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That is an important question, and the housing to 2040 strategy acknowledges that. The rural and island housing action plan came out in October 2023. Again, there was a review and there were indicators for the short term, medium term and long term. There is a review going on with regard to the short-term indicators. I said that I would come back to the committee or Parliament to provide an update on the rural housing action plan one year on. We are very transparent about that and are happy to come back to the committee or Parliament in October.

Last year, I indicated how important it was to me that I make visits. I will go out again this year because the situation is very different in rural communities. I have talked about the importance of the work that SSEN is doing. I come back to the point about the renewables hubs. On the requirement for the Western Isles, we are talking about the work bringing in roughly 1,000 jobs. That work cannot just be around the main population centres, but must be spread across all the communities. The same applies in Inverness, Shetland and Orkney, for example. That needs to be developed.

On the importance of that, we have talked about the rural housing funding, including for key workers. More needs to be done on that with local authorities. I mentioned that I was talking to Argyll and Bute Council about that. We need a strategic overview. We had a round-table meeting with some key employers. Therefore, work is being carried out in that regard.

However, the key thing is that I come back to make a statement to the committee or Parliament. I said at the start of the process that we are happy to do that in order to be held to account for how successful the rural and islands housing action plan is in relation to the aims of the housing to 2040 strategy and with regard to what we need to do. That work will continue to develop.

Three or four years ago, the opportunities around renewables would not have been considered, but those are now an incredibly important part of what we need to do. Those opportunities can bring jobs and housing, so how do we ensure that we connect housing and employability? If we do not get that bit right, it will create problems around homelessness, but that will also be an opportunity to tie this in to legacy housing, which SSEN is keen to sit down to discuss with us.

I am happy to come back to committee or the Parliament in October. We had indicated that we would do that, anyway. It is an incredibly important part of what we need to do because, as you said, the situations in urban and rural communities are completely different.

We talked about construction inflation. You can probably add another 15 per cent to 20 per cent to the costs of delivering homes in rural communities as a result of that inflation, which makes that work even more challenging. The discussions that we have been having with local authorities about housing in rural communities have been about how we can deliver key worker funding, how we can look at the renewables opportunities and so on. Those issues all tie together.

I will come back to the specific point about the housing investment task force. It was asked not only to look at funding for urban communities but to have a real focus on rural housing. How do we ensure that we do not look only at urban communities but that we look at opportunities in rural areas and how we fund them, and at the particular challenges that those communities face? That will be referenced in the housing investment task force reports. It is a key piece of work.

The housing investment task force was pulled together for that reason. It includes banks, institutional investors, local authorities and housing associations, and it will look at the barriers to investment as well as the opportunities. That piece of work is really important. The feedback that we had from the first meeting was incredibly positive. I have not looked at the potential funders that are involved, but that is one part of it.

In October, I met 25 institutional investors in London to talk about the subject, and on Thursday I will have a round table to talk about it and the Housing (Scotland) Bill. We are also talking about broader flex in the finance system and how we get SNIB and the SFT involved, as well as how we look at hubco. That is not about institutional investment; it is about trying to flex the system that we already have. I have talked about how the use of guarantees, for example, would be useful in relation to what can be offered to investors.

Lots of discussions are going on. The housing investment task force is the main player, but there are lots of pieces of work going on around that. I have had about half a dozen round-table meetings with institutional investors, and that relationship will continue to develop, particularly through the housing investment task force, which will report on what it thinks the barriers and opportunities are in terms of flexing the whole system. We need to do that in order not to replace but to supplement the funding that already exists, because the demand is there, pure and simple. We need to look at different opportunities to bring in money, and institutional investment is an incredibly important part of that.

The issue is relevant not only to housing. I have talked about the lease model in parts of London that operates in relation to the provision of temporary accommodation. There is also social investment in housing through work with homelessness charities. I know that about half a dozen places in Scotland are already looking at that model, and it is already in operation in some places.

We need to flex the system, but institutional investment is vital in what we need to do.

If we do not, I am sure that he will tell us.

