Annabelle Ewing's social housing building plan for Scotland
Across Scotland, the shortage of affordable homes has reached a level familiar to residents of Sydney and Melbourne, where waiting lists for public housing stretch for years and renters compete fiercely for each vacancy. Annabelle Ewing, standing for Ochil and South Perthshire, has made a social housing building programme a centrepiece of her campaign, framing it as a pathway to economic renewal and a fairer society.
Her proposal borrows from the experience of countries that have confronted similar pressures while responding directly to the realities of rural Perthshire towns and the urban fringes of Edinburgh. By tying together public investment, skilled trades, and community-led design, she aims to deliver homes that meet both immediate need and long-term sustainability goals.
A crisis that resonates beyond Scotland
Housing pressure in Britain is not unique to the United Kingdom. In Australia, the National Rental Affordability Scheme has grappled with shrinking supply, while state governments in New South Wales and Victoria have launched their own social housing construction pledges. Ewing argues that Scotland can learn from these models without copying them wholesale, instead developing an approach suited to Scottish planning law, climate targets, and demographic patterns.
Her team points to the Build to Rent sector that has reshaped inner Brisbane and Perth as evidence that long-term institutional investment, when structured properly, can produce stable tenancies. She maintains that the same disciplined approach, redirected through public borrowing, can build council and housing association homes at a comparable scale.
How the programme would be funded
Central to the building plan is the use of long-term, low-interest borrowing through HM Treasury frameworks, allowing the Scottish Government to raise capital at significantly lower rates than private developers. Ewing has suggested repurposing funds currently spent on temporary accommodation and homelessness services into permanent stock, a redirection that has parallels with proposals floated in Canberra to redirect Commonwealth Rent Assistance into direct construction.
She has also floated the idea of establishing regional development zones that channel private finance toward housing and infrastructure, drawing on the special economic zone approach used elsewhere to attract local investors. Such zones, she argues, could bring together housing, transport links, and skills training to revive towns like Alloa, Dunfermline, and Stirling.
She further proposes that pension funds and ethical investment vehicles in Edinburgh and Glasgow could be invited to participate under guarantees from the UK Treasury, reducing reliance on overseas capital while delivering reliable long-term returns for savers.
Construction capacity and skills
A housing programme of this ambition depends on a trained workforce, an issue of acute relevance in Victoria where apprenticeship completions have struggled to keep pace with infrastructure demand. Ewing has committed to expanding college places in construction trades, modernising the apprenticeship system inherited from the previous SNP government, and partnering with trade unions to ensure fair wages on publicly funded sites.
Her team also emphasises modular and timber-frame construction, methods increasingly used in the Australian apartment sector to cut build times. By combining factory production with on-site assembly, the programme could reduce costs, limit weather disruption, and hit the Scottish Government's net-zero targets for new buildings.
Standards for energy and community use
New homes would be required to meet a rigorous energy efficiency standard, with passive solar design, triple glazing, and integrated renewable systems as a baseline. This mirrors tightening provisions in Australian building codes, particularly the recent updates in the National Construction Code that push toward a seven-star energy rating.
Ewing insists that quality must extend beyond fabric and fittings. Plans include communal workshops, secure cycle storage, accessible green space, and adaptable layouts so flats can be reconfigured as families grow or care needs change. The approach reflects a community-led design ethos promoted by some Australian housing providers, where residents help shape the buildings they will occupy.
Local authorities at the centre
Council-built housing has historically been a strength of Scottish local government, and Ewing wants to restore that capacity after years of stock transfers. Her plan would give local authorities direct access to construction grants, bypassing some of the procurement layers that have slowed projects in places like Adelaide and parts of regional Western Australia.
Through reforms to the planning system and stronger compulsory purchase powers, councils would be better placed to assemble sites and move quickly from approval to occupancy. Ewing describes this as devolving the housing programme to the people who understand local need, whether that is a ferry-linked island community in the Firth of Forth or a former mining town seeking regeneration.
Where Scotland sits among comparable programmes
Housing construction plans across the developed world share common pressures and have generated a range of responses. The table below compares Ewing's proposals with several well-known Australian state and federal programmes.
| Programme | Lead body | Funding source | Annual target | Energy standard |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ewing's Scottish proposal | Scottish Government and councils | Long-term public borrowing, redirected welfare budget | To be confirmed, scoped per council | Net-zero compliant |
| Victoria Big Housing Build | State government | State treasury borrowing | 12,000 homes over four years | 7-star equivalent |
| NSW Land and Housing renewal | State agency | Mixed public and private | Several thousand per year | Updated NCC rules |
| Queensland Housing Strategy 2024–34 | State government | Federal and state partnership | 1,200 social dwellings per year | Progressive lift to 7-star |
Practical measures worth watching
- Direct grant funding to local authorities for land acquisition and pre-development works.
- A modular construction pipeline based in Scottish regional colleges.
- A retrofit scheme for existing tower blocks alongside new-build delivery.
- A tenant participation framework modelled on Australian cooperative housing traditions.
Obstacles that cannot be ignored
- Rising borrowing costs that pressure public balance sheets across Westminster.
- Supply chain bottlenecks in timber, insulation, and skilled electricians.
- Planning delays inherited from a stretched local authority workforce.
- Political uncertainty around the timing of any future referendum.
To get involved, residents of Ochil and South Perthshire can explore the wider campaign at https://snp-annabelle-ewing.org/, where updates on hustings, doorstep events, and policy briefings appear weekly. Anyone who wants to host a kitchen-table meeting, deliver leaflets in their village, or sign up to attend the upcoming local forums on housing is encouraged to make contact through the site's outreach page over the coming months.