SFHA seeking clarification of Fair Work First guidance - Member update

SFHA is continuing to seek Scottish Government clarification of its Fair Work First (FWF) Guidance and the conditions that will apply to our members.

Scottish Government introduced Fair Work conditionality to public sector grants in 2023, guided by the National Strategy for Economic Transformation and Bute House Agreement commitments to introduce requirements on all public sector grants, including the Affordable Housing Supply Programme.

According to the FWF guidance, all public sector grant recipients must pay at least the real Living Wage to all UK-based staff aged 16 and over directly employed by the RSL (including apprentices) and provide appropriate channels for effective workers’ voice. RSLs are required to confirm in the grant application process that they are meeting the real Living Wage and effective voice conditions.

However, we understand that some members have received different or conflicting information from your More Homes Area Teams that affects your ability to access Affordable Housing Supply Programme grant. SFHA is requesting clear and consistent guidance from senior More Homes officials about RSL requirements, including a previously confirmed assurance that our members are not required to ensure that sub-contractors also meet the conditionality.

SFHA has met with the Deputy Director of More Homes several times this year to discuss members questions and concerns on FWF and have been continuously informed since January that a Scottish-Government wide review of the FWF guidance is delaying communications in efforts to achieve consistency with potential updates.

We expect Scottish Government’s Review of the Fair Work Guidance to conclude shortly according to a ‘late summer/early autumn’ timeline provided by the More Homes and Fair Work Team at Scottish Government. Following the updated guidance, SFHA will publish our member’s briefing on RSL compliance requirements that has been delayed since the start of the year.

In the meantime, we have requested a statement of confirmation from More Homes to publicly clarify that RSLs are not responsible for ensuring real living wage conditions are met by sub-contractors. We understand this is a particularly challenging and onerous condition for members that contract maintenance work, repairs, construction, adaptations, etc., and that mixed guidance provided by local Area Teams is adding to confusion throughout the Scottish Government’s review period.  

While many members are already compliant with FWF, some have expressed the following:

• Concern that the Real Living Wage conditionality will inhibit RSL efforts to upskill trades and develop local workforces, particularly for RSLs that are investing heavily in modern apprenticeships and in-house maintenance and repair teams, or remote/rural RSLs. Concerns include a lack of financial support to help RSLs meet this requirement within the implementation timeline, and in the context of other delivery delays and pressures.
• Concern that different Scottish Government Departments are issuing different advice on the FWF criteria, including More Homes and Better Homes.
• Concern that ensuring sub-contractors and suppliers pay the real living wage to their employees (particularly smaller contractors) is not viable and administratively burdensome.
• Questions about the sufficiency of Fair Work Statements.
• A lack of transparency around the criteria, consultation, and phasing in time of conditionality that has affected contract timelines.

Please email apidgeon@sfha.co.uk / sfitton@sfha.co.uk to discuss Fair Work First Guidance or feed into the above.

Current Fair Work First Guidance remains available in full on Scot Gov website, including information about exceptions to the conditions (SFHA has previously been advised that exceptions will only be made for the real Living Wage criteria, limited to a defined amount of time and with stipulations for ‘progress towards meeting conditionality.’ We were also advised at the time that members should not expect to be excepted from effective employee voice conditions.) We will keep members updated as Scottish Government concludes its FWF review and provides answers to our questions.