Housing emergency

Argyll and Bute Council was the first local authority in Scotland to declare a Housing Emergency in June 2023. Declaring a housing emergency was a call to action and envisioned as the catalyst to bring partners, stakeholders, investors and communities together to prioritise and commit to the collective action needed to tackle housing shortage.

In October 2023, the Council launched two surveys asking for views on housing from the community and businesses. In total, the Council received 688 responses to the community and 72 responses to the workforce survey, indicating that most of the respondents (92%) felt their communities were negatively impacted by the housing shortage. We were delighted that so many of you took the time to respond and provide us with details on local impacts and ideas to help tackle the housing shortage. Thank you for participating. The feedback you provided through the surveys was crucial in shaping the Council’s approach to tackling the housing emergency. Details of the survey responses can be found in the Housing Emergency Summit report.

A Housing Emergency Summit was held in November 2023, bringing together 90 partners from public, private, third and community sectors who pledged their support to take decisive and bold action to address the housing emergency. Summit activity included pre-engagement workshops with stakeholders and extensive analysis to evidence the extent and nature of the housing emergency in Argyll & Bute. The results from the community and business surveys were also carefully considered by the delegates at the summit.

The Housing Emergency Summit report outlines the outcomes achieved by the summit including the shortlisting and appraisal of housing emergency responses and the collective partnership pledge to act on each response. The full outcome report can be accessed below.

Moving forward, Council Officers are working with partners on the development of the Action Programme to take forward the delivery of the identified priorities