Housing needs

The impacts of the housing crisis on business in Skye and Lochalsh

During the last 4 months we’ve been working on an important study, commissioned jointly by Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Lochalsh & Skye Housing Association, SkyeConnect Tourist Destination Management Organisation and The Highland Council, which has sought to measure the impacts of the lack of affordable housing in Skye and Lochalsh on businesses, in particular their efforts to recruit staff.

The study has involved a mixture of approaches including an online survey of 143 businesses and ten one-to-one in depth consultations with a range of organisations operating in the area (including representatives from several larger private sector companies, the NHS and housing organisations).

The survey results were published earlier this month, revealing that the scale of the problem is significantly worse than public agencies had previously estimated. Headline findings from the research included the following:

  • Between 1300 and 1700 job vacancies are currently unfilled because of the lack of accommodation.

  • 2 in 5 businesses are currently experiencing recruitment problems with the most significant issues amongst businesses with 5 employees or more

  • 29% of businesses have offered a job to an individual who has decided not to take the role. Accommodation issues were mentioned in 50% of these cases

  • 1 in 5 people employed in businesses in the area live outside Skye and Lochalsh and 1 in 4 don’t live in their own home

  • 25% of businesses expect the number of positions they need to fill to increase over the next three years

  • 65% expect recruitment of permanent posts to get harder and 58% expect the situation to worsen in relation to seasonal posts

Our report concluded that the housing shortage is already impacting on the local economy with many businesses forced to reduce the services they deliver or choosing to not invest in the growth of their business. Looking ahead, the chronic lack of supply of affordable housing is constraining economic growth and limiting the ability of businesses to respond to development opportunities across the area.

However, respondents to the study also highlighted that there are many potential solutions to the problems including more investment in all forms of affordable housing. There is no one-size-fits-all solution and government policy needs to be adaptive and sensitive to remote and island needs.

As shown below the release of the report has generated much interest in the press. Our clients for this project will now use the results from the survey to lobby Governments and other public and private sector agencies for the investment they feel is required to alleviate the housing crisis and protect the economy of Skye and Lochalsh.

We look forward to continuing to support our clients for this project in the sharing of results. If you would like to find out more about the research please get in touch.

 

Helping address the housing crisis in Badenoch and Strathspey

Introduction

Recently, 56 Degree Insight have been working with local organisations and Chambers of Commerce in various parts of Scotland to understand the scale of the housing shortage in some parts of the country which is limiting economic sustainability and growth in these areas. Work undertaken in the first area covered - Badenoch and Strathspey - has just been completed, and a Housing Summit took place in Aviemore today and the press release reproduced below from Cairngorm Business Partnership provides further details and the response from the Scottish Government Ministers involved:

Kate Forbes, Highland MSP and Cabinet Secretary for Housing address Cairngorms housing Summit

Business leaders, public sector and community representatives came together today to discuss the housing crisis in Badenoch & Strathspey with Kate Forbes, Highland MSP who is also Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Economy and Shona Robison, MSP, Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice, Housing and Local Government.

The summit at Macdonald Aviemore Resort and led by the Cairngorms Business Partnership brought together some of the significant employers in the area and leaders from Highland Council, Cairngorms National Park Authority, Highland Housing Alliance, Communities Housing Trust, Government Officials, Highlands and Islands Enterprise and representatives of the local community.

The summit discussed work underway to help people, who want to live in, work in and care for the area, find homes.

Ms Robison, who opened the summit, commented “Good quality, affordable housing is essential to help attract and retain people in Scotland’s remote and rural communities. As part of our £3.4 billion Affordable Housing Supply Programme we have delivered more than 6,000 affordable homes in rural and island communities between 2016-17 and 2020/21.

Building on this, we are now working to deliver 110,000 affordable homes across Scotland by 2032, of which 10% will be in our remote, rural and island communities. This will be backed by a Remote, Rural & Islands Housing Action Plan – we now want to engage with community organisations and those in the public and private sector to ensure it delivers for people in these areas.”

The results of a recent business housing demand survey, conducted by 56 Degree insight, were released at the summit. The results found that:

  • two in three businesses state the lack of affordable housing has inhibited their ability to recruit new staff (68%)

  • 39% indicated that this was having a ‘major impact’ on their business.

  • over half of the businesses (59%) expected the issues to worsen if no action was taken.

  • the meeting heard that, right now, there are 180 vacancies in Badenoch and Strathspey listed on the Indeed website alone. Survey results suggest that around 50 of these will not be filled due to a shortage of suitable homes.

