Housing emergency ‘only set to deepen’, ministers warned

The number of new homes being built in Scotland could fall to just 5,000 by 2031, a report has said, with Homes for Scotland warning the housing emergency is “only set to deepen”.

The industry body said 19,797 new properties were built in 2024 – the most recent year for which figures are available – but its research suggests this could fall as low as 5,000.

It claimed this is “a direct result of failing planning policy”.

It warned Scotland’s housing emergency – first declared by ministers in May 2024 – could “develop into catastrophic proportions unless the Scottish Government acts now to intervene effectively”.

Jane Wood, HFS chief executive, said: “In stark terms, Scotland does not have the deliverable land that is required to maintain a sufficient housing pipeline over the next 10 years.

“This means that far from being solved any time soon, the housing emergency is only set to deepen.”

The Government has said there are 164,000 homes for which consent has been granted that have yet to be built across Scotland, but HFS said this figure “fails to reflect the reality and complexity of the home building process”.

Of these, HFS said just over half – 86,000 proposed properties – are planned for sites under the control of home builders with detailed planning permission in place. Three-quarters of these developments range from four homes to more than 3,000.

But there are 43,000 proposed properties under the control of non-builders, HFS said.

Its report also made clear it is “concerned that new housing completions will continue to fall due to the lack of deliverable land to build on”.

It added: “Without deliverable sites, the home building sector will contract, given that evidence from HFS members has found that it takes almost four years from the pre-application planning process being initiated to the first occupation of homes for developments of 50-plus homes.”

The report blames the lack of land for housebuilding on the introduction of Scotland’s National Planning Framework 4 (NPF4) in 2023, saying this means 60% of local development plans (LDPs) – which set out where different developments can be sited – are out of date.

It said new development plans are, on average, not due to be published until 2029.

The report added the situation in Scotland is “in sharp contrast to the emerging position in England”, where “mechanisms are being introduced to increase the supply of housing, providing developers with the confidence they need to invest”.

HFS director of planning Kevin Murphy said: “The truth is, planning policy, particularly transition from NPF4 to LDPs, is exacerbating rather than addressing the fundamental problem which lies at the heart of the matter – the chronic undersupply of effective land on which to build homes.

“In the context of only 1.4% of Scotland’s land being in residential use, it is a shocking and untenable state of affairs that more than one in four Scottish households have been identified as being in some form of housing need.

“Frustratingly, this new report only confirms the specific concerns we have been expressing to ministers and officials since before NPF4 was introduced.

“However, rather than the Scottish Government addressing these and taking the necessary corrective action, we find ourselves with yet another consultation which describes ‘a living pipeline of land’ with planning permission being ‘in place for at least 164,000 homes’ which have not yet been built.

“As our research shows, this simply isn’t the case. Such narrative belies the wide-ranging, lengthy, complex and costly challenges that the home building sector has to face in delivering much-needed homes of all tenures.”

The Scottish Government has been contacted for comment.