Fideline I'm not sure what your "pesky academic training" is in, but it certainly cannot be property related, as you know nothing about it. Neither can it be economics or accounting. I would have thought however that it would have equipped you with the ability to research your subject matter prior to prescribing solutions to and insulting those who are qualified in a relevant field and who know better than you.
I don't doubt that the Scottish system works better than the English (for e.g.) one. 'Better' and 'perfect' are two different things however
I wouldn't agree that the Scottish system works better than the English; they make a number of mistakes and human rights errors re freedom to contract and EU competition law. Much of it seems to operate on the basis of licensing areas so that only one company is authorised to carry out the requited check, at great expense, and increasing year by year the number of checks required, not always by primary legislation. For instance, we are required to throw away our fire blankets and fire extinguishers after 3 years even if they still function, and only one company can check and supply authorised replacements, and that company is owned by someone who used to work for the local authority. Ditto when we had to have the locks replaced so that they could not be locked with a key from the inside.
English law, possibly due to the doctrine of privity of contract having some latent effect, interprets HMOs less strictly and only tends to apply the law relating to those to flatted dwellings in many LAs. However, the annual gas safety certificate and notification periods for eviction and court procedures required/protection of tenant's rights are still stronger than in the majority of EU jurisdictions.
In Germany for instance, the only requirements for rented property is to renew or have checked the windows and central heating system every 20 years.
Its pretty obvious that its either a trade off between high quality conditions for rental property and/or regulated rents/longer assured tenancies. I don't think the market can support both. ie in Germany tenancies are longer and sometimes for life but the tenant is expected to do many repairs themselves/not moan too much and if they do breach their tenancy obligations, they will be out on their ears. Some rented properties are rented in Germany without anything in them, even kitchens - tenants have their own kitchen and take it with them if they move. My German lawyers friends have difficulty believing me when I tell them how in Scotland, we must have sprinkler systems in two level flats, self closing doors, cookers chained to walls, and so on, and they laugh at the ineptitude of the tenants and the nanny state which insists on such measures.
Likewise, many tenants simply do not want to rent from social landlords because they do not provide a good standard of accommodation in all cases. For some reason you seem to confuse these with "professional" landlords (although as you have consistently refused to explain what you mean by this while simultaneously using it as a criticism of any landlord you mention).
In short, I don't think you live in the real world. The real world had my DH removing a fridge freezer our tenants had broken at the weekend and replacing it with a new one and me writing letters to them to invite them to explain why its door no longer functioned but was detached from its body, so as to enable me to write to the Tenancy Deposit Scheme for their deposits back when they move out to assist in replacing it. He also reset their central heating for them as they are unable to work the controls or follow the manual. All within less than 36 hours from getting a phone call from them, and at the weekend. In my experience, this is what the majority of small landlords do, while the larger ones are by no means immune to taking a couple of weeks to respond to similar requests.
We have now reached the stage in Scotland where its considered perfectly good advice to a client to leave their property empty rather than putting it on the rental market, due to the expense in doing so and continuing to do so, when offset against the likelihood of damage and tax regime.