'I MET with Cabinet Secretary Angela Constance to discuss the housing crisis we are facing in Scotland. I have called for a national house build plan as a means to tackle the housing crisis and was able to discuss moving this forward with the Cabinet Secretary. Interestingly, Shelter Scotland launched their new homelessness campaign – Homelessness: Far From Fixed at the start of this week.

The campaign aims to show how homelessness can happen to anyone in Scotland and that unexpected life events can lead to difficulties in keeping a secure accommodation. It also aims to draw attention to the fact that homelessness is more than just people sleeping rough on the streets, and that this is actually only the visible tip of the iceberg.

Campaigns such as this by Shelter Scotland are important to ensure that any progress made in Scotland does not begin to slip back given the impact of austerity, sweeping cuts to local budgets and further cuts to social security. This is coupled with the fact that right now in Scotland we have a housing crisis, making the impact of these cuts even worse. The result is the most vulnerable groups in society end up at a higher risk of losing the roofs over their heads.

There were 2628 homeless applications in Fife alone last year and sadly 308 children in temporary accommodation. It is time that the Scottish Government set forward a coherent plan to stop this kind of thing from happening in future. When I was leader of Fife Council, I brought forward a proposal to build 1,700 houses and set up a Housing Board that brought together planners, housing staff, building service staff, finance and legal so we had all the professionals in the same room to plan work with the key stakeholders to deliver. A national plan to deliver house building could help solve the many barriers to building on the scale we need. The best way to tackle homelessness is to ensure that we are building enough houses, and particularly in the social rented sector.

Shelter’s campaign is right to highlight that homelessness is far from fixed, and more can be done in Scotland to tackle the blight not having such a basic human right can have on a person’s life. It impacts an individual’s life expectancy, health, employability, education, and wider wellbeing. It is shocking that homelessness is still such a major issue in 21st century Scotland.

Tackling homelessness once and for all ties in to two things I have called for in Scotland, as mentioned before a national house build plan and on top of this a comprehensive anti-poverty strategy. It is about time the Scottish Government stepped up to the mark and fully tackled one of the great shames still happening today in Scotland.'