A £20 million rescue deal for Aberdeen residents living in the shadow of RAAC will be proposed at a crucial meeting between campaigners and a Scottish minister on Friday.

In 2022, more than 500 council and private properties were found to contain reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC), prompting the evacuation of homes the following year.

Aberdeen City Council plans to demolish all affected properties in Balnagask by 2028. However, the Torry RAAC Campaign Group estimates that losses on owner-occupied properties could be £50,000 each.

Minister Paul McLennan will meet with campaigners as well as Liam Kerr and Audrey Nicoll, local MSPs, to discuss next steps.

Mr Kerr, a Scottish Conservative, will propose a rescue deal similar to the one struck for residents of so-called “Orlit housing” in Garthdee in the 1980s and 1990s.

It would be funded by the Scottish Government’s unspent £20 million fund for new city properties, established in 2016.

The City Region Deal memorandum of understanding included “£20million in infrastructure funding to unlock housing sites that are of strategic importance to the local authorities” but was never spent.

As of May 2024, no Aberdeen or Aberdeenshire projects met Housing Infrastructure Fund criteria.

Mr Kerr discovered that houses built in the late 1940s and early 1950s were purchased from the Scottish Special Housing Association (SSHA) during the “right to buy” scheme in the 1980s.

However, an issue was later discovered with their non-standard construction. Homeowners were given the option of selling the property back to SSHA for full market value, with no loss of value due to the construction issue.

These were then rebuilt and transferred to the council and housing associations.

Liam Kerr outside some of the homes built to replace the Orlit houses in Garthdee

It was the focus of a campaign led by late Tory MP Alick Buchanan-Smith, who died a year after the last Orlit house was demolished in 1990.

North East MSP Mr Kerr stated: “There is £20 million that has yet to be touched because nothing in the North East meets the criteria.”

“There is still a year left on the city deal, and I don’t see any other way, or, more importantly, any better way, to spend this.

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