What’s it all about?
The Housing (Scotland) Act
requires all local authorities
in Scotland to draw up a
Local Housing Strategy
(LHS) and submit it to the
Scottish Executive. East
Lothian Council was among
the first to submit their
strategy in September 2003.
The Local Housing Strategy
will be the Council’s work
plan for housing in the next
ten years. It affects everyone
living in East Lothian –
tenants, owner-occupiers,
and those setting up home for
the first time.
If you want to tell us what you think of the strategy we would
like to hear from you – contact the Local Housing Strategy
Team at:
ELC Housing Development Services
9-11 Lodge Street
Haddington EH41 3DX
Or e-mail us at [email protected]
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East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
Introduction
We want our housing strategy to paint a clear picture of how we
plan to tackle the housing problems faced by people in East
Lothian over the next ten years. For example, East Lothian has
a growing population and we must make sure that everyone has
access to housing that meets their needs. At the same time we
need to protect the quality of the environment and work with
others to make sure there are adequate schools, transport and
other services to make successful communities.
We also need to take account of what is happening at a wider
regional and national level. For example, economic growth in
Edinburgh is creating huge demand for housing, pushing up
house prices throughout the surrounding area. This also
increases the demand for affordable rented housing. At the
same time the government, quite rightly, wants us to do more to
tackle homelessness and fuel poverty and to improve the
condition of houses.
Last year we asked people what they thought should be in the
strategy. The top priorities were increasing the supply of
affordable housing – and making sure that communities are
‘sustainable’, that is places where the environment is good and
where people want to live.
The overall objective of the strategy is
To promote and enable sustainable communities
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East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
Shaping the future – strategy objectives
More households mean increasing demand for homes and other
public services. Although unemployment is quite low in East
Lothian compared to other parts of Scotland, wages are lower
than the national average. The healthcare industry is growing especially in the personal care services where pay is low. Other
workers like classroom or care assistants may also have
difficulty finding a home they can afford.
Census facts – East Lothian 2001
 90,088 people and 38,157 households
 0.73% of the population were from ethnic minorities
 A quarter of the population was aged under 20 and 22.4% were
60 or over
 More than a third of the adult population was either single,
divorced, separated or widowed
 Among people of working age 42% are in full-time employment –
13% work part-time – and 8% are self-employed

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Nearly one in five people has a long-term limiting illness
East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
We need to build around 275 affordable homes each year over
the next ten years to meet the needs of people in situations like
this. The overall aim of the strategy is to develop an additional
2750 homes for East Lothian. Our key objective is
To increase the supply of affordable housing
What’s happening in the owner-occupied sector?
Around 64 per cent of households in East Lothian are owneroccupiers. Although prices have been rising throughout East
Lothian they do vary in different areas, with the North Berwick
area having the highest prices and Prestonpans the lowest.
House prices in East Lothian – 2002 (second-hand sales)
Area
Prestonpans
Tranent
Musselburgh
Dunbar
East Lothian
Haddington
North Berwick
Mean (average) price
£69,677
£80,349
£95,804
£101,547
£113,208
£118,506
£170,726
(Source: Edinburgh Solicitors Property Centre)
In other parts of Scotland former council houses have provided a
route into relatively low-cost owner-occupation but in East
Lothian the average resale price of these properties was £67,000
in 2002. The Right to Buy means that between 300 and 500
council houses are continuing to transfer to the private sector
each year.
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East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
House price trends in East Lothian – 1990-2000
Figure 21
Recent Trends In
Mean Re-sale Prices (£)
100,000
99,739
91,888
90,000
82,436
80,000
85,116
75,809
69,207
70,000
78,037
70,715
66,019
66,026
67,540
46,698
46,627
75,562
69,712
60,000
50,000
40,000
52,799
41,229
42,951
41,980
45,541
47,456
47,757
47,208
30,000
20,000
10,000
0
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
Ex ELC All House types
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
East Lothian All 2nd Hand
Edinburgh All 2nd Hand
(Source: Rosenburg (2001), Impact of the Right to Buy in East Lothian, ELC)
The need for affordable housing
There are more than 5,000 people on the waiting list for council
housing yet only around 450-500 houses become available for
letting each year. While there is a need for affordable homes
across East Lothian the relative need is greatest in the North
Berwick area and in some of the smaller settlements across East
Lothian.
Homelessness
The lack of affordable housing has led to a big homelessness
problem in East Lothian and each year between 800 and 900
homeless people or families apply to the council for help. The
majority of applicants are single people or lone parents – who
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East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
are least likely to be able to afford to buy their own home.
Many are vulnerable, for example because of a physical
disability or because they have dependent children. About twothirds of the single or lone parent applicants were aged over 25.
Key LHS objective:
To prevent and reduce homelessness
The private rented sector
We know, from a Housing Needs Study we carried out in 2001,
that private renting is more common in the east (Dunbar, North
Berwick and Haddington areas) than in the west (Prestonpans,
Musselburgh and Tranent areas). Couples without children,
lone parents and single non-pensioner adults are more likely
than other groups of households to rent privately. They also
tend to be on low incomes - £10,300 a year or less. We need to
find out more about the private rented sector in East Lothian, but
it does seem that it is a temporary housing solution for people
who would prefer more secure accommodation.
Housing and support for people with particular
needs
Even for people who have a
house, it doesn’t always meet
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their needs – for example, it
is in a poor state of repair or
needs to be adapted to make
it easier for someone in the
household to live there. This
may mean they need a new
house, or more support to let
them stay in their own home.
