I welcome the opportunity to give evidence on the draft Enhanced Enforcement Areas Scheme (Scotland) Regulations 2015.
Drew Smith lodged an amendment at stage 3 of the Housing (Scotland) Bill introducing the provisions on enhanced enforcement areas and requiring draft regulations to be laid by 1 April 2015. He made it clear in his remarks supporting his amendment that the power to designate enhanced enforcement areas would be used only in exceptional circumstances. On that basis, I was happy to support his amendment to the bill.
The regulations, if approved, will enable local authorities to apply for new discretionary powers to assist them in tackling acute problems in a geographical area.
In order to make an application, the local authority must consider that the area has an overprovision or a concentration of private rented sector accommodation that is characterised as being of a poor environmental standard, being overcrowded, and having a prevalence of antisocial behaviour.
I was clear throughout Parliament’s scrutiny of the bill that I want to raise standards across the private rented sector. That is why the Housing (Scotland) Act 2014 includes a number of new measures that were supported by the Infrastructure and Capital Investment Committee and by Parliament. The act introduces regulation of letting agents; enables disputes in the private rented sector to be transferred to the first-tier tribunal for Scotland; gives local authorities discretionary powers to report breaches of the repairing standard to the private rented housing panel, along with the power to enter a house to establish whether there is a breach; and places duties on landlords to provide carbon monoxide detectors and carry out electrical safety checks every five years.
I also want to see local authorities making effective use of their statutory powers for landlord registration. Work is under way to revise the landlord registration guidance to support them to do that.
We published our consultation on the policy approach to the regulations in autumn last year, following discussions with individual local authorities and the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. We received 33 responses, including from 13 local authorities, the Scottish Association of Landlords, Shelter Scotland and a number of registered tenant organisation networks. All were all broadly supportive of our approach.
Enhanced enforcement area designation is intended to be used to tackle only the most difficult and extreme circumstances where a local authority has not been able to improve conditions in an area by using its existing powers. That is why the draft regulations require a local authority, when applying for designation of an area, to set out its wider strategy for improving standards in the private rented sector.
I want to ensure that we take a proportionate approach to the process, so the draft regulations give local authorities the flexibility to bring forward the most relevant evidence of the three criteria specified in the 2014 act to support an application.
Local authorities have a wide range of existing powers to tackle poor standards in the private rented sector. When an area is designated as an EEA, the local authority will have a number of new discretionary powers that it can use in that area and which will give it a new set of tools to tackle an exceptional set of circumstances.
The powers will enable local authorities to require a landlord who is applying for registration or renewing their registration to provide an enhanced criminal record certificate to evidence that they are a fit and proper person; to require landlords to produce the documents that are specified in the draft regulations for inspection by local authority officers to evidence that they are complying with their related duties and responsibilities as landlords; and to authorise a person to enter a house or building to ensure that the accommodation is safe, well managed and of good quality.
As set out in the 2014 act, the draft regulations also set out the purposes for which local authorities can use those powers. They are: to enable the local authority to exercise its functions under landlord registration legislation; to ensure the safety and upkeep of the house; to ensure that information is available to tenants; and to enable the local authority to decide whether the house and the building that it is in are safe, well managed and of good quality.
In drafting the regulations, the Scottish Government has tried to give local authorities additional powers to respond flexibly and proportionately to exceptional circumstances. I am happy to answer any questions.