University students in Scotland rallied outside of Parliament today to fight for student housing.
They came with concerns that with the upcoming Housing Bill, students and apprentices are being treated as an afterthought and are at risk of being left out in the cold.
An open letter to MSP Paul McLennan from the National Union of Students Scotland (NUS Scotland) wrote: “Housing is housing and a home is a home.
“As rent dramatically increases in student accomodation across the country, increasing the risk of people being made homeless or skipping meals to afford their rent, there is no excuse for not applying the same regulation to these homes as those in the private rented sector.”
The NUS Scotland want the Housing Bill to recognise students and apprentices as tenants and to take into account their specific needs as renters.
They asked for the bill to extend to all tenent protections and rent controls to purpose-built student accomodation on an equal basis to the private rented sector.
Oluwatomisin Osinubi, vice president for the Glasgow School of Business and Society is one of the many international students at Glasgow Caledonian University who has struggled to find a safe place to live.
“I came to Glasgow. I had the funds to rent a flat, I even had a family member to be my garantor.
“But the landlord thought he had the audacity to discriminate against me because I was an international student and refused to give me a home to live in.
“As a student from the biggest city in Scotland, we see the same housing issues year after year and we are tired.”
The housing bill does not address the issue of garantors.
Renters are expected to provide a garantor based in the UK, who either owns property or earns a certain amount of money to guarantee that they will pay their rent or pay up to 12 months rent up-front on top of their deposit.
This is a difficult ask for international students as well as students who are from a working-class backgrounds, estranged from their family, care-experienced or carers themselves.
This is not an issue unique to Glasgow Caledonian Univeristy, as students across the country also spoke out on their struggles.
Shannon MacCallum, vice president education at the University of the Highlands and Islands stated: “students are being forced out of rural Scotland because they can’t find affordable housing, and when students are priced out it’s not just our futures at risk it’s the future of these communites as a whole.”
“In many rural areas, homes that were once available for students or local residents are now being converted into short-term rentals for tourists.”
Ruth Elliot, vice president community at Edinburgh University added: “We’re cold and we’re hungry.”
“How are students expected to thrive?”
A survey by the National Union of Students Scotland showed that 34% of respondents were unable to pay their rent in full.
That is 26% higher than the overall level in the UK.
Sai Shraddha Suresh Viswanathan, president of NUS Scotland, said: “We are a movement.
“We represent the countless stories of students who have struggled; who have to choose to pay their rent or heat their houses or buy groceries.
“These stories are real and these stories are painful.”
Maggie Chapman, Green MSP for North East Scotland, was one of the polticians backing the rally today.
She said in her speech: “Housing is, if not the number one issue, always in the top two issues that students face.
“University accomodation doesn’t give you the rights you need and it certainly doesn’t match the rights that other tenants in the private rentor sector have and we do need to change that.
Chapman is leading on the Housing Bill for the Scottish Greens.
She continued: “I promise to take your views into the discussions, into the conversations I have in Parliament.
“These things take time, and the process is always slower than you think it should be”
Other parties have yet to comment.
