Reflections from the National Manager
It’s been a busy few months since I joined the Scottish Empty Homes Partnership as National Manager, covering Lisa Borthwick’s maternity leave. I wanted to use this opportunity to introduce myself and reflect on the experience so far.
I spent most of my early career doing homelessness advice and advocacy, mostly in London but I’ve been in Scotland for over two years now. Although more recent roles have focussed on project management, everything I’ve done has had the same end goal: making sure people have a home to call their own. I see this role and work as a continuation of that.
It’s been a very exciting getting stuck in. The team have been helping me get up to speed and working hard to gather and disseminate the information on all the wonderful work that took place last year in 2023/24. I know it hasn’t been without its challenges but what’s struck me is the passion that people have. And it’s this passion that has resulted in 1,875 empties that have now becomes homes, the highest we’ve ever had. What an amazing achievement!
My first week saw the Scottish Government announce a national housing emergency, with empty homes featuring during the motion’s discussion. This shows how vital it is to respond to the need, especially if homes are being used as social or affordable housing. At the time of writing, we’ve had ten local authorities declaring housing with around 12,000 empty homes across them.
We know that there are lots of financial challenges which has been reflected in the highest total number of empty homes reported last year. We’ve had yearly figures of 1000+ (except for the pandemic year) leading to in 10,889 homes being brought back into use across Scotland since the partnership began in 2010.
Almost all local authorities across Scotland now have an empty homes service, indicating a recognition that this is an important area of investment. The partnership is in phase two of delivery, focusing on how we can strategically support the day-to-day work of Empty Homes Officers and other colleagues to bring more homes back into use as social and affordable housing. We will continue to share our learning and advocate for more to be done to make it easier to turn an empty home into a forever home for households across Scotland.
From the personal impacts on communities to helping local authorities meet their housing need through regenerating, revitalising or reclaiming unused properties, empty homes are an asset we need to maximise. I look forward to getting out more and meeting colleagues, communities and people interested in and working in this area and to hear from their expertise. Having grown up in and only ever lived in cities, I’m particularly interested in learning about the challenges and opportunities in the rural areas and seeing more of the beauty across Scotland.
To speak more on this, or invite me for a visit, you can reach me via email at [email protected]
You can find our Impact Report for 2023/24 here.