Lack of rural housing a concern to Senior Lecturer

In a news item entitled; "Housing in the Highlands: what’s the problem?" available on the University of Stirling web pages the following comments were presented:

With six families for every house available to let in the Highlands and Islands, the amount and quality of rural housing is a cause for concern

Dr Madhu Satsangi, a senior lecturer in housing studies at the University of Stirling, has studied the issue of housing provision in rural Scotland for over a decade, and says the number of people waiting for each suitable let can rise to ten in parts of the country such as Sutherland, Skye and Lochalsh where, in some settlements, up to 80 per cent of the houses are second homes. In many other parts of the country, the number of people waiting is more typically three.

“The problem is fundamentally one of supply,” explains Dr Satsangi. “Historically, we haven’t built sufficient housing to meet the demand in the social sector. One reason for this is the shortage of land available – much of which is held in the private sector and owned by large estates.

“But another reason is the prevailing attitude towards the Highlands and what they should be used for. Is it, as some believe, purely for recreation? Should we be preserving quaint little villages for the enjoyment of tourists and guarding against new properties being built at their margins to meet the needs of local communities?

“While there has been no rigorous analysis of the situation, the common view is that tight spatial planning strategies have constrained growth. Despite the good intentions of many, the big push has been to encourage growth in the larger cities instead – which means that community members migrate away from the rural Highlands. I call it the Modern Day Clearances.”

He warns the situation may get worse: “In some parts of the Highlands, businesses find it difficult to recruit staff, because the people they need can’t afford to live in the area.

“So there is a very real possibility that those tourists who move in and out of the Highland areas in pursuit of the recreational facilities which some have been at great pains to protect, will find when they arrive that there are few available services and facilities, because the people needed to support that service infrastructure no longer live in the Highlands and Islands.”

The issue was the subject of a University of Stirling lecture ‘Rural Housing in the Highlands and Islands’, and was delivered at the Centre for Health Science in Inverness on Thursday 26 March at 4pm. The talk was open to all and admission was free.