The former Lansdowne Church in Glasgow’s West end has received substantial funding from The National Lottery Heritage Fund and  Glasgow City Heritage Trust to undertake an innovative project called ‘Accessing Websters’. The project will be run by the charity FACT THREE and will include an oral history project, outreach events and a new accessible database of known Alf Webster windows.

The building, designed by the Glasgow architect John Honeyman (1831-1914), houses two stained glass windows designed by renowned stained glass artist Alf Webster (1883-1915). The A Listed building, formerly known as Lansdowne Church, now houses the Stand Comedy Club on the ground floor with the stained glass gallery currently under developmentat upper gallery level.

As part of the project a new stained glass museum will be created, which will be dedicated to the research and presentation of the city’s stained glass. We are fortunate in having one of the few UK ICON Accredited Conservator-Restorers, Rab MacInnes, who is  a British Society of Master Glass Painters Member living and working near to the project. He will be working with a team to conserve and reinstate one of Webster’s windows which is currently in storage. With the focus on one of Scotland’s endangered traditional skills, we are also lucky to have one of Historic Environment Scotland’s Stained Glass Craft Fellow, Gordon Muir, working on the team.

The Accessing Websters Project has the promotion of traditional skills at its core. For over three decades Four Acres Charitable Trust and its sister charity FACT THREE  have been supporting the use of traditional skills over several buildings including Lansdowne Church and Cottiers. Work at Cottiers and Websters has provided many opportunities for traditional skills to be passed down to the next generation and new team members. Such skills include slab laying, stone pointing, cutting and indenting stone, mosaic, internal joinery, sheeting, brickwork and blockwork and other aspects of the building trades.

About Webster and the windows

Although Webster’s stained glass career was relatively short in comparison to his contemporaries, through new research, as part of the project, we are discovering that his output was prolific.

Born in Glasgow’s south side in 1883, Webster studied Architecture and Modelling at the Glasgow School of Art (GSA) before studying under Stephen Adam Senior (1848-1910) in Adam’s Glasgow studio. During this period, GSA was an exciting place to study with influential individuals such as its architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh, artistic tutor the symbolist Jean Delville, Ann Macbeth, Jessie Newbery and Director Fra Newbery studying or teaching there. In 1904, Webster began an apprenticeship at Adam Senior’s studio at 168 Bath Street in the city centre which was known as the ‘Adam Studio’. After Adam’s death in 1910, Webster took over the studio until his death during WWI in 1915.

The McCowan window depicts the events of Holy Week, and consists of three large, detailed lancets and a trefoil situated above. The McCowan window, installed in 1913-14, was the gift of Mr and Mrs David McCowan of 9 Park Circus Place. David McCowan was a senior partner of the marine insurance brokers and underwriting firm, Messrs William Euing & Company.  Although the window is currently in storage awaiting the team to start work, progress has been made with the installation of the light tables in the space designated for the museum.

The second window, commonly referred to as The Templeton building, is still in situ in its original location. Named after the Misses Templeton, who gifted the window, it depicts the life of Christ in eight large scenes with a panel dedicated to the memory of their mother, brother, and sister and in appreciation of their present minister. Misses Templeton was the spinster daughter of James Templeton, a long-serving Manager and Elder of Lansdowne UP Church. Like the McCowan window, the main scenes of the window are surrounded by detailed motifs and symbols.

The Accessing Websters Project will run for two years with the aim of sharing the story and art of Alf Webster through various means. It is hoped that the museum will be open to the public in 2026.

Dr. Karen Mailley has an MA Joint (Hons) and an MLitt in Decorative Arts & Design History from the University of Glasgow. She helped to establish Scotland’s first online stained glass database. Image: Detail of the McCowan Window courtesy of FACT THREE.

This blog is part of the third edition of the Places of Worship Forum (POWF) Newsletter which was published on 12 November 2025. The newsletter aims to share the ongoing work of the group. Would you like to receive the next edition of the newsletter? Sign up here. 

On the high streets of our towns and cities, at the centres of our villages, up country lanes, peppering our coastline – churches are central to Scotland’s built environment. Today, many of these buildings are in peril of closing their doors to the public. Approximately 800 churches in Scotland are either closing or due to close in the next few years, and with 200 closed recently, this amounts to around one third of all Scottish churches. Aiming to address this issue, the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland and Scotland’s Churches Trust have teamed up for the project Finding Futures for Scotland’s Churches. Thanks to grants from National Lottery Heritage Fund and the Pilgrim Trust, this two-year project will undertake a rapid assessment of Scotland’s at-risk church heritage and social value, and work with others to help communities find sustainable futures for their buildings.

