This event follows on from part 1, held in January, and continues to explore innovative, affordable and low-carbon solutions to Scotland's housing crises – both rural and urban. This event will start with a showcase of some of the beautifully-designed, prefabricated houses already available in Scotland. We know how to do it – we just need to be able to do it at scale.

Over four sessions, we will discuss how we might roll out more manufacturing hubs across Scotland, using local timber, and other ways of speeding up the building process. Experts will address issues around regulation, finance and whether retrofit might follow a similar model.

Whether you're involved in construction, housing policy, provision or campaigning, or simply interested in learning more about innovative ways of addressing the housing emergency, this is the conference for you.

"Radical Housing Conference Scotland brings together the thinkers and the doers in housing, providing an opportunity to grow the links needed to deliver more of the sustainable, affordable, home-grown housing that addresses Scotland's housing needs." - Highlands & Islands MSP and housing committee convenor Ariane Burgess 

We can't just wait for the Scottish Government to resolve this; we have to take action ourselves. Let's work together to create a more equitable, affordable and sustainable housing future in Scotland. We have one simple rule, don't come to describe the problem, only come with solutions.

Morning

9:00 Arrival, coffee and exhibition

9:15 Welcome

9:30 Session 1: INSPIRATION – a showcase of affordable prefabricated house models

• Chair – Louise Rogers, impact manager, housing and manufacturing, BE-ST

• Tam – Craig White,   CEO & founder, Agile Homes

• Makar – Neil Sutherland, founder & director, MAKAR

• Social Bite house – Matt Stevenson, founder & CEO, Ecosystems Technologies

10:45 Session 2: Financial INNOVATION – carbon and social value trades (CSVT)

Craig White,  CEO & founder, Agile Homes

11:15   Poetry interlude

Chris Powici reads a poem commission for the event.

11:30  Session 3: THE MEANS - rural construction hubs

• Chair – Diarmaid Lawlor – associate director, Scottish Futures Trust

• Neil Sutherland – founder & director, MAKAR

• John Forbes – communities co-ordinator, Communities Housing Trust

• Mark Councill – founder, Logie Timber & CleanCut Forestry

• Ronnie MacRae –  housing delivery manager, SSEN

• HIE / SOSE
  

12:45 Lunch and exhibition

Afternoon

13:45 Session 4: THE OBVIOUS - trustworthy retrofit centres

• Chair – Barbara Lantschner  – John Gilbert Architects Ltd 

• Matthew Clubb – mwclubb / Architectural Design

• Toby Tucker – Scottish Futures Trust

• Joanne McClelland & Aythan Lewes – EALA Impacts

• Colin Tennant – HES Retrofit Centre

• TBC
  

15:00 Musical interlude

15:30 Session 5: THE VISIONARY – regulatory futures

• Chair – Gail Halvorsen, chair, SEDA Land

• Ariane Burgess MSP – Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee

• Bea Nichols – Place Development Manager, HES

• Neil Sutherland – founder & director, MAKAR

• John Forbes – communities co-ordinator, Communities Housing Trust

• Matt Stevenson – founder &managing director, Ecosystems Technologies

• TBC
  

16:45 Concluding remarks

17:00 Close

ARTISTIC CONTRIBUTION

Chris Powici, poet and Teaching Fellow, University of Stirling

This poem was commissioned for the event.

Chris’s poetry focuses on how the natural and human worlds overlap. His poems range from the shed door to the back of beyond, from a rain-swept railway station to a graveyard in Skye. Powici edited the literary magazine Northwords Now for seven years. His poems have been published widely including in Gutter, BBC Wildlife, New Writing Scotland and Scotia Extremis.

In Person tickets:

General Admission: £120 

SEDA member: £80

Promo Code: SEDAmember

Student / unwaged: £40

Promo Code: RadicalStudent

For Online tickets:

General Admission: £30

SEDA member: £20

Promo Code: SEDAmemberOnline

Student / unwaged: £10

Promo Code: RadicalStudentOnline

Ariane Burgess MSP, for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Green Party.

Ariane Burgess MSP grew up in Scotland and lived for 20 years in New York City, she returned to Scotland and became involved in the independence movement, joining the Scottish Green Party in Moray. She authored “Life Design for Women: Conscious Living as a Force for Positive Change” and previously worked in sustainable community development. She is the Scottish Green Party spokesperson for Communities, Land Reform, Housing and Rural Affairs and MSP for the Highlands & Islands. As Convenor of the Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee she helped to steer the new National Planning Framework through Parliament and she also sits as an ordinary member of the Rural Affairs and Islands Committee. In January 2023 she launched her Regenerative Scotland podcast which explores the action needed to ensure a thriving future in the face of our climate and nature emergency through a series of in-depth conversations about aspects of her parliamentary work. 

Joanne McLelland, President, EALA Impacts & Treasurer and, Edinburgh Building Retrofit & Improvement Collective

Jo is the founder of Eala CIC and an Accredited Conservation Architect with the RIBA. Jo’s twin passions of conservation and sustainability are shown in her work as well as memberships of the RIAS boards for both areas, as well as memberships of SEDA, SPAB and IHBC. Jo is the immediate past EAA President, a trustee of the RIAS, director of Circular Economy initiative Plan A, and Treasurer of the Edinburgh Building Retrofit & Improvement Collective. The Collective is a community support organisation to improve the relationship of people and their buildings in Edinburgh. She was responsible for the Edinburgh RIAS COP26 activities, including the steering group of SpACE – Space for Architecture Carbon and Environment. Jo is a tutor at the Edinburgh School of Architecture & Landscape Architecture (ESALA).