I will bring Kate Hall in on that. As I said, discussions about building safety are on-going every day. There is obviously an element between the SBA process and moving towards remediation, in which there is assessment of whether there are immediate risks and where those sit. Again, that is different for every developer and every building. Kate Hall or Rachel Sunderland might want to come in on your specific point. Developers have raised that with us, as well.

I will bring in Kate Hall or Rachel Sunderland in a moment.

In the discussions that we have had, we have considered the approach that the UK Government has taken—there are on-going discussions on that. We have been talking to the SMEs, including in the Homes for Scotland context, about what that looks like.

This is a really important issue, so I am not just looking at the SME sector as a whole. We are speaking to individual developers and asking them where they sit. Even though we are considering a similar approach to that of the UK Government, our approach has to be based on what the developers tell us. There is always a balance: we want to remediate buildings as quickly as possible, but there is not much point in doing that if we lose five or six developers as a result of their not having the ability to pay.

That has been a really important approach. I emphasise the individual discussions that I and officials have had. As I said, our door is open. This is very much a partnership as we move forward, and we need to learn about that through the pilot programme.

Rachel or Kate might want to come in on the point about the profit threshold.

Again, it is about learning lessons. Down south, the UK Government has gone through the same process. There will be SMEs at certain levels. We all know where the threshold sits for SMEs, but where do the different SMEs sit within that? It is important to have the broader discussions with Homes for Scotland and SMEs, but we also need individual discussions to learn what it looks like for different SMEs. That is an important part of getting to the nuanced position as we learn from the pilot programme and go forward.

There are a number of things to say on that. It is very much demand led, which is one of the key points that we are considering. There is a discussion about what the programme will look like in the next year or so. In the past number of months, the spend on it has increased as we have done more work on the matter, and it is important to do that.

The figure for 2024-25 is £41.3 million. As I said, it is very much demand led. That cost is not just remediation; there are other costs involved as well. That is the figure that has been set aside in that regard at the moment. As I say, it is very much demand led. Hopefully, if we quicken the pace, we will see where that leads us in 2024-25. It is a substantial increase on previous years, as we get more into the programme.

That has been a frustration of the process. In November or December, I chaired an interministerial group meeting. It is a reserved matter, so we discussed it with UK Finance. The Welsh Government, which I had previously met, had the same concerns at that time. Officials have raised the issue on a number of occasions, and I have raised it on a number of occasions with my opposite number, including in the ministerial group.

One of the key things that we asked for, which is in the process of being arranged, is a working group with officials to progress matters. In the discussions that we had, the United Kingdom Government said that, with regard to regulations, it was focusing its approach first on England, and that it hoped to roll that out to the devolved Administrations. We needed to see a quickening of the pace. We got an undertaking that that would happen, but, as I said, that is not within our control because we are talking about a reserved matter.

We are aware of the issue, which has been raised by residents on a number of occasions. Discussions are on-going with officials in an effort to get to a solution, not only for the UK Government but for us, the Welsh Government and—now that it has been reformed—the Northern Ireland Executive, although it is just starting the process.

The pace at the moment is frustrating. It is outwith our control, but we continue to push the matter whenever we meet ministers or officials. Rachel Sunderland or Kate Hall might want to mention some of the discussions that they have had in the past few weeks.

I have not done so myself, but colleagues have. There is obviously an element of technical knowledge required, of which I have a little, but discussions involving actual technical fire safety knowledge have been held and fed back to me. Kate Hall or Rachel Sunderland might want to come in on this, but I can say that there have been extensive discussions with that sector.

I will bring in officials on that question, too.

There have been a number of cases. With regard to some of the developers that we have spoken to, there are different ownership models. There are historical developments. How has a company developed from where it was 30 years ago to where it is now? That becomes difficult. When it comes to individual discussions, where is the proof of liability? That becomes hard. I know that there have been discussions about design standards, which were probably okay at the time, but where do they come in now? It is about when a building was designed as opposed to when it was built. We are looking at the past 30 years. Some buildings will just be at that 30-year level.

I know that that issue has been discussed, but the question of who takes the action becomes really difficult. Should that be the companies or the Government? That becomes really difficult legally. I do not know whether Micheila West wants to come in on that. I will bring in Rachel Sunderland and Kate Hall on the discussions and Micheila West on legal things that have been discussed.