Tag Archives: government targets

• Pat McFadden: government’s targets will be meaningless unless they reverse disastrous mistakes
• Scot Lib Dems reveal 27,954 empty homes across Scotland
• Key mental health targets breached for 168,000 people

Pat McFadden: government’s targets will be meaningless unless they reverse disastrous mistakes

Responding to Pat McFadden on the Laura Kuenssberg show on the government’s plan for change, Liberal Democrat Cabinet Office spokesperson Sarah Olney MP said:

The government’s targets will be utterly meaningless unless they reverse the disastrous mistakes made so far.

Scrapping the Winter Fuel Payment will force vulnerable pensioners to choose between heating and eating and their family farm tax risks a lost generation of farmers.

Ministers must swallow their pride, recognise the damage that these proposals will do and scrap the family farm tax and reinstate Winter Fuel Payments.

Scot Lib Dems reveal 27,954 empty homes across Scotland

Scottish Liberal Democrat housing spokesperson Paul McGarry has today accused the SNP of a “massive failure” to tackle the housing crisis after new research by his party uncovered that almost 28,000 homes are lying empty across Scotland.

A freedom of information request submitted by Scottish Liberal Democrats asked all 32 of Scotland’s local councils how many homes were classed as long-term vacant, meaning they have been empty for longer than 6 months.

The request found that:

• Across the 30 councils with data on how many homes are long-term vacant, there are 27,954 long-term vacant properties.
• There are 3,093 long-term vacant homes in Edinburgh, 2,929 in Aberdeenshire, 2,801 in Glasgow and 2,584 in Argyll & Bute.
• Of the councils with data for how long they had been vacant, 1,420 had been vacant for longer than a year, while 2,609 had been vacant for more than 5 years and 5,937 more than 10 years.
• In 2023/24, only 579 properties were brought back into use in Glasgow- just 20% of the number of long-term vacant homes.
• In 2023/24, just 71 properties were brought back into use in Dumfries & Galloway, despite the number of long-term vacant properties being 1,211.