The Challenge   

All denominations are currently grappling with the issue of how to manage their estate at a time when congregations are dwindling. The church closures happening as a result are now proceeding at an unprecedented pace. Most in the built heritage sector will have been touched by the issue, whether formally through their role or simply because they are concerned about a cherished church’s planned closure. Some historically important buildings, such as Fowlis Easter (Scotland’s most complete pre-Reformation Church) and Croick (made famous by the record of the Clearances engraved on its windows) have galvanised support for closing churches, with the former a recent recipient of a grant from Architectural Heritage Fund and the latter acquired by Historic Churches Scotland. The Church of Scotland has also identified twelve ‘Signature Churches’, a scheme aimed at supporting some of their most vibrant and historic churches.

Still, there are hundreds of churches which are at risk. Many are architecturally important, others are like mini museums with important collections, and almost all of them are centres of significant intangible cultural heritage. It is also the case that we simply do not know what we might be losing because Scottish churches have long been undervalued and under-researched. There have already been accidents where historic interiors have been damaged in the closure process, and there is a real risk that we might not know what we’ve got ‘til it’s gone. The Finding Futures for Scotland’s Churches project will create a publicly accessible database to record ecclesiastical heritage and social value, to empower the communities who care for churches and help heritage organisations take a strategic view of the challenges.

The Project

With funding for two years, the project team will undertake a rapid analysis of Scotland’s at-risk ecclesiastical heritage and the social value of churches. There are several existing resources available which survey heritage, such as Historic Environment Scotland’s Trove and specialist databases, for example, of church bells. So, the first job is to collate this data and identify gaps in knowledge. Then comes the tricky task of prioritising churches with particularly high heritage and/or social value to explore in greater depth. We are creating a method of assessment that is transparent, sensitive, and necessarily speedy given the scale of church closures. Ten sites will be chosen for full recording of their heritage using Scotland Churches Trust’s Church Recording scheme as a model, alongside in-depth research and expert advice. Ten churches will also be selected for social value surveys, based on the University of Stirling’s Social Value Toolkit. Throughout, we will engage with affected communities, placing them at the front and centre of all the work we do.

Get Involved

Launched in June 2025, the project is staffed by a Research Manager and a newly-appointed Communities Officer, supported by colleagues in the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland and Scotland’s Churches Trust. Collaboration is key, and we are in dialogue with the Church of Scotland, the Sacred Landscapes initiative run by the University of St Andrews, Historic Environment Scotland, National Museums Scotland, and members of the Places of Worship Forum. In particular, we are working closely with the team at Development Trusts Association Scotland who have their own programme ‘New Futures: Former Places of Worship’ focussing on bringing church buildings into sustainable community ownership. We are always keen to find new partners, and we are establishing an action group to contribute to our research and help advise churches on the heritage assets they hold. Please contact lizzie@socantscot.org if you would like to attend our launch event in Edinburgh on the 11^th of September.

To stay abreast of the progress of the project, you can find us on Bluesky @ScotChurchFutures, follow Scotland’s Churches Trust on their social media for updates, and subscribe to the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland’s public e-newsletter at www.socantscot.org/enews.

Dr Lizzie Swarbrick FSAScot is the Research Manager for the Finding Futures for Scotland’s Churches project run by the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland and Scotland’s Churches Trust. Lizzie is an art and architectural historian specialising in Scottish medieval churches, with a particular interest in how people have created, moulded, and used church buildings and their associated material culture. She joined the Society of Antiquaries in June 2025 after a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship at the University of Edinburgh and a PhD at the University of St Andrews.

This blog is part of the second edition of the Places of Worship Forum (POWF) Newsletter which was published on 14 August 2025. To read the first edition, please click here. The newsletter aims to share the ongoing work of the group. Would you like to receive the next edition of the newsletter? Sign up here. 

It is now well known that the Church of Scotland (CoS) in particular, is rationalising its estate at pace and our research shows that as many as 800 church assets across Scotland (across all denominations) are potentially up for sale in the next few years. COSS (Community Ownership Support Services) has been supporting groups over the years with their ambitions to bring churches and glebe land into community ownership but to support this unprecedented demand we have now launched a new dedicated support service.  

