusion in the aftermath of COVID-19. As we continue to better understand Covid-19, there exists a growing realisation that the virus was

Construction Scotland Innovation Centre innovation manager Sarah Buchanan writes in our COP26SHN feature that retrofit activity is going to ramp up significantly over the next 10-15 years as we head towards the government’s net-zero goals, with the affordable housing sector

University of Glasgow researcher Andrew Watson highlights the findings from a report, published yesterday, that explores temporary legislation introduced by the UK and Scottish governments to prevent the pandemic leading to a surge in evictions in both the private rented sector (PRS) and t

SFHA chief executive Sally Thomas spoke at an official COP26 UN System Side Event yesterday to discuss how to decarbonise homes in an inclusive and affordable way. In her contribution to our #COP26SHN feature, she highlights how the housing sector is already working on this.

Scottish Housing News' #COP26SHN showcase of the social housing sector's efforts to help tackle the climate crisis continues with Andy Moseley, senior policy officer at the Scottish Empty Homes Partnership, who makes the case for utilising empty homes as a critical tool in terms of minimis

PhD researcher Khadijah Naeem from Royal Holloway, University of London, highlights how the Covid-19 disproportionately impacts ethnic minorities in overcrowded households.

Scott Restrick, Link Group energy and sustainability officer, is next up in Scottish Housing News' #COP26SHN showcase of the social housing sector's efforts to help tackle the climate crisis with his take on how the housing sector urgently needs access to a more sophisticated toolkit to respond to t

Scottish Housing News Podcast co-host Jimmy Black outlines the roundtable discussion from the first episode of the podcast, which has been launched to kick off our series on how Scotland’s social housing sector is meeting the net zero challenge. Some intriguing possibilities were thrown up in

National Housing and Dementia Forum co-chairs Ashley Campbell and Lesley Palmer summarise the discussion from the fourth and final evidence session of the Scottish Government-organised body.