SCOTLAND is in the grip of a housing crisis.
According to Shelter Scotland, the charity that has for the past 50 years campaigned to bring an end to homelessness, decent and affordable homes are getting further from many people’s reach, with the average local authority rent increasing by nearly 50 per cent in the past decade while one in 10 households are currently affected by dampness or condensation and 39 per cent are living in fuel poverty.
While this means that many families are living in substandard accommodation, figures released by the Scottish Government showed that the number of people assessed as being homeless or likely to become homeless reduced in 2016/17, although the number of households in temporary accommodation increased.
For Fiona McPhail, principal solicitor at Shelter Scotland, this is a function of the fact that as of 2012 Scotland has “a strong legal framework for homeless people” although she stresses that homelessness and the threat of becoming homeless is far from a resolved issue in the country.
“In 2012 priority need was abolished so people don’t have to demonstrate they are vulnerable or have children - anyone who a local authority has reason to believe is homeless should be given temporary accommodation,” she said.
However, Ms McPhail noted things do not always work out that way in practice with some local authorities, which are themselves feeling the impact of austerity measures, failing to adhere to the letter of the law when it comes to ensuring homeless people can access their rights.
“Sometimes people are told to come back tomorrow because the local authority has got nothing to give them - and people take that at face value,” Ms McPhail said.
“People who don’t know their rights take what they are told at face value but the statutory obligation on the local authority is that if they believe someone may be homeless they have to provide temporary accommodation.
“That’s not dependant on availability of stock or on them having a vulnerability. That’s what the law says.”
As a result, much of the work Ms McPhail and her team of four solicitors and two legal representatives does is focused on enforcing the law on behalf of clients who have come to Shelter when they are at their most vulnerable.
“Nine times out of 10 Shelter advisers are able to advocate successfully on behalf of homeless individuals, but if not it is escalated to the legal team and can lead to court action,” Ms McPhail said.
“By the time they come to legal services they are already homeless. It’s at the urgent and crisis end; it’s people who are in dire straits.”
In general, the threat of court action is enough to make local authorities reassess their position, with Ms McPhail noting that only a small number of cases actually make it as far as the Court of Session. Of those that have made it that far, all have resolved at the last minute, meaning the issue of homeless rights has never actually been tested in court.
Eviction is a different matter, with the Shelter team regularly appearing in sheriff courts across the country to fight eviction orders, most of which come from the social rented sector.
“By the time these cases get to us people need representation. The threat of homelessness is very real,” Ms McPhail said.
“If you look at the upward trend in social rented sector evictions they relate to rent arrears - those are not people who can instruct solicitors.”
Though the Shelter legal service is heavily involved in helping people fend of eviction, it also plays an active role in shaping policy in this area, participating in consultations such as one that will result in private rented sector eviction cases being passed from the sheriff courts to the First-tier Tribunal as of December this year.
As the tribunal’s Property and Housing Chamber is dedicated to the housing sector the aim is to have disputes resolved in a more specialist arena in front of an interventionist rather than adversarial panel.
“Where we feel there’s a need to make the administration of justice more efficient we are very keen to highlight that these actions concern an individual and their family,” Ms McPhail said. “We’re talking about someone’s home and the consequences that has.”
Indeed, Ms McPhail said it is vital she speaks up on behalf of “a client group who tend to feel powerless” because “eviction is the most severe form of interference in a person’s life and is at the most severe end of housing”.
The hope is that if the organisation can play a role in halting such interference then it will go some way towards reducing homelessness too.
Though she admitted that Shelter’s legal service is not able to help everyone who finds themselves on Scotland’s streets or facing eviction from their homes – often because people simply are not aware that they have rights - Ms McPhail said any small victory her team can win helps in the overall fight against homelessness.
“Through helping some individuals in the course of strategic litigation we can help improve or clarify issues for a wider group of people and through word of mouth people might realise they can defend eviction action to protect their home or can take steps to have dampness removed,” she said, adding: “Access to justice is about empowering people.”
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