I am the Churches Advisor covering the North half of Scotland and my colleague Claire Martin, covers the Southern half. A third advisor will also be coming on board shortly as our research shows that demand is due to further increase next year. This research was started by the DTAS (Development Trusts Association Scotland) Research and Insights team and further developed by our new Programme Support Officer, Harry Whitmore. 

Harry is part of our churches team and has been leading on developing an open-source database detailing the status of all Church of Scotland assets from local presbytery plans and other publicly available material on other denominations into one handy searchable document that we can continue to update. This will provide communities and stakeholders with vital information to help them plan support and community action.  

As advisors we will provide dedicated support along with training and guidance to equip communities to make informed decisions on the future of their local church assets, providing the tools for community ownership where appropriate and ensuring communities across Scotland have the support they need. We will also be raising awareness, visiting targeted areas and highlighting to communities the assets that may be being disposed of the support available to them.  So, in summary, our service will, over the next three years provide-  

• early-stage guidance and advice to communities including 1-2-1 Advisor support 

• start up support, mentoring and sharing good practice with groups 

• peer-to-peer networking and learning exchanges 

• help building capacity in community ownership through training workshops, guidance and resources 

• dedicated web pages with digital resources (still to be developed) as well as signposting to other support bodies 

• a ‘Churches SOS’ Crisis Support Service for groups that need to access support quickly to access their options 

• microgrants to groups to set up to hold early-stage community consultation events, print leaflets etc. 

• work with a range of partners and stakeholders to ensure holistic package of support. 

We are also looking forward to continuing our work with BEFS, by co-developing and delivering workshop sessions and exploring how best we can support local authority officers in this fast-paced environment.  

As the programme develops, we will be sharing information and findings with partners across the UK and look forward to working with a variety of stakeholders including those involved in the Places of Worship forum. 

It’s early days and our webpages are still under construction, but we have been busy! Since 2024 the COSS team have been working with over 50 active community groups who are exploring the options available to them and we have launched our first series of online workshops.  The topics so far cover place planning and community engagement delivered in partnership with Coalfields Regeneration Trust and an information session on Community Right to Buy delivered by Scottish Government. The past few months we have delivered workshops such as “Churches into Community Ownership – First steps”, “Finance and Fundraising”, and “Business Planning”.

This three-year project is possible thanks to funding by the National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) and Historic Environment Scotland (HES) and Development Trust Association Scotland (DTAS). 

Please do share our contact details amongst your network and we very much look forward to hearing from new groups considering taking a former place of worship into community ownership. 

Delivered by the Development Trusts Association Scotland, the Community Ownership Support Service is funded by the Scottish Government to support the sustainable transfer of predominantly public assets into community ownership.   

Audrey Dunn, Churches Advisor at COSS (Community Ownership Support Services) introduces their New Futures Programme – Former places of Worship in Scotland a new initiative dedicated to supporting churches into community ownership. 

This blog is part of the Places of Worship Forum (POWF) Newsletter which launched 3 July 2025. To read the first edition, please click here. The newsletter aims to share the ongoing work of the group. Would you like to receive the next edition of the newsletter? Sign up here. 

In her first Joining the Dots piece, Hazel Johnson said that the policy landscape is complex. I’d like to add to that assessment and suggest that policy complexity is not a static feature – but it’s something that changes over time, as policy develops. Looking at things from planning perspective, the last few years have added new topics, new technologies and new duties to the remit of planners – whether that’s play sufficiency assessments, nature networks, battery storage and hydrogen to name a few. The result is a policy landscape that is complex and dynamic, and trends towards both deepening and broadening.  

As well as increasing numbers of topics, planning now involves many more technical assessments and tools. As a case in point the guidance on NPF4 Policy 2 climate mitigation and adaptation was published very recently, explaining how lifecycle carbon assessments are to be used in the decision-making process. It’s not enough to support renewables and energy efficiency, planners are being asked to consider a technical assessment of lifecycle carbon as part of the planning process.  

These examples are in themselves a form of Joining the Dots – linking national policy goals through to decisions and developments on the ground. And technical assessment is a necessary step in realising those national ambitions. But just adding more work to the system isn’t yet delivering the step change needed. So, what else could be done?  

