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ANNEX B
Regional Seminars
A series of regional seminars were held between 25 August and 10 September in Irvine, Dundee, Inverness, Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow, to which RSLs and local authorities were invited. The purpose of the seminars was to advise stakeholders about the Government's initial thinking and seek their views on aspects of investment reform.
A range of views were expressed by participants at each of the seminars. Overall, the views may be summarised under six headings:
1 Being more strategic and value for money
Most were sympathetic to the aims of developing a more strategic approach and seeking to improve value for money. However, there was some scepticism as to where cost efficiencies could be found.
2 The credit crunch and the 2008 changes to HAG
There were some early indications that RSLs were coping with the tighter grant assumptions. However, several felt that they were already seeking to reduce operating costs, and that the credit crunch made it very difficult for them to drive subsidy costs further down through use of savings or adoption of more commercial borrowing practices.
3 Lead Developers
Reaction to the concept of lead developers was mixed. However, in some parts of Scotland progress along these lines is already taking place, and in some others it is recognised that this would be a sensible evolution for the RSL sector.
4 The future for community-based associations
Some RSLs were positive and encouraged progress with reform as they were ready and keen to engage with the new approaches. However, other RSLs contended that small community-based RSLs developing at their own hand would be better placed to serve the needs of local communities and to innovate, both on quality and on value for money.
5 Competition
The majority of RSLs were wary about the introduction of competition. They were concerned that competitive mechanisms would need to be designed with care if they were not to introduce perverse incentives.
6 Local authorities' role
There was considerable interest in the future role of local authorities, and requests for clarity on how future competitive approaches could integrate with local authorities' strategic role regarding social housing developments in their areas.
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