Renfrewshire Council tenants’ satisfaction levels have dropped markedly in the last two years – a trend that has disappointed elected members.

A survey of just over 1,200 households by a market research firm has shown 72 per cent of respondents were either very or fairly satisfied with the overall service provided by the local authority – down from 82 per cent in 2022.

Satisfaction also decreased across other crucial measurements, including – but not limited to – opportunity to participate in decision-making processes, quality of home and whether rent represents value for money.

A report discussed at Tuesday’s communities and housing policy board said, despite the downturn, satisfaction levels for the key indicators remained at 70 per cent or above against a challenging backdrop for social landlords.

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Ray Walkinshaw, the council’s housing regeneration and development manager, said: “It’s fair to say the satisfaction has declined.

“We’re not unique in that. We’re being benchmarked by Scotland’s Housing Network against other local authorities who have done surveys this year as well and there is a national trend of a drop in satisfaction, which is very much to be regretted, but, like I say, it’s not unique to us.

“Another thing we’ve teased out is that there seems to have been an increase in people replying that are neither satisfied nor dissatisfied on particular questions and unfortunately because of the way we’re required to report the stats by the Scottish Housing Regulator those people are all counted as if they were dissatisfied, which is unfortunate but that’s the landscape we’re in.”

Councillor Mags MacLaren, an SNP representative for Paisley Northwest, said she was “quite disappointed” to see how much tenant satisfaction had dropped in recent years.

She added: “I understand that there’s factors across all areas of Scotland but I think what I’d really like to know is a bit more detail about how we’re going to try and address this.

“There is some information in the report but I didn’t feel there was a huge amount of detail about how we’re going to actually try and improve tenant satisfaction levels.

“I certainly feel the areas where people are telling us they’re dissatisfied very much dovetail with the type of complaints that I’m getting as a councillor.”

Mr Walkinshaw said the service could return with a “more detailed analysis”, which Councillor Marie McGurk, board convener and SNP representative for Paisley Southeast, said would be brought to a future board.