East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
In 2001 the council carried out an assessment of Community
Care Housing Needs. It found many unmet needs, including a
shortage of suitable housing for young single people, former
offenders and people with mental health problems, and housingrelated support services were very limited. All of this serves to
emphasise the need for planning housing support at a strategic
level. We also need to find out more about the housing needs of
minority groups of people, for example gypsies/travellers.
Key LHS objectives:
To provide and enable appropriate housing provision,
including support, for people with particular needs
To promote and enable sustainable housing
Summary of strategy objectives and options
There are a number of ways we could meet each of the
objectives and we have assessed some of these options with our
partners. Some of the options are linked and could meet more
than one of the objectives. They are not all mutually exclusive.
And the options and actions that flow from them need to be
prioritised because we do not want to attempt to do too much
and spread our resources too thinly.
We were helped to identify, define and select the strategic
options by
 our Housing Forum and LHS Stakeholders Steering
Group
 feedback from people through the consultation period
last year
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East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
 workshops to consider and rate each of the options
Here is a summary of the objectives and the options we have
decided to take forward.
Objective 1 – to promote and enable sustainable
communities
We aim to
 promote a mix of different kinds of housing to meet the
needs of all communities in East Lothian
 develop more flexible and innovative housing management
services for council houses
 increase community involvement and make sure the LHS
fits in with the Community Planning framework
 develop new housing in a mix of new and existing
settlements
Objective 2 – to increase the supply of affordable
housing across East Lothian
We aim to
 use the council’s land and other public sector assets to
bring in new housing investment
 support some new housing development from the Housing
Revenue Account
 develop and implement an affordable housing policy
 manage our own housing more effectively, for example
developing letting plans for each area so that we meet local
needs
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East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
Objective 3 – To provide and enable appropriate
housing provision, including support, for people with
particular needs
We aim to
 increase understanding of groups of people with particular
needs and develop housing options to meet their needs
 provide housing support to people in their own homes
 build new or improve existing specialist accommodation
Objective 4 – To prevent and reduce homelessness
We aim to
 develop a ‘homeseeker service’ that matches people up
with the best option for them
 increase the supply of affordable housing (see objective 2)
 develop an early intervention strategy to stop people
becoming homeless in the first place
Objective 5 – To promote and enable sustainable
housing
We aim to
 develop and implement sustainability standards for
existing and new affordable housing
 increase householder awareness of sustainability issues
 develop and implement sustainability criteria for private
sector housing over the longer term
Strategy into action
It is important to recognise that these options are linked in many
ways and each may have an impact on one of our other housing
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East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
strategy or wider objectives. These options have been translated
into more than ninety different actions to make sure our strategy
objectives are met over the next ten years. The actions are listed
in a detailed action plan that comes with the full LHS document.
You can find it on our website at
http://www.eastlothian.gov.uk/content/0,1094,428,00.html.
We are already working on a number of projects that we hope
will help to deliver the objectives. These include
 Reviews of our adaptations, estate management and rehousing services
 A web-based housing advice resource to support the
homeseeker service – and make it easier for people to find
out about their housing options
 Joint Future – a joint service approach to the needs of
older people and other vulnerable groups
 The Supporting People Strategic Plan which outlines our
priorities for housing support services
 A Central Assessment Team that aims to make sure that
homeless applicants, in particular young people, have
access to the most appropriate services.
 A temporary accommodation strategy to replace the use of
bed and breakfast for homeless people. We aim to
increase the supply of temporary accommodation to 50
units by April 2004.
 Together with tenants, we are reviewing council house rent
structures and looking at how we can deliver an East
Lothian Property and Service standard for Council tenants.
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East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
What do we need to deliver the strategy?
The resources we need to deliver the strategy are
1. Money (capital and revenue funding)
2. People – council staff and staff in other services
3. Other organisations – do we provide the right sort of
information and support for them to help us deliver the
strategy? Do they have the resources and expertise?
4. Assets such as land and property for housing
5. Time – resources are limited and we need to decide
which actions we need to do first
People are probably the most important resource when it comes
to making things happen and we have reviewed our staffing
structures in Housing Development Services to make sure we
have the right mix of skills.
Current investment for new affordable housing from all sources
is around £5.8 m per annum, which delivers around 85 new units
per year. We estimate the shortfall in resources is therefore
£14.8m a year to deliver the strategy target of 275 new homes.
The ten-year resource shortfall would be just under £150m. We
intend to make up this shortfall through
 Efficiency savings in new housing development
 Using our own and our partners’ assets to draw in funding
 Using an Affordable Housing Policy to obtain land for
affordable housing at reduced cost and allowing public
funding to be spread wider
 Working with RSL partners with substantial financial
resources to put into the East Lothian Housing Strategy
 Using the government’s new ‘prudential borrowing’ rules to
provide capital funding
 Flexibility about the kinds of affordable housing to be
developed – this may help us to spread the money we have
more widely
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East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013
Monitoring and evaluating the strategy
For the strategy to be successful we need to set targets and
measure our performance so that we can make sure we achieve
what we want to. We’ll do this by
1. Developing a Local Investment Framework to guide
investment in new affordable housing – and monitor things
like house prices and housing need at local level
2. Monitoring progress on each of the objectives and actions
– and rating the outcomes. That means checking whether
they are leading to real improvements in the quality of life
for people in East Lothian.
Moving forward
Delivering sustainable communities with a wide range of
housing choices for people is the key theme of our Housing
Strategy. This document is simply the beginning of that process.
Look out for news about the strategy development process on
the Council website.
And remember if you have any comments or observations on
this housing strategy please get in touch with us.
You can read the full Local Housing Strategy
document on our website at www.eastlothian.gov.uk,
or email us at [email protected]
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East Lothian Local Housing Strategy 2003-2013