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4 Housing Quality

4.1 The Scottish Housing Quality Standard

67. The Scottish Housing Quality Standard ( SHQS) was announced by the Minister for Communities in February 2004 ²⁴. All social landlords must ensure that all of their dwellings pass the SHQS by 2015. The SHQS consists of 5 criteria; the dwelling must be:

• Above the statutory Tolerable Standard; ²⁵
• Free from serious disrepair;
• Energy efficient;
• With modern facilities and services;
• Healthy, safe and secure.

68. Estimates of failure rates from the 2002 SHCS were produced following the announcement. Fieldwork for the 2003/4 survey began in October 2003, before the final clarification of the SHQS in July 2004 ²⁶. Thus the 2003/4 survey (and the 2002 survey) did not gather all the information required to fully assess dwellings against the SHQS. The surveys did not cover the number of sockets in the kitchen, safety of gas and oil systems, kitchen layout, kitchen safety, kitchen storage and disrepair to attached garages. This was rectified in the 2004/5 and 2005/6 surveys in which all of these areas were included. Given the profile of failures across the SHQS criteria, we believe the addition of this information would not materially affect the estimates of overall failure already published.

69. However, in preparing the SHQS tables this year, an error in the SHQS analysis for 2004/05 and 2005/06 was found. The error was in the SHQS assessment of common entrances for dwellings with common parts. The figures for the SHQS for previous years have now been revised.

70. Approximately 68% of dwellings in Scotland failed the SHQS in 2007 (Table 24). This estimate is lower than the rates of failure for 2002 (77%) and 2003/4 (71%).

71. The majority of dwellings that failed the SHQS failed on the energy efficiency criterion. Full efficient central heating ²⁷ is a strict requirement of this criterion. (Dwellings with 'inefficient' central heating, even if it is full, will fail). Also crucial is the presence of thermal insulation measures (such as loft, hot water tank and wall insulation, where applicable) in the dwelling. The number of failures on the modern facilities and services criteria has increased slightly since 2002 because of the additional information collected in the 2004/5, 2005/6 and 2007 surveys.

Table 24: Scottish Housing Quality Standard 2007 (000s and %)

Figure 8: Dwellings by failure to meet Scottish Housing Quality Standard by tenure 2007 (%)

72. The proportions of dwellings with more than one criteria failure are slightly higher than for the 2002 and 2003/4 surveys, with around 1 in 5 dwellings failing on more than one of the criteria (Table 25) but 2002 and 2003/4 have not been revised because some SHQS elements were not recorded.

Table 25: Number of SHQS failures 2002, 2003/4 and 2007 (000s and Column %)

73. Table 26 shows the number of dwellings passing or failing the SHQS by private or social sector tenure.

Table 26: SHQS by Tenure 2002, 2003/4 and 2007 (000s)²⁸

74. Table 27 shows that the private sector's failure rates overall are roughly the same as the social sector in the period 2002-2007. The Scottish Government has stated that the entire stock of every social landlord must meet the SHQS criteria by 2015. Private owners and private landlords are currently under no obligation to bring their properties up to a standard which meets the SHQS.

Table 27: SHQS by Tenure 2002, 2003/4 and 2007 (Column %)

75. Table 28 shows that dwellings in rural areas are slightly more likely to fail the SHQS.

Table 28: SHQS urban/rural breakdown (000s and %)

4.2 Dampness and Condensation

76. Tables 29 and 30 ²⁹ indicate that just over 1 in 10 dwellings have condensation in at least one room, whilst very few dwellings in Scotland suffer from either rising or penetrating damp (around 1 in 20). These figures are largely unchanged from those reported from 2002 to 2005/6. 'Any condensation' and 'Any rising or penetrating damp' cover anything from a small damp patch or area of condensation on a single wall in one room to prevalence throughout a dwelling.

Table 29: Presence of condensation in dwelling (000s and %)

Table 30: Presence of rising or penetrating damp in dwelling (000s and %)

4.3 Disrepair

77. Data on the state of disrepair of each dwelling is gathered in the physical inspection part of the SHCS. A range of elements - both internal and external - are assessed for the presence of disrepair, the urgency of disrepair (for external and common elements only), the extent of disrepair and in some cases the residual life of the element. These assessments allow an overall picture of the state of dwelling disrepair to be built up. We can therefore estimate the extent of disrepair of various types in Scotland's occupied housing stock. Definitions of the different types of disrepair are given in paragraph 120.

