Chamber and committees

As is to be expected, there is a range of opinions on the subject, but Scotland’s forests are an important carbon sink. The strategy of having the right tree in the right place is crucial, but does the First Minister share my view that expanding, restoring and improving forests and woodlands has a key role to play in achieving our net zero targets and restoring Scotland’s natural environment?

To ask the Scottish Government what recent engagement it has had with the United Kingdom Government regarding projects in Scotland that will contribute to meeting net zero targets. (S6O-02180)

I welcome the minister to his new role and to the committee meeting. Is remuneration or pay offered to board members?

I wish the minister every success in her new role. I think that this is the first opportunity that I have had to do so.

Social isolation and loneliness can impact everyone—people of any age at any time. It is therefore vital that the Scottish Government is taking action to properly tackle isolation and loneliness, which is, as has already been said, a public health issue.

In the first 100 days of this parliamentary session, the Scottish Government invested £1 million for immediate work by organisations that tackle loneliness, including for helplines, befriending and practical support. That funding will help to provide warm spaces, hot meals, group activities and fuel payments to folk who are most at risk of isolation, including older folk, young parents, carers and disabled people.

The funding is a lifeline for a range of organisations that are helping to keep people connected during this challenging time. Organisations that will receive grant funds include Age Scotland, which will continue to deliver its keeping the doors open grants programme, and Chest Heart & Stroke Scotland, which is recruiting Urdu and Punjabi-speaking volunteers to make kindness calls.

The work that is being funded includes that of Aberdeen Linking Lives, which operates across my constituency of Aberdeen Donside. Aberdeen Linking Lives is a befriending service aimed at adults who find themselves requiring some extra friendship and support, which is provided through weekly home visits or telephone calls. Linking Lives matches volunteers with folk who are referred to it, and all volunteers are carefully selected, trained and vetted. The service does really important work, and I look forward to visiting it in the near future. I would welcome it if the minister came along, too, but I realise that she will have an extremely busy diary.

The fund is just one of the many crucial steps that the Scottish Government is taking to tackle social isolation and loneliness as part of its “A Connected Scotland” strategy. Support for community groups to bring folk and communities together to tackle isolation was launched in March. The £3.8 million social isolation and loneliness fund is part of a new plan, “Recovering our Connections 2023 to 2026”, which aims to reduce inequality by bringing together folk from communities across Scotland. It will provide vital longer-term support for organisations and projects that are working on the ground to bring folk together and create connections in communities throughout the country. Everyone can play a part in tackling those challenges. The Scottish Government’s new plan reaffirms its commitment to building a connected Scotland for everyone, which I welcome.

We know that social isolation and loneliness can affect anyone, at any age or stage of life. During the pandemic, though, it became obvious that not everyone was affected equally. The pandemic meant that more folk across society suffered as a result of social isolation and loneliness, but it had a particular impact on disabled people, younger people and those who live alone. The biggest increase in loneliness during the pandemic was seen in older folk aged 60 or over, although the groups identified as experiencing the highest rates of loneliness were 16 to 24-year-olds, disabled people, those on lower incomes and those with a pre-existing mental health condition.

Regular polling data on the societal harms of the pandemic tells us that, during 2020 and 2021, around half the people surveyed reported feeling lonely at least some of the time in the previous week. Around one in seven people reported being lonely most, almost all or all of the time. That is supported by the findings of the Scottish household survey 2020, published in January 2022, which found that 35 per cent of adults reported feeling lonely at least some of the time in the previous week, while 44 per cent rarely or never met others socially. It is clear that the pandemic exacerbated isolation. Again, that highlights why the work that the Scottish Government is doing is so important.

Although the key levers that are required to tackle the root causes of poverty and the associated poor mental health are still held by the UK Government, the Scottish Government is doing everything that it can, with its limited powers, to support people right now. As Carol Mochan said, there is a clear link between isolation and poverty. That is why I am pleased that the Scottish child payment has been further expanded to eligible six to 15-year-olds and increased in value to £25 per child per week. Around 387,000 bairns are now forecast to be eligible in 2023-24. Based on modelling from March 2022, it is estimated that the payment will lift 50,000 bairns out of poverty and reduce relative child poverty by 5 percentage points in 2023-24.

The Scottish Government is offering free school lunches during term time to all pupils in primaries 1 to 5 and in special schools. As part of the most generous free school meal offer in the UK, that is saving families an average of £400 per child per year. Scotland already has the most generous childcare offer anywhere in the UK, but it is only with independence that we can really ensure that that work reaches its full potential.

I welcome the work that the Scottish Government is doing, and I again take the opportunity to thank all the organisations that are working to tackle isolation across Donside and across Scotland.

Good afternoon. Support for green hydrogen in the United States and the European Union is being ramped up, and everybody would agree that we have to ensure that the UK does not lose its competitive advantage. What work is being done to ensure that any existing competitive advantage that we have in hydrogen is maintained and enhanced?

Do you have a timescale for that? It is good to hear that it is now part of the track 2 process, but when will we see that up and running?

It is vital that we get it, but the Climate Change Committee has said that we do not have the necessary powers in Scotland to get there. When will the Scottish CCS cluster receive the required support from the UK Government so that we can—

Yes.

You said that, in order for the UK to meet its net zero target by 2050, we need to meet our target in Scotland by 2045. The committee has heard that carbon capture and storage is vital for enabling us to—I think that you know what is coming, because you have your arms crossed.

What is the UK Government doing to develop a regulatory regime for hydrogen production and storage? Do you have a timescale for that?