I want to make the case here for data – and the potential of data integration as a way of joining the dots. As a former (recovering) academic, you might not be surprised that I’m keen on building an evidence base to support all forms of policy development and implementation. There is lots of data out there, but it’s not necessarily in the right places or available in the right formats to make it usable.  

All of us will be aware of reports commissioned at various times and places about biodiversity, ground conditions, archaeology, or something else – but which exist solely in a stand-alone document, possibly in PDF. Local authority planning portals must collectively have thousands of examples of these sitting on the cyber shelves. Many of these provide useful data about individual plots of land and the surrounding neighbourhood – but it’s both inaccessible and invisible in its current format. What if we could make it available and usable?  

Let’s just imagine that scenario and what it might mean. For local authorities, it would allow data submitted to support planning applications – transport models, ground conditions, contaminated land assessments, site investigations and ecological surveys to be presented in a map layer – making it accessible to decision makers. This could be embedded into a digital twin or a digital gazetteer and allow local authority officers and members to interrogate that the data layer to help inform decision making. I think we could all imagine how that might be useful. There is also something else here about the accumulation and collation of spatial data. We all understand the idea of crowd-sourcing information and the power of citizen science using mass observation to build robust data sets. But where data is stored in a PDF, there’s no opportunity to harness that robustness.  

 If you have never come across it before then please let me introduce you to GiGL. One of my favourite acronyms in the built environment sector – Greenspace information for Greater London – is a records centre that manages, collates and does useful things with environmental data. GiGL offers an array of tools, including data visualisations such as maps, tables and infographics. These tools can help professionals assess a specific site as well as consider wider issues across a neighbourhood or a whole London borough. For example, GiGL has developed a nature deficiency measure – mapping areas in London which have the least greenspace. This tool joins the dots between environmental data and policy goals on accessible natural greenspace and maps them in a way that makes it usable to practitioners. That can of course include decisions on planning applications, or the preparation of a new development plan – but it can also influence other public sector strategies on parks, active travel, school grounds, street trees and budgets for local nature projects.  

In Scotland we are blessed with Canmore which has been refreshed as Trove (an excellent name for all that treasured data). Trove also demonstrates the power of collating information, digitising records and making things accessible and searchable through a web interface. But, imagine going further than GiGL and Canmore and combining heritage data, transport information and all the other things you can think of into the same digital platform. Imagine being able to draw on the information collected through the planning process. What else could you do? What other links could be made? What other synergies could be discovered?  

Glasgow City Council has been doing its own digital data integration work, creating a digital twin which has just been made public (June 2025). It’s a work in progress, but good to see the variety of data layers which have been included in the model – including data about trees and forest cover. In the era of big data, AI tools and the commercialisation of data, joining up data to inform decision makers seems an obvious step. We shouldn’t get hung up on the technicalities of the best way to do this – but rather press ahead with trying it out. And, since architecture and building design is already happening in digital form, digital twins can also support the integration of CAD models of new buildings into the city’s datascape.  

Prime Minister Keir Starmer recently announced a new AI tool called ‘Extract’ being rolled out to planners in England. The tool will enable data to be extracted from planning documents and turn it into data ‘in minutes’. Whilst the emphasis of the Labour Government is on speeding up planning, I think AI tools like this one just might do something much more profound. They could bring data and evidence into decision-making in a way that is simply not possible at the moment. What a breakthrough that would be.   

Dr. Caroline Brown MRTPI is Director for Scotland, Ireland and English Regions at the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI). Caroline is a chartered town planner and experienced planning academic whose research and teaching interests focus on green and blue health, cycling and walking, sustainability and urban form. Over the years she has been involved in several international research collaborations and is currently part of the child-focussed cities network with researchers in Brazil, Australia, Africa and Europe. For the last six years Caroline was Senior Editor at the journal Cities & Health, helping to develop a place for the dissemination of cross-disciplinary research spanning academic, policy and practitioner boundaries in urban planning, public health and policy.  

This blog is part of BEFS ‘Joining the Dots’ series exploring interconnected policy areas. See the first blog for an introduction to the series. 

Get in touch – to find out more about BEFS work or to discuss a particular topic or policy area email us at info@befs.org.uk or contact the Team. 

Tenements make up approximately 40 per cent of Scotland’s housing stock, and there are over half a million tenement property owners across the country. Tenements are a unique feature of Scotland’s urban landscape, and what happens in them impacts our communities. According to a Scottish Government report on the provision of Building Reserve Funds, 53% of people, both renters and tenement owners, wish that more was done to maintain the tenement they live in.

