The Scottish government has pledged to invest £45m of funding to go towards about 1,200 new homes.

Holyrood’s financial injection into housing will help fuel the Scottish economy while at the same time creating new council and housing association homes for rent.

The news follows Finance Secretary John Swinney’s allocation of additional funding for housing in September’s draft Budget.

The package will also include support for people on low to moderate incomes who wish to purchase their own home.

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The government also claims this will support 800 jobs in construction and related industry sectors over the next two years.

Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said: "Investing in affordable homes creates a jobs spin-off with the employment and training that takes place during construction.

"This funding illustrates that despite the cuts to our capital budget by Westminster, the Scottish Government is determined to continue investing in new social housing.

"Councils across Scotland, backed by over £115m from the Scottish Government, have spearheaded a new era of council house building. In the last twelve months over 1,000 council houses were built, this is the highest number of completions recorded in the last twenty years.

"Independence is very much about creating jobs and growing the economy and, as this new funding illustrates, we could do so much more of it if we had full responsibility for our own resources."

(IT/CD)