Bea Nichols, Place development manager, Historic Environment Scotland

Bea has always worked in rural planning, first at Scottish Borders, then in Perth & Kinross followed by South Lanarkshire. She recently joined the newly formed place development scheme at Historic Environment Scotland. Her passion comes from her childhood growing up in remote Herefordshire. Locals were being bought out of the area by wealthier incomers, rural services were diminishing, and it was increasingly difficult to live and work without a car. She moved to Edinburgh before she could afford to move back to the countryside, further exacerbating the issue for the next generation of young people. Bea believes that planners are placemakers responsible for shaping communities that providing an equitable choice for future generations.

Craig White, Founder and CEO, Agile Homes

Craig is CEO at Agile Property and Homes. Agile delivers low-carbon, affordable homes to those in housing need. Prior to setting up Agile, Craig founded the Chartered RIBA Architectural Practice, White Design and ModCell Straw Technology, prefabricated, renewable building systems. This combination of design and fabrication lead to one of the first construction products to make large-scale, carbon-negative building a commercial reality. 

Neil Sutherland, founder, MAKAR Ltd.

Neil is an award winning, ecologically driven architect who runs his own construction company, MAKAR Ltd., South of Inverness. MAKAR is a pioneering company that designs and builds ecological homes, offices and community buildings using off-site construction. Neil is passionate about building healthy, environmentally friendly, low energy buildings using locally grown timber. Neil has experience in timber and land management and teaches at the Scott Sutherland School of Architecture, Aberdeen.

Toby Tucker, associate director, Scottish Futures Trust

Toby is a qualified Chartered Accountant and finance specialist with over 20 years' experience in corporate and project finance, as well as Banking. Toby leads SFT's work on Scottish Government’s Energy Efficient Scotland programme. He led the development and delivery of SFT’s successful Streetlighting toolkit. He is a Director of Energy for Edinburgh service company. 

John Forbes, Community Led Housing Co-ordinator, Communities Housing Trust

With a background in Mechanical Engineering John has worked throughout the UK on Construction and Facility Management Projects. Now living on the West coast of Scotland his focus over the past decade has been to support and take forward affordable house developments throughout Rural Scotland. His role with the Communities Housing Trust includes early engagement with communities, identifying housing need, securing funding, undertaking site appraisals, land and property transactions, tenure modelling as well as construction development of new homes.

Matthew Clubb, director, mwclubb | Architectural Design

Through his firm of Architects and Retrofit Coordinators in Aberdeen, Matthew champions the adoption of whole house retrofit and community led, place-based approaches. mwclubb are the main delivery agent for the Scottish Rugby Club and Community Net Zero Fund, a project to help decarbonise rugby club buildings in communities across Scotland. Matthew chairs the North East Scotland Retrofit Hub (NESFIT), aimed at raising awareness of whole house retrofit, to alleviate fuel poverty, to build a supply chain and to transition our built environment towards healthy, resilient buildings.

Matt Stevenson, founder & CEO, Ecosystems Technologies

Founder of Ecosystems Technologies, Matt Stevenson is a recognised industry leader in digital construction technology and low carbon building designs, having previously founded and developed early industry pioneer Carbon Dynamic. He has delivered multiple projects with partners such as Arc Digital, Napier University COCIS, CSIC and RGU through innovative projects such as the technology enabled assisted living ‘FitHome’ project and the Dyson Institute of Engineering and Technology Student village.

Diarmaid Lawlor, Associate Director, Scottish Futures Trust

Diarmaid is a designer, educator, and communicator who champions creative approaches to making better places. He has over 20 years’ experience working with communities and across sectors to make well-informed decisions about place-based policy and investment challenges. In SFT, Diarmaid leads on support to the Scottish Government Place Based Investment Programme, and works with public bodies across Scotland to shape place-based strategies for services, assets and investments.

Ronnie MacRae –  Housing Delivery Manager, SSEN

Ronnie has over 40 years experience of the housing, construction and community sectors as a partner in a family construction business in Durness, promoting private sector improvements for Highland Council, before joining CHT in 2005 and was CEO from 2010 delivering a wide range of community projects and initiatives.   Now assisting SSEN to deliver its exciting Housing Strategy, he is also a Member of the Chartered Institute of Building and is a Chartered Environmentalist.

Mark Councill – founder, Logie Timber & CleanCut Forestry,

As an experienced forester, Mark is passionate about ensuring that there is an established market for high quality hardwood production in the region. With Clean Cut Forestry, his tree surgery and forestry business, Mark sources quality timber from forestry jobs that would otherwise be a waste product or cut up into firewood. Logie Timber works symbiotically with my pre-existing forestry business to complete our Full Circle approach.

Louise Rogers, Impact Manager, Housing and Manufacturing, BE-ST

As an Impact Manager on our MMC team, Louise is passionate about transforming the built environment. With a strong foundation in R&D, Louise has been dedicated to advancing modern methods of construction throughout her career, specifically through the wider use of biogenic materials in construction and adopting lean manufacturing techniques. Louise supports projects running through our innovation factory, and particularly enjoys anything mass timber related.

Barbara Lantschner, retrofit coordinator, John Gilbert Architects Ltd