According to the latest Scottish Housing Survey results published in 2023, 45% of all properties in Scotland had disrepair which impacted their watertightness or structural stability. This tells us that Scotland’s tenements are in urgent need of maintenance, and the people who live in them need assistance to achieve even a basic standard of a warm, waterproof home.

When homes are in a poor state of repair, they become energy inefficient. A home with rotting windows, damaged stonework and damp lofts takes much more energy to heat than a home which is watertight and in good repair. This is why the poor state of many of Scotland’s tenement properties will make it harder for us to reach our Net Zero carbon emissions targets by 2045.

In a recent feasibility study, carried out in partnership with Loco Homes, we studied the options for retrofit of a typical tenement building in Dennistoun, Glasgow. Retrofit differs from maintenance in that it involves fitting new, energy efficient heating systems and insulation in traditional homes, while maintenance work consists only of looking after the current features of the building. However, in our study we found that before the retrofit could even begin, significant maintenance work was required on the flat to make it watertight.

There is little point in retrofitting a traditional tenement building with a modern, zero carbon heating system, if the heat is still leaking out from poorly maintained walls, roofs and windows. Maintenance of our tenements must be one of the Scottish Government’s priorities as it aims for Net Zero.

Good maintenance of Scotland’s tenements requires hard work and collaboration between owners, factors, local authorities and the Scottish Government. Typical barriers to good maintenance include property owners’ lack of knowledge of how to approach common repairs, limited finances to pay for repairs, and frustrations or lack of communication between neighbours, factors and local authorities.

The Scottish Parliamentary Working Group on Tenements has made several recommendations to the Scottish Government on how they could create a supportive environment for tenement maintenance and repair. We have endorsed mandatory homeowners’ associations as a solution for poor communication between owners, as they lead to improved communication and faster decision-making in discussions about maintenance and repair.  Making owners’ associations compulsory for tenements will bring Scotland in line with most of the rest of the world, and will make it easier for owners to keep their buildings in good repair. We also endorse mandatory building reserve funds, which would oblige homeowners to save together, in small, regular increments, for important repairs.

We also recommend that tenement owners should not be shouldering the cost of long overdue maintenance work alone. Rather, the Scottish Government should consider introducing property-linked, publicly supported loans for tenement owners. These could be administered by each local authority in a similar fashion to Council Tax, because the loan would stay with the property rather than with the owner. This would give homeowners the financial support they need to keep their properties warm and watertight, a key consideration in the journey towards Net Zero.

The importance of keeping Scotland’s tenements in good repair, and supporting maintenance work, cannot be overstated. Good maintenance is crucial to maintain the unique aesthetic and culture of Scotland’s towns and cities. It is vital for ensuring that the people who live in tenements have safe, warm homes. It also plays an essential role in improving energy efficiency, decarbonising our homes and reducing the harms of climate change. It is the first step in the retrofitting process. This is why the Scottish Government’s approach to decarbonisation must make tenement maintenance a key priority.

Mike Heffron is the Chief Executive Officer at Under One Roof. He is responsible for overseeing the strategic direction of the organisation as well as finance, fundraising, and team leadership. BEFS Members Under One Roof is Scotland’s only charity committed to providing free and impartial information on repairs, maintenance, and retrofit for tenement flat owner-occupiers, landlords, and housing professionals in Scotland. The Under One Roof website hosts a wealth of information, with over 200 articles that cover a wide range of topics related to tenement maintenance and management. Their website also has an enquiry service which enables owner-occupiers, landlords, housing professionals, or local authority staff to receive tailored answers to specific queries. Under One Roof and BEFS provide co-secretariat for the Tenement Maintenance Working Group.

This blog is part of BEFS ‘Joining the Dots’ series exploring interconnected policy areas. See the first blog for an introduction to the series. 

Get in touch – to find out more about BEFS work or to discuss a particular topic or policy area email us at info@befs.org.uk or contact the Team. 

Scotland cannot solve its housing, net zero or Just Transition goals without holistic, cross-portfolio policymaking. 

Throughout our advocacy efforts, the CIOB has continued to assert Scotland will struggle to tackle the housing emergency in the absence of a long-term, strategic approach to meeting our housing challenges. 

