PRS Resilience Group 22 June 2020 Note of Meeting In attendance:              {Redacted}, Shelter Scotland {Redacted}, Dundee City Council {Redacted}, Propertymark {Redacted}. Shelter Scotland {Redacted}, Glasgow City Council {Redacted}, North Ayrshire Council {Redacted}, Scottish Association of Landlords (SAL) {Redacted}, COSLA {Redacted} Public Health Scotland {Redacted}, Public Health Scotland – Guest to discuss PHS toolkit {Redacted}, Citizen Advice Scotland (CAS) – Chair {Redacted}, ALACHO {Redacted}, SG Apologies:  {Redacted}, SG  {Redacted},, Citizen Advice Scotland (CAS)  {Redacted}, Dundee City Council  {Redacted},, City of Edinburgh Council 1. Welcome and introductions {Redacted} opened the meeting and welcomed participants. 2. Note of previous meeting and action log The group was content with the note of the previous meeting. Action log updates: Action 9: Still ongoing Action 12: Figures for May show that new applications are down 15%. Renewals holding up slightly. April and May have similar figures. Action 13: Recent information was sent out on Friday. Would be helpful if could let members know of confirmed dates in future. It was also suggested be useful to know the number of bounce back emails. Action 19 and Action 27: Group agreed should amalgamate actions 19 and 27. GCC advised they have extended the time period to apply by another two months, taking it to five months in total. 3. Feedback from ministerial meeting with resilience group chairs {Redacted} talked through the note and advised that these meetings are being held weekly every Wednesday. From a PRS Resilience Group perspective, the meetings have discussed supporting and engaging with tenants and the tenant toolkit under development. Also wider discussions on how to link void properties with PRS. Shelter advised they have talked to empty homes officers and there needs to be increased work around this, particularly on properties empty for less than 6 months. Action 34: Request that {Redacted} provides an update on the Empty Homes work at next meeting. 4. Private Landlord Pre-Action Protocols {Redacted} SG thanked members of the group who have provided feedback on the protocols, which are currently being considered. The regulations are due to be laid to Parliament the first week of August and come into force the first week of September. The regulations will be temporary, time limited and tied to the Coronavirus (Scotland) (No. 2) Act 2020. There is a commitment to make the regulations part of the process permanently and this will be considered post-COVID. Guidance will also be published and members are keen to have them published in advance, if possible. {Redacted} SG advised that tribunal members will be versed and part of the process in response to query on the support available. {Redacted} SG also advised that although landlords don’t have to follow the protocols, the tribunal will consider what the landlord has done beforehand as part of the discretionary nature of the emergency provisions. Suggestions were made by the group including:  could discuss the protocols with lenders  checking sample forms from letting agencies might assist  might also be helpful to have case studies included in the guidance Action 35: All - Contact {Redacted} SG if you still want to provide feedback or to discuss further Action 36: {Redacted} SG will provide a further update on this work in due course 5. Public Health Scotland Toolkit for tenants {Redacted} PHS advised that the subgroup have met to discuss this toolkit which will provide tenants with key information on tenancy sustainment, financial support and also wider, information domestic abuse and mental health signposting. They are currently taking comments and drafting up the first document. The PRS group have been asked to provide any case studies. There was also discussion on how to circulate this toolkit out with social media channels. It was also suggested the need to link into the local authority resilience group. Action 37: {Redacted} SG – will liaise with {Redacted} SAL and provide copies of case studies to {Redacted} PHS. All – if anyone else has any case studies then please also send to {Redacted} PHS. Action 38: SG – to consider how this toolkit could be circulated out with social media channels. Action 39: {Redacted} SG - Letter from Minister to all PRS tenants and the need to link up with the Social Housing Resilience Group on this 6. Tenancy Sustainment The group discussed what the risks were to tenants in the PRS in relation to effective tenancy sustainment, in order to minimise evictions and rent arrears. CAS set out that failure of tenancy is usually due to some form of income shock (i.e. redundancy etc) which tenants struggle to recover from. CAS will share information with the group from their monthly statistics. The group discussed the need to protect people from eviction further down the line i.e. September onwards. It was suggested that it would be helpful if landlords could provide information on other sources of help/support available to tenants. Communication of tenancy sustainment should be targeted through letting agents, registered landlords and landlord registration and directly to the public by targeted social media activity. The group discussed the transferring of property ownership with sitting tenants and how commercial lenders have a different approach to buy to let. Action 40: CAS will share information with the group from their monthly statistics. Action 41: Discuss tenancy sustainment further at next meeting 7. Holiday lets/Airbnb The group discussed the licensing of holiday lets and Airbnb’s and the impact of many short term let owners moving into longer term lets, due to voids. Shelter suggested that the regulations being taken forward by the SG in relation to short term lets need to come into force earlier and it was suggested that policy leads in this area could attend a future meeting to discuss further. Action 42: SG to arrange for the appropriate policy leads to provide a written update regarding the regulations for short term lets 8. AOB Social media activity has suggested that tenants interests are not appropriately represented on the PRS Resilience Group. The group discussed and agreed that CAS and Shelter represent tenants. Action 43: {Redacted} SG will feedback to Minister and provide an update to the group. 9. Date and Time of next meeting The next meeting will be held on Monday 6 July from 2pm until 3:30pm.