Short term lets - licensing scheme part 2: supplementary guidance for licensing authorities, letting agencies and platforms

Annex B - Design Principles

The regulatory framework should be:

1. Proportionate: minimising bureaucracy and barriers to innovation or tourism and encouraging high-tech entrepreneurship, to benefit the Scottish economy

2. Promoting safe practice: for hosts, guests and local residents - includes health, fire safety and prevention of nuisance or crime

3. Robust: with no loopholes in regulation and taxation

4. Responsive: councils are empowered to implement the regime that responds to local needs, of both residents and businesses (e.g. new festivals starting up)

5. Built on existing powers and solutions as much as possible, e.g. existing noise and nuisance powers

6. Fair across the hospitality sector, maintaining a level playing field both between new entrants and established operators and between short-term letting and other parts of the hospitality sector

7. Flexible and future-proofed: not assuming that today’s approaches or platforms will be the approach taken in future

8. Easy to understand by all: visitors, hosts and platforms, this will aid enforcement as different participants will be able to identify compliance failures

9. Cost effective: the approach should seek to minimise administrative costs to all participants

10. Straightforward and effective to enforce: making good use of existing enforcement mechanisms and data that is easy to obtain.