The survey was commissioned by Highland Council and the Cairngorms Business Partnership. The Scottish Government, the National Park Authority and the Highland Council have undertaken to take the results into account when assessing housing needs analysis for Badenoch and Strathspey and therefore funding and allocations for public sector supported housing.

The summit also discussed an innovative scheme being led by the Cairngorms Business Partnership (CBP) to improve the prospects for local employees looking to rent homes in Badenoch and Strathspey. In a pilot partnership with Highland Council and the Highland Housing Alliance (HHA,) with support from Highlands and Islands Enterprise, the CBP will establish a not for profit, business led, organisation that will offer rent void guarantees to HHA and in return properties will be allocated based on local employment needs. The initial pilot for 4 homes in Aviemore is expected to be available for occupation in summer 2022.

Commenting on the scheme, Mark Tate, chief executive of the Cairngorms Business Partnership, commented “The lack of affordable homes for people who want to work in, live in and care for the National Park, has long been a problem. This past summer it has severely impacted business recovery. This pilot clearly demonstrates that businesses are prepared to make a contribution to help alleviate the problem and ensure new mid market rent housing is available for people working locally. We very much see all of the work we are discussing here today as work that we can replicate across the National Park and can be useful for many rural communities beyond that”.

Convener of Highland Council, local councillor and Aviemore resident, Bill Lobban added “The biggest issue facing our community is the provision of affordable housing. Our economy is almost exclusively tourism based so we do need accommodation for tourists but we also desperately need homes for the local people who live and work here many of whom serve the tourists who come here in their droves. There has to be a balance and currently that balance has shifted far too far away from the provision of affordable housing and we must redress that balance as a matter of urgency.”

Finally the summit heard, from the Communities Housing Trust who have been commissioned by the CBP with support from HIE, about a longer term ambition to develop a community of around 80 homes from short term seasonal worker accommodation to homes for people to build, buy, buy to rent and rent of varying sizes built around a community of local people; fitting for a National Park delivering economic, community and environmental sustainability. This scheme has the ambition of keeping at least 80% of those homes for local employees and people who want to live, work and care for the area in perpetuity.

There then followed a positive discussion about how these schemes can be improved further and a commitment from all parties to build on these solutions in a way that allows them to be scaled and replicated across the National Park and further.

Xander McDade, Convener of the Cairngorms National Park Authority, said: “The availability of affordable housing is an issue of profound importance to the communities and businesses of the National Park, something which is again coming across loud and clear from our consultation on the next Park Partnership Plan. Having recently increased the affordable housing requirement to 45% in key settlements, we welcome today’s announcements and look forward to working with partners on substantially increasing affordable housing as set out in the draft National Park Partnership Plan.”

Closing the meeting Ms Forbes commented “I am delighted that the Housing Minister, Shona Robison, is spending time with businesses to seek to resolve this major issue.There are tools at our disposal, in terms of building and securing more housing, but we need to make sure it is the right kind of housing for those who are most in need.”

Understanding how housing challenges in the Highlands are impacting rural businesses

There’s been a great deal of news coverage recently regarding the significant challenges facing businesses across the UK when it comes to the recruitment and retention of staff. Businesses in a whole range of sectors are facing a ‘perfect storm’ of factors including reduced access to labour following our departure from the European Union and changing patterns of demand caused by Covid 19.

However, in addition to these challenges, As reported in our blog on 3rd August, the April to June 2021 Cairngorms Business Barometer found that many business based in this area were also experiencing recruitment and retention challenges because of a lack of housing for their employees to live in.

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Our survey and anecdotal evidence gained from conversations with businesses suggests that with increasing house prices (partly driven by the number of houses becoming second homes or holiday accommodation), this issue is becoming increasingly urgent for employers in many parts of rural Scotland, affecting a wide range of sectors from tourism businesses to food and drink producers.

Indeed, it is feared that this issue could significantly constrain the potential growth of many businesses in areas such as the Cairngorms or even threaten the survival of some.

To better understand this issue we were commissioned last month by Cairngorms Business Partnership to undertake new research to understand the scale of the issue amongst business in the Badenoch and Strathspey area and we are delighted to announce that we have also just been commissioned to undertake a similar study in Lochaber on behalf of Lochaber Chamber of Commerce.

In both areas we will soon be launching surveys of businesses which will collect evidence to ensure we can determine the scale of the issue currently, details of the sectors, skills and roles most affected plus an understanding of how the issues is impacting businesses.

By collecting this evidence we hope that these studies will play a key role in future decisions on housing provision in the Highlands, helping business to survive and grow sustainably.

If you’d like to find out more about these studies or how we can support your with your research needs – including surveys of businesses get in touch.