The home building industry has given a cautious welcome to the details announced yesterday on how the £9m first tranche of the £100m brought forward within the Scottish Government's Affordable Housing Investment Programme is being invested.

The First Minister announced the accelerated funding in August as part of a package of measures designed to enable private developers and housing associations to work together to increase provision of homes across Scotland as new build output plummeted in response to the credit crunch.

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Jonathan Fair, Chief Executive of Homes for Scotland, the organisation which represents companies building 95% of the country's new homes, said: "Seven weeks after the initial announcement, we are pleased to see this first round of funds being brought forward and allocated today to assist housing associations with site starts and land acquisition. Bringing forward these projects will help inject some activity back into new home construction as well as providing more of the affordable homes that Scotland so desperately needs.

"However, with private new build starts down by over 70% in the last quarter and much development now effectively on hold, this is just a small first step. We need to see other projects which are currently in the system evaluated quickly and all remaining funding allocations massively accelerated to make any kind of difference to housing supply in Scotland."

(GK/JM)