REGARDING Sunday's Big Read ("Scotland's affordable homes boss vents on the county's 'catastrophic' housing crisis", September 22), it beggars belief that so many social housing professionals, and all our main political parties, seem to think the way out of our housing crisis is to load more debt on to social housing tenants. In 2023 the Scottish Housing Regulator reported that social housing debt stood at £6.55 billion.
As interest rates rose towards normal the past two years, housing associations have struggled to make interest payments. They have cut maintenance budgets to make ends meet. Over 20% of my rent goes straight into bankers' pockets in the form of interest repayments.
To say housing associations are non-profit organisations is to deny these payments. A lot of what was said in the article is part of the myth-making housing associations and politicians of all parties have found convenient over the years. Housing associations are private companies .
They have been used since the 1980s to pass the burden of debt from the taxpayer to the tenant, with a built-in profit for the "investors". It was a Tory idea, it has suited SNP housebuilding, and neither the Greens, Labour nor Shelter have a problem with it. It is not a sustainable model.
It doesn’t redistribute property wealth. A solution to the housing crisis is far off so long as housing professionals (public and private) and politicians are allowed to dominate the debate in line with their own personal agendas. .
