A Bill to establish a register of property factors and require property factors to be registered; to make provision in relation to the resolution of disputes between homeowners and property factors; and for connected purposes. More hear
Understanding Bills more here
A call for written evidence was issued by the Local Government and Communities Committee for interested parties to submit their views on the Bill. The call for evidence is now closed.
A selection of the comments made in the first session on 08/09/10 include:
"The SFHA welcomes the bill. We are fairly content that, by and large, the services that are provided by housing associations are more than up to the standards that are set out in the bill—particularly in the light of the fact that lately we have been doing a lot of work on the matter."
"Thank you for the opportunity to contribute. The question is an excellent one. In effect, it covered the whole issue. The bill recognises the need for registration, regulation and resolution—which are all good things for the industry, as they are for any industry.
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The bigger picture, so to speak, is that there is a lack of the three Rs in property management. I therefore welcome the opportunity that the bill or some other mechanism will allow to make that happen.
We are confused about some of the drafting of the bill. We understand that it applies to property factors. In our submission to the consultation, we made it clear that Greenbelt is not a property factor; indeed, we have been making that clear for a number of years. We have an interest in the bill, but it does not apply to us. That may sound like a pretentious thing to say, but that is our position. At the end of the day, we support a means or mechanism that would allow the introduction of the three Rs."
"(Property Managers Association Scotland): My short answer is that, yes—the bill as introduced would improve standards in property management for the consumer, which is ultimately what we are trying to achieve. The PMAS supported the proposal that was made before, and supports the current proposal for accreditation. We have worked very hard and been involved with the working party during the past 18 months in support of accreditation. The bill would be another option for raising standards in property management.""Hanover Housing Association's view broadly echoes that of the SFHA. We provide a factoring service to 1,000 or so retired self-funding owner occupiers in 30 to 31 developments across Scotland. Our practice is to adhere to the "Private Retirement Housing: Code of Practice", which the Minister for Housing and Communities launched last year. I have the document in my hand; I think
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that the committee is familiar with it. We expect the standards in that document to be reflected broadly in the proposed code of conduct under the bill, as well as in the voluntary accreditation core standards, on which the Scottish Government is consulting. The prospect of a statutory code does not therefore present us with any difficulties. We believe that they are standards to which we should be working."
More information can be found here
There were three other sessions which can be found on the links at this page here,
At its meeting on 15 September 2010, the Committee took evidence from the Office of Fair Trading, Consumer Focus Scotland, Greenbelt Group Action and Stonelaw Court Owners' Association.
At its meeting on 22 September 2010, the Committee took evidence from the Minister for Housing and Communities and Scottish Government officials.
At its meeting on 29 September 2010, the Committee took evidence from Patricia Ferguson MSP and Mike Dailly, Govan Law Centre.
In order to get a balanced view of the proceedings readers are advised to read the reports of the oral evidence sessions in full.
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