We know Scotland needs to increase its housing supply, and, as the Scottish Government has recognised, we need to retrofit our existing homes at pace and scale to ensure everyone has a home that is safe, affordable, and meets their needs. What’s more, we won’t achieve net zero targets unless we ensure that both new and existing housing is energy efficient and fit for purpose now and into the future. 

Getting these homes built, repaired, and improved to a high degree of quality, which achieves in situ the efficiency levels required, will not happen without a robust pipeline of skilled, qualified people to undertake the work. To recruit and train the necessary workforce to deliver high-quality housing, the industry needs clarity, stability, and increased resources. 

Therefore, facilitating widescale housing construction and retrofit will require long-term thinking from policymakers and a commitment to adopting a strategic approach that makes the most of public resources by ensuring funds are used effectively. This is a particularly acute issue when it comes to retrofit.

That’s why the current short-term, siloed approach to wide-sweeping policy and social problems remains frustrating. For example, while supportive of the Government’s necessarily ambitious aims to decarbonise the built environment, the CIOB previously raised concerns about the approach proposed in the initial Heat in Buildings Strategy and the potential for its proposals to worsen rates of fuel poverty, a view now shared by the Scottish Government. The initial legislation was arguably reflective of short-term, siloed thinking. This approach to policymaking is inefficient; it wastes both time and money. 

The CIOB has argued, as have others, that retrofit projects can support many policy and social objectives; they can support the economy, in particular creating local jobs, and are an example of a socially valuable project.  

However, these economic and social benefits will be put at risk if the challenges of retrofit and decarbonisation are not considered holistically and with a cross-portfolio approach to identifying and supplying the resources needed to meet these challenges.  

For example, the by-tenure, piecemeal model for retrofit funding loses out on economies of scale, which makes the per-unit price to renovate homes higher than it needs to be. If a cross-tenure, neighbourhood-wide model was adopted for retrofit, these costs could be reduced with materials and sites shared. This model also presents wider benefits for local jobs and can help address the skills gap, as larger-scale, longer-term projects would facilitate the training and retention of local skilled workers. 

The CIOB is, in principle, supportive of the ambitions behind aims outlined in legislation like the Heat in Buildings Strategy and Social Housing Net Zero Standard. However, these by-tenure standards, which arguably fail to adequately consider the full breadth of Scotland’s housing challenges and barriers to the widescale uptake of retrofit projects, may have unintended consequences, in particular for vulnerable households. 

Significant reforms are needed to the way Scotland approaches retrofit if we are ever going to reach our goals for housing and decarbonisation while ensuring a Just Transition. All tenures must be considered together when developing our approach to retrofit. It is equally vital policymakers engage with non-housing departments— like Further and Higher Education, Climate Action, and Public Finance— that directly influence the nation’s ability to tackle its housing challenges. 

That’s why the CIOB, alongside industry partners, continues to call for the development of a national Retrofit Delivery and Resource Plan, which takes a cross-tenure, neighbourhood-based approach and considers how we will adequately resource these projects— both financially and with a sufficient pipeline of the right people with the right skills. We have further suggested such a plan should be overseen by a Ministerial Oversight Group on Retrofit, which brings together the relevant ministers, civil servants, and wider stakeholder groups needed to meet Scotland’s retrofit challenge. 

There are positive steps in this space, but we need declarative, urgent action and leadership from the Scottish Government to bring together the relevant people and portfolios to set to work on an ambitious national strategy for housing and retrofit. It will be a long road ahead, and careful consideration and extensive consultation will be necessary to avoid unintended consequences. 

Nonetheless, I remain optimistic about the collaborative landscape across Scotland’s construction industry, its housing sector, and at Holyrood. 

Jocelyne Fleming is the Senior Policy & Public Affairs Officer for Scotland at the Chartered Institute of Building. She leads the organisation’s work advocating in the public interest on all issues relating to the built environment and construction in Scotland. Jocelyne is also undertaking a PhD in Urban Studies at the University of Glasgow. 

This blog is part of BEFS ‘Joining the Dots’ series exploring interconnected policy areas. See the first blog for an introduction to the series. 

Get in touch – to find out more about BEFS work or to discuss a particular topic or policy area email us at info@befs.org.uk or contact the Team. 

The policy landscape is complex. This is an often-repeated phrase for BEFS, a mantra when navigating the growing array of existing and nascent policy and legislation.  

A large part of BEFS work is undertaking to de-mystify, connect, and signpost the alignment and interdependencies within policy which can seem at times distant and remote from practical application and the action that we all desire.   