78. 'Any disrepair' covers ALL disrepair, irrespective of extent or seriousness, and can therefore mean anything from a leaking bathroom tap to a missing roof.

79. Table 31 shows the presence of 'any disrepair' by age of dwelling. Almost eighty percent (79%) of dwellings in Scotland have some disrepair. Older dwellings are more likely to have some form of disrepair with those built before 1919 being almost twice as likely to suffer disrepair as those built after 1982.

80. Around three quarters of private sector dwellings have some form of disrepair, compared to 84% of dwellings in the social sector. Dwellings in urban areas are more likely to experience some form of disrepair than those in rural areas.

81. For common and external elements the surveyor is asked to assess the urgency of disrepair. An urgent repair is one which, if not carried out, would cause the fabric of the building to deteriorate further and/or place the health and safety of the occupier at risk. Table 32 shows 'any disrepair' by 'urgency of disrepair'.

Table 31: Presence of any disrepair by age of dwelling, tenure and urban/rural indicator (000s and Row %)

82. Figure 9 shows the presence of urgent disrepair, disrepair to critical elements and extensive disrepair in dwellings which have some form of disrepair ( i.e. dwellings which have 'any disrepair' as defined above).

83. 'Any disrepair to critical elements' is defined as any disrepair to the critical elements of the dwelling. The critical elements are those whose condition is central to a dwelling being wind and weather proof, structurally stable and safeguarded against further rapid deterioration. Paragraph 120 lists the critical elements.

84. 'Extensive disrepair' is used to identify dwellings where the disrepair present is of relatively greater severity. A detailed definition of extensive disrepair is given in paragraph 120.

85. Urgent disrepair, extensive disrepair and disrepair to critical elements are all subsets of 'any disrepair'.

Table 32: Presence of any disrepair by urgency of disrepair (000s and Column %)

86. In just under half of dwellings (49%) with some form of disrepair, that disrepair is urgent. 72% of dwellings with disrepair have some disrepair to critical elements whilst over a third (37%) suffer from extensive disrepair. (Tables 33 and 34 and Figures 9a-9c).

87. Table 33 shows that the likelihood of experiencing disrepair to critical elements increases with age of dwelling. Just under three-quarters of pre-1919 dwellings have some form of disrepair to critical elements, compared to a quarter of those built after 1982. Just over half of owner-occupied dwellings or dwellings rented from housing associations/housing co-operatives have some form of critical disrepair compared with 61% of those which are rented from a private landlord and 69% of those rented from a local authority/other public sector organisation.

88. For almost two thirds of dwellings with some disrepair to critical elements the disrepair is urgent (Figure 10).

89. Table 34 shows that 29% of dwellings in Scotland have some extensive disrepair. Following the same trend as 'any disrepair' and 'disrepair to critical elements', newer dwellings are less likely to suffer from extensive disrepair. 43% of dwellings built before 1919 have some extensive disrepair compared with just 13% of those built after 1982. Housing association/housing co-operatives and owner-occupied dwellings are least likely to have some extensive disrepair.

90. In 58% of dwellings with extensive disrepair, the disrepair is classed as 'urgent' (Figure 11).

91. Figure 12 shows the proportion of dwellings in each age group which experience 'any disrepair', 'disrepair to critical elements' and 'extensive disrepair'.

Figure 9: Dwellings with any disrepair: (a) urgency of disrepair (b) some disrepair to critical elements and (c) some extensive disrepair (%)

Table 33: Disrepair to critical elements by age of dwelling, tenure and urban/rural indicator (000s and Row %)

Table 34: Extensive disrepair by age of dwelling, tenure and urban/rural indicator (000s and Row %)

Figure 10: Urgent disrepair in dwellings with some form of disrepair to critical elements (%)

Figure 11: Urgent disrepair in dwellings with some form of extensive disrepair (%)

Figure 12: Any, critical and extensive disrepair by age of dwelling (%)

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