Consultation opened on future of social housing regulation
The Scottish Housing Regulator is inviting tenants, landlords, and others with an interest in its work to reply to its consultation by 15 December.
The Scottish Housing Regulator (SHR) has formally opened its consultation on how it regulates social housing in Scotland. It is inviting tenants, landlords and others with an interest in its work to give their views by 15 December.
This follows on from the discussion paper the SHR issued earlier this year, that SFHA responded to in August.
SFHA's response will be developed based on feedback from SFHA members, including our Governance Forum, and will also reflect the 20 recommendations in the Altair research report commissioned by SFHA: the Regulatory Framework in Practice.
In its proposals, the Regulator explains how it will continue to safeguard and promote the interests of current and future tenants, people who are homeless and others who use social landlords’ services.
A key proposal would see the Regulator introduce a new provision to its statutory guidance to allow the Regulator to require landlords to provide explicit assurance in the Annual Assurance Statement (AAS) on a specific issue or issues.
They also propose changes to strengthen the emphasis in its Regulatory Framework on social landlords listening to tenants and service users, to make it clearer when a social landlord is non-compliant, and to initiate a comprehensive review of the Annual Return on the Charter which it will consult on next year.
The Regulator will use the consultation feedback to develop its final Regulatory Framework and guidance which it will publish in February 2024 and implement on 1 April 2024.
An SFHA briefing on the consultation paper will be made available shortly. If you have any queries in the meantime, or would like to feed into the SFHA response, please contact astokes@sfha.co.uk.