The Scottish Housing Regulator today published the final quarterly dashboard report, covering the period 1 January to 31 March 2022. The COVID-19 return was introduced by the Social Housing Resilience Group in March 2020 to help understand the impact of the pandemic and where support was needed.
The final COVID-19 quarterly return submitted by landlords shows there was a 16.5% increase compared to the last quarter in the number of applications to local authorities by people experiencing or threatened with homelessness, with 9,281 applications submitted. On 31 March 2022, 13,375 households remained in temporary accommodation; up 2% from the end of December 2021.
Both RSLs and local authorities saw small drops in their respective level of rent arrears, with an aggregate decrease from 6.5% of total rent due at the end of December 2021 to 6.2% at the end of March 2022. Local authority rent arrears continue to be higher than that of RSLs (8.48% and 4.26%, respectively).
The number of lets made by social landlords did increase slightly compared to the previous quarter, and social landlords allocated 37% of lets made to homeless households. Local authorities continue to allocate a higher proportion of lets made to homeless households compared to RSLs (45% and 29%, respectively).
The Regulator wrote to social landlords in March 2022 to confirm that the Social Housing Resilience Group had decided to end collection of the returns, and thanked social landlords for their co-operation in submitting the information over the last two years.
Notes to editors
- The Scottish Housing Regulator was established on 1 April 2011 under the Housing (Scotland) Act 2010. Its objective is to safeguard and promote the interests of tenants and others who use local authority and RSL housing services. The Regulator operates independently of Scottish Ministers and is accountable directly to the Scottish Parliament. It assumed its full regulatory responsibilities on 1 April 2012. The Regulator consists of the Chair and eight Board members. More information about the Regulator can be found on its website at housingregulator.gov.scot
- SHR sets out how it regulates social landlords in its published framework – Regulation of Social Housing in Scotland.