Sharing of Housing (Scotland) Bill consultation with stakeholders: FOI release

Information requested

'Could you share how you have shared the following consultation with different stakeholders? https://consult.gov.scot/local-government-and-communities/housing-scotland-bill/consultation/ Specifically, how has this consultation been shared with landlords, tenants, homeowners? Please include email, paper and online communications.'

Response

The answer to your question is that the Scottish Government has acted since the Housing (Scotland) Bill consultation’s publication on 23 April 2025 to promote the consultation and encourage participation by landlords, tenants and others active in Scotland’s rented housing sector; no engagement has been targeted to homeowners outwith those who offer property for rent in Scotland.

Communications with stakeholders began with a press release on the day the consultation was published. This is available online here: https://www.gov.scot/news/rent-control-consultation-published/. Subscribers to the Housing and Regeneration mailing list on Citizen Space were also notified at the time of the consultation’s publication.

The consultation was promoted with a launch announcement on the Twitter accounts @ScotGovFairer on the 23 April and @ScotGovEngage on 25 April. These tweets are available respectively through the following links: https://x.com/ScotGovFairer/status/1915008763930591600, https://x.com/ScotGovEngage/status/1915737558346011104.

The consultation was shared directly with a group of stakeholders on the day of publication by email (Documents 1-5). A letter from the Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice to several of these same stakeholders followed on 25 April (Documents 6-16). A further letter from the Cabinet Secretary was sent to Housing Investment Taskforce members on 30 April (Document 17). On 1 May, the consultation was shared with a wider group of stakeholders (Document 18).

On 2 May, the Scottish Government emailed the three tenancy deposit schemes to promote the consultation with tenants through their communications channels (Documents 19-24). On 7 May, the Scottish Government emailed TIS and TPAS for the same purpose (Documents 25-26). An announcement email was shared with Registers of Scotland on 1 May (Documents 27-30), and was issued to registered landlords on 16 May.

​​​​​​​Exemptions under sections 38(1)(a) (personal data relating to the applicant) and 38(1)(b) (personal data relating to a third party) of FOISA apply to some of the information you have requested. These exemptions are not subject to the 'public interest test', so we are not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption.

​​​​​​​In addition, we are not required to consider for release any information that is a previous draft and substantially the same as information in any final version. We are also not required to consider any information produced after receipt of an FOI request as being within the scope of that request. Such instances have been redacted where they appear in released documents containing information within the scope of your request.​​​​​​​

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

FOI 202500466246 - Information Released - Annex

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