 And not only is the landscape complex, it is ever evolving. Alongside the big-ticket items that Scotland as a nation – and we as a sector – is mandated to strive towards; we have moved through acknowledging a Climate Emergency, declaring a Housing Emergency, an emphasis on Just Transition and Wellbeing Economy, and adapted alongside regular Parliamentary re-shuffles.  

 Working within shifting parameters is not new. The 2026 election presents an additional need to ensure that a baseline approach to evidencing the value of our existing built environment is robust and embedded; understanding and building on what has come before can help us as we make smart choices and choose action for today.   

 BEFS work covers key strategic areas including (but not limited) to Net Zero and Climate Change, Tenement Maintenance and Repair, Retrofit, Skills, Planning and Placemaking. Seeded throughout all these is a sustainable future for Scotland’s people and places. Crucially, all of these policy areas – whilst distinct – must not be viewed or pursued in isolation.  

Setting the scene 

Our past, Our Future, Scotland’s Strategy for the Historic Environment identifies the three key priorities for the historic environment to be: Net Zero, Communities and Places, and the Wellbeing Economy. And these thematic areas, as priorities, are unlikely to be going anywhere any time soon. Under these headlines heritage and built environment sector bodies are facing a lack of skills, lack of funding and investment, and lack of capacity. 

 Drill down to the national policies and legislation themselves within which we operate, and we often see these polices constructed and written with an eye to the headline agendas, mandated targets and national drivers – but not necessarily speaking to each other. Where does heritage and the existing built environment, and all that it encompasses, sit within a legislative pecking order and how can we collectively elevate our interests? This, hopefully, is what this series will explore over the coming months.  

 For example, in delivering Net Zero; the Heat in Buildings Bill presents the sector with a need to present a clear case to guarantee that our existing and historic buildings are recognised as an asset and receive appropriate advice and interventions to make them even more sustainable for the future. To do this, we must have the right skills, in the right places.  

The National Planning Framework (NPF4) is being reviewed in its second year since publication. We know that a clear steer towards Net Zero targets within planning can and should sit alongside those policies that protect and enhance the historic and existing built environment – but decision makers are faced with an unclear legislative hierarchy. How do we make good heritage decisions a de-facto win for Net Zero? 

A further challenge is how Local Place Plans sit within the planning system; local authority teams remain stretched and under-resourced, with potential further consequences for heritage with the implementation of Local Heat Networks.  

And there’s more – although we know that construction and demolition accounts for around half of all waste produced in Scotland; Scotland’s Circular Economy and Waste Route Map to 2030 under-represents construction waste, the potential for reuse, and the role that Scotland’s existing building stock can and should play in conversations around sustainability.  

 Our historic buildings themselves can play a starring role in a Just Transition plan for construction – this in tandem with the Climate Change Adaptation Plan can accelerate the pace of progress towards Net Zero. Retrofit must be framed within the agenda for promoting maintenance and repair. These are strategies in which the whole sector needs to be embedded and delivering in innovative ways.  

Further hooks are out there – our cultural heritage is a priceless asset, but the labour and skills to support and look after those assets do have a price. And so when it comes to Scotland’s tourism offer, decisions relating to the Visitor Levy Bill affect how our places could, and should, benefit from taxation on those who choose to visit. Placing heritage within culture is something we need to continue to keep shouting about, again and again. 

These are just some examples; collectively articulating these challenges and opportunities, and the way in which we do this, will be a significant part of how we can operate strategically for the future. We also know that how we frame and present the opportunities and challenges ahead is crucial – advocacy has to be backed up by data and evidence. 

Setting out our stall 

This is not about preaching to the converted. Readers will recognise how far our collective work permeates and supports national aims, and national change, but more can be done to seek increased opportunities for cross-portfolio wins to be realised – how we align and express our activities to take best advantage of this will be key.  

Policy should and can overlap, supporting and mutually elevating work being done across all areas of the built environment, heritage and culture sectors.  

In exploring the challenges and opportunities ahead, this series aims to invite a collective discussion, making space to advocate, align and take the best possible advantage of shaping current and future policy in the long term. How can strategic advocacy be amplified through joined-up thinking, capacity building and cross-sector collaboration? Through this series we look forward to exploring this with you over the coming months.  

Get in touch – to find out more about BEFS work or to discuss a particular topic or policy area email us at info@befs.org.uk or contact the Team.