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To start with Mr Stewart’s last point, I think that I have engaged fairly well with Crisis, both face to face and by email. I hope that it would it agree with that.

I agree with him that Crisis has played a very positive role in getting us to where we are today. Some of the amendments that have been lodged in my name were drafted with the help of Crisis. I therefore absolutely agree with Mr Stewart on that.

I also agree that we want this to have, if at all possible, all-party support. That is why we will not vote against Mr Stewart’s amendments, if they go to a vote today, but abstain. The reason for that is that we need to do a wee bit more work around some of the definitions and make sure that everything is absolutely tied up. Depending on where we end up today, that is perhaps a helpful conversation that we could have before stage 3.

There has been progress. As Mr Stewart will know from his former role, housing bills do not come around very often, and so we want to make sure that what is passed in legislation is workable at the coalface for local authorities.

If Mr Stewart’s amendments are moved and pressed today, the two of us in the Conservative group on the committee want to see whether we can find that consensus. That is why we will not vote against them, even if at the moment we cannot give them our full support. We would be very willing to work with the minister, and with others in other parties, before stage 3 to see whether we could do the tidying up that might be required.

Although we have taken a number of minutes to discuss these amendments, that has shown the advantage of having things in the bill rather than in guidance and regulations. Guidance is not scrutinised at all by the Parliament. It can be introduced by any Government without any scrutiny. Nor does it have any legal authority. As I said previously, with due respect, regulations are not given the same scrutiny as primary legislation.

My real concern is that the Government is not willing to put things in the bill because it does not want to have proper scrutiny from me and my colleagues and to be held accountable for those things. That is a concern in relation to the different amendments that have been lodged for this section.

I say with gentleness to the minister that, particularly with regard to my amendment, he has really not grasped the issues that many disabled people face. We are told by the minister that amendment 1015 is not required because it is already covered by other legislation. However, if his case load is anything like my case load, he will know that such legislation is having too little effect for many disabled and older people, who are too often put into accommodation that is unsuitable for them. I also completely accept the point that Mr Griffin makes in amendment 1015A that it is not just those groups who are affected and that there can be other issues in relation to rural areas, for example.

It is deeply disappointing that the minister has dismissed the amendments so quickly, with no practical solution being given. The minister keeps saying that we need to have further consultation on this and see what comes up in guidelines. Surely, that work should have been done before the bill was introduced, so that these issues—which are fairly obvious—could have been ironed out before this point. There has been a lack of thinking by the Scottish Government on how the bill would work in practice.

Having said all of that, I will not press amendment 1015 to a vote this morning. I will look at the matter again with the minister, if he is willing—as I am sure that he is. However, I am deeply disappointed that the amendment seems to have been dismissed without giving real consideration of what it means for disabled and older people across Scotland.

I am happy to.

Will Maggie Chapman take an intervention on that point?

The point that you just made to Mr Doris and what the minister said to Meghan Gallacher highlight the concern that I have. Surely, in order to pass good legislation, you should consult COSLA and stakeholders first, and then work out what the legislation should be. We are doing this the other way round. You—and, to some degree, Mr Stewart—are saying, “Let’s pass the legislation, and then we will work out what it means and how it will work with COSLA.” My concern is that, in quite a number of areas in the bill, we are being asked to pass the principle without knowing the consequences of it. I worry when I hear that local authorities have not responded to your amendment, because it means that we do not know how it will work in practice, and the same is true, to some extent, with Mr Stewart’s amendments.

You almost took the words right out of my mouth, as Meat Loaf would say. We have not received purpose and effect notes from any of the other members. I also put on the record that I only received the Government’s purpose and effect document at 10 to 9 this morning—10 minutes before this meeting started—so I have not been able to reflect on that in any way at all. That is slightly disappointing, because we normally receive those documents 24 hours before the committee meets. It has been impossible—certainly for me—to be able to reflect on it. It has made it more difficult not to have had that before us earlier.

If we are going to talk about these documents, we need to make it clear that we have not received any from back benchers and that the Government’s document came too late to be able to examine it.

I will follow up on Pam Duncan-Glancy’s point. The powers that we are talking about have been in legislation for, in some cases, decades, but given that we are still facing problems day to day with young folk not getting appropriate accommodation, how will the duties be enforced? We can pass the best legislation in the world, but if it does not affect a child in Dundee, Aberdeen or Glasgow, why are we doing so? What will the Government actually do to ensure that children live in appropriate accommodation?

Accommodation in and of itself is important, but the right type of accommodation is as important. I lodged amendment 1015 because I want to look at the suitability of accommodation for people with some protected characteristics.

I will use the most extreme example. Somebody might be found a flat in Edinburgh but, if they have a wheelchair and there is no lift to the flat, putting them in it would mean that they would be housebound for the whole period. Yes, they would have suitable accommodation, in that they would have a roof over their head and would be dry and warm, but so much of the rest of their life would be restricted.

I am concerned that, because there is so little accommodation in many parts of our cities and rural areas, people are being placed in accommodation that does not fit their needs, whether they have children, are disabled, are older or have other protected characteristics. We need to ensure that we see a house not just as a place where people can be warm and dry—although, clearly, that is very important—but as a place where someone can function and lead as normal a life as possible, given the restrictions on them. I would be interested to hear what the minister has to say about that.

I support Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendments 1050 and 1060 although, depending on what she has to say about them, I might change my mind. I support Roz McCall’s amendment 1073 and look forward to hearing Maggie Chapman’s remarks on amendments 1070 and 1071.

I move amendment 1015.

Thank you, convener, and good morning to the minister and his team of colleagues.

I will go through the amendments in the group. As I said in my earlier intervention, I am sympathetic to what Mr O’Kane is trying to do with amendment 1078. However, one of the issues with it, with those of Mr Griffin, and with a lot of the bill is that there are lots of carrots but not too many sticks. If we were to amend the legislation in this way, we would need to look at how it could be better enforced, because the only way open at the moment is full judicial review of a decision, or the lack of a decision by whoever was making it. I wonder whether amendment 1078 could be looked at again to see whether it might have other consequences, and I would make the same comment about Mark Griffin’s amendment 1053.

As for the rest of Mr Griffin’s amendments, I am sympathetic to what he is trying to achieve, but again I have some concerns, particularly about the lack of clarity in the wording with regard to age and how this would work, particularly for 17 and 18-year-olds. It depends on what the member wants to do, but I might be looking for him to bring the amendments back at stage 3 with slightly different wording. If that does not happen and he moves them today, I and my colleague will abstain, simply because the wording needs to be looked at and tightened up.

For the record, there is some concern at Crisis about the homelessness definition and the Government’s ability to change it through regulations. The Scottish Conservatives will support amendment 1047, because its intention is right, but I would like to have further discussions with the minister.