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2.1 The Housing (Homeless Persons) Act 1977, now consolidated into Part II of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1987 introduced statutory duties on housing authorities to assist those who are homeless or threatened with homelessness (potentially homeless), including providing accommodation in certain circumstances.
2.2 The legislation requires local authorities to make inquiries into the circumstances of applicants to satisfy themselves whether the applicant is homeless or potentially homeless. Once the authority is satisfied this is the case, it must also determine whether the applicant has a priority need, whether he/she became homeless intentionally and, in some cases, whether the applicant has a local connection with another authority in Scotland, England or Wales. A local connection with an authority means that the applicant normally resided in that area from choice, or because he/she was employed in or had family associations with it or for other special reasons.
2.3 Section 24 of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1987 defines homelessness for the purposes of the Act as follows. A person is homeless if he/she has no accommodation in Scotland, England or Wales. A person is also homeless if he/she has accommodation but cannot occupy it, for example because of a threat of violence. A person is potentially homeless (threatened with homelessness) if it is likely that he/she will become homeless within 28 days. A person is intentionally homeless if he/she deliberately did or failed to do anything which led to the loss of accommodation which it was reasonable for him/her to continue to occupy.
2.4 A household is regarded as having a priority need for accommodation if:
a. it contains dependent children, or
b. a member of the household is pregnant, or
c. a member of the household is vulnerable because of:
old age,
physical disability,
mental illness or handicap,
or other special reasons, or
d. it is a single young person under 21 who is looked after by a local authority (formerly "in care") at school leaving age or later, or
e. the household is homeless in an emergency (e.g. fire or flood)
(Housing (Scotland) Act 1987, Section 25).
2.5 A summary of the local authorities' responsibilities is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Local authority assessment of the circumstances of the applicants and responsibility under the legislation
2.6 The local authority may lose contact with the applicant. For the purposes of these returns, this is regarded as having happened 28 days after the last interview with him or her.
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