Every year we seek feedback about proposed changes to our ABS programme guidance from every local council. This guidance is also shared in draft with COSLA for information and comment. Scottish Government officials are also regularly approached by individual councils to discuss and where needed, to agree a higher intensity of grant-in-aid for projects with extra costs.

The Scottish Government has provided a grant of £0.5 million to Care and Repair Scotland to support assistance for home owners with the installation of alarms to meet the new Scottish standard. Up to £400,000 of this grant may be used to purchase alarms, and up to £100,000 may be allocated to local offices for costs associated with fitting alarms.

The Scottish Government provides funding to local councils through our Area Based Schemes to deliver energy efficiency improvements to households living in or at risk of fuel poverty. The guidance for the scheme specifies an average amount per property for the intensity of grant-in-aid that can usually be provided for fabric improvements.

This maxima was increased by £500 for all categories of property from 1 April 2020. This reflected feedback about increased costs of providing insulation received from all 32 councils and managing agents involved in delivery of the programme in
‎ 2019-20. Local councils can provide a higher intensity of grant-in-aid for households in extreme fuel poverty or other relevant factors, for example where there are additional costs due to non-standard construction type.

The £0.5 million funding has been granted to Care and Repair Scotland to provide assistance in the business year 2021-22. Information on the number of homes assisted will be collected, and will be available at the end of this period.

The Scottish Government does not provide loans to home owners for the purpose of installing fire alarms that are compliant with the new standard. Local authorities have broad discretionary powers to provide assistance to home owners, in connection with work on private homes, including assistance by way of loans. Local authorities are best placed to determine what types of assistance are provided in their area, subject to local resources and priorities.

We recognise that some owners will have more difficulty, particularly with the option to fit alarms themselves, and we have provided £0.5 million additional funding for Care and Repair Scotland to provide help installing alarms for older and disabled home owners. We have also provided £1 million to the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service to provide alarms for owners who are considered most vulnerable to the risk of fire.

The Scottish Government accepted recommendation 22 of the independent Barclay Review of Non-Domestic Rates, which proposed a condition to tackle a known tax avoidance measure that all owners or occupiers of self-catering properties must provide evidence of 70 days of actual letting per year in order to qualify as non-domestic.

The Scottish Budget 2021-22 stated: “Due to COVID-19, the implementation of the requirement that self-catering properties be let for 70 days or more in order to be classed as non-domestic, as recommended by the independent Barclay Review of non-domestic rates, was initially delayed and will now be in place for 2021-22.” The Scottish Government will shortly lay secondary legislation with the Scottish Parliament to deliver this change although how the changes will be administered is a matter for independent Local Assessors.

The valuation of all non-domestic property is a matter for Scottish Assessors, including requests for information pertaining to the non-domestic property. Assessors may request information from a proprietor, tenant or occupier of a property as well as any other relevant person for the purposes of valuation and a response is required by legislation to be returned within 28 days. These information provision obligations are applied to all non-domestic properties, including self-catering properties. As set out in the Non-Domestic Rates (Scotland) Act, failure to respond within that period may result in a civil penalty.

In 2020-21 and 2021-22, Assessors received additional resources to support the implementation of the Barclay Review.

The following tables presents the estimated value of Small Business Bonus Scheme (SBBS) relief as at 1 June 2021, awarded to self-catering properties, broken down by assessor and local authority, for properties receiving 100% SBBS, 25% SBBS, and other percentages of SBBS (e.g. when combined with other reliefs). These tables include all self-catering properties in receipt of SBBS relief. The Scottish Government cannot reliably estimate the cumulative rateable value for each ratepayer and can therefore not state the number of self-catering units with a combined rateable value of £35,000 in receipt of the Small Business Bonus Scheme relief. However, ratepayers with a combined rateable value of £35,000 may still be eligible for SBBS relief where the individual property has a rateable value up to £18,000.

Table 1: Value (£ thousands) of SBBS relief awarded to self-catering properties by assessor area and SBBS rate, as at 1 June 2021

The following tables presents the number of self-catering properties on the Valuation Roll as at 1 October 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 (30 September data is not available), broken down by assessor and local authority.

Table 1: Number of self-catering properties as at 1 October 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021, by assessor area.

The following table presents the estimated number of self-catering units receiving Small Business Bonus Scheme(SBBS) relief as at 1 June 2021, broken down by assessor and local authority, for properties (unit owners cannot be reliably identified from the information held) receiving 100% SBBS, 25% SBBS, and other percentages of SBBS (e.g. when combined with other reliefs). These tables include all self-catering properties in receipt of SBBS relief. The Scottish Government cannot reliably estimate the cumulative rateable value for each ratepayer and can therefore not state the number of self-catering units with a combined rateable value of £35,000 in receipt of the Small Business Bonus Scheme relief. However, ratepayers with a combined rateable value of £35,000 may still be eligible for SBBS relief where the individual property has a rateable value up to £18,000.

Table 1: Number of self-catering properties receiving SBBS as at 1 June 2021, by percentage of SBBS and assessor area.

Further the government’s answer to question S6W-01541 by Shona Robison on 10 August, my officials have now received a complete response from members of the Building Standards (Fire Safety) Review panel.

Of those responses:

• 1 member of the 2018-19 panel (21 members) and 3 members of the 2020-21 panel (26 members) had a role in designing BS 8414; and
• 1 member of the 2018-19 panel (21 members) and 3 members of the 2020-21 panel (26 members) have worked for organisations that carry out BS 8414 fire tests on behalf of commercial sponsors.