SFHA calls for capital investment in housebuilding ahead of UK Budget

Further capital investment in housebuilding are among SFHA’s key policy asks ahead of next Wednesday’s UK Government Budget.

The Budget on 30 October, will be the first delivered by Chancellor, Rachel Reeves MP, since Labour returned to power in July’s General Election. It is expected to set out a series of tax and spending plans which will significantly influence December’s Scottish Government Budget.

Whilst the majority of housing policy is devolved to the Scottish Parliament, SFHA is calling on the UK Government to commit to significantly increased capital investment in housebuilding, as this would result in additional money for Scotland’s capital budget.

And whilst it would be up to the Scottish Government to determine how any additional funding is spent, Scottish Ministers have repeatedly committed to invest any additional spend in the Affordable Housing Supply Programme.

Some of the other policy levers which sit at Westminster include responsibility for large parts of the social security system, and SFHA will again call for the level of Universal Credit to be increased to cover the cost of household essentials.

Following the UK Budget, members will receive a full briefing on what the spending decisions are likely to mean for your organisation and tenants.

SFHA has also begun significant work on our policy asks for the Scottish Budget in December and will set these out in further detail in the coming weeks once we have analysed next week’s UK Budget.