Cost of Living (Tenant Protection) (Scotland) Bill: business regulatory impact assessment

Scottish Firms Impact Test

As part of our engagement to develop the Bill, the Scottish Government have held discussions with a number of stakeholders. This focused on understanding the impact and difficulties from the measures on the for private and social landlords in Scotland.

We have committed to work in partnership with the social rented sector to determine the best way forwards, should the measures be extended. This will focused on monitoring over the coming months to determine what action will be appropriate up to and beyond 31 March 2023 and discussing the impacts of different options on the sector.

Institutional investors favour certainty and there will be further engagement with this sector as the detail of the emergency legislation is published and as part of the ongoing regular review of the provisions.

UK Finance indicated some concern about lender confidence. By allowing evictions for lenders evicting to sell as a result of a mortgage repossession we seek to maintain the confidence of lenders. Very few evictions of this sort take place and in this case the landlord is likely to be financially vulnerable. Internal analysis of published eviction decisions in 2022 (Jan to August) by the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland suggests that there were 3 evictions on the basis of ground 2, property to be sold by lender.