The Scottish Government expects all organisations to comply with all relevant legislation, including the Equality Act 2010 and the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992.

As part of their funding agreements, organisations funded by the Scottish Government must ensure that their policies and practices are legally compliant and uphold their statutory duties, including those related to equality, safety, and workplace protections. Public bodies are responsible for ensuring that their policies align with the legal framework in Scotland, and they must conduct appropriate due diligence when implementing policies.

The Scottish Government published a further update to the work on Scottish Government bonds alongside the 2025-26 Scottish Budget https://www.gov.scot/isbn/9781836910558.

This explains the outcome of the initial phase of due diligence and the work required in the next stage in the due diligence process. This phase will include timing considerations for an inaugural issuance given market conditions and related events.

The Scottish Government remains committed to ensuring Parliament is updated on this work as it progresses.

Scotland's national forests and land, managed by Forestry and Land Scotland has 76 land agreements in place with private companies covering renewable energy schemes which are currently operational. There are 25 windfarms and 51 hydro schemes. There are no solar schemes. The assets comprising the FLS renewable energy portfolio are managed under operational leases.

The current operational capacity of this portfolio is 1257.95 MW, this comprises 1213.7 MW wind and 44.245 MW hydro.

The most recently recorded annual income for this portfolio is £21,800,000 wind and £2,049,842 hydro.

The lease end dates vary depending on lease length and whether any variations are applied during the lease period.

The Scottish Government is in regular contact with the UK Government to set out Scotland's priorities for the future relationship with the EU. We are clear that the UK Government should seek to agree a generous and wide-ranging youth mobility visa agreement with the EU. A youth mobility visa agreement will never replicate the benefits of freedom of movement, however, it will provide more opportunities for young people to live, work or study overseas. The UK already has reciprocal youth mobility agreements in place with 13 countries and territories and recent opinion polling shows strong support across Scotland for a UK/EU agreement.

Scotland’s national forests and land, managed by Forestry and Land Scotland has 10 land agreements in place with 100% community owned or part community owned organisations covering renewable energy schemes which are currently operational. These are all hydro schemes. There are no windfarms or solar schemes. The assets comprising the FLS renewable energy portfolio are managed under operational leases.

The current operational capacity of this portfolio is 5.501 MW.

The most recently recorded annual income for this portfolio is £250,158.

The lease end dates vary depending on lease length and whether any variations are applied during the lease period.

Local Authority borrowing decisions are a matter for the individual local authority and Scottish Ministers have no locus or powers to intervene.

Local authorities are required by statute to ensure effective and prudent management of their resources, to deliver best value to local residents and to have regard to the CIPFA Prudential and Treasury Management codes of practice which require a local authority to ensure that all borrowing is prudent, affordable and sustainable.

In having regard to the Prudential and Treasury Management codes of practice, local authorities are expected to develop and publish an annual integrated borrowing and treasury management strategy. The CIPFA Treasury Management Code of practice sets out the importance of a local authority having an effective strategy to manage and control risk and specifically advises on the requirement for a local authority to ensure that its treasury management strategy adequately addresses credit and counterparty risk, liquidity risk, interest rate risk, inflation risk, and refinancing risk.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-30676 on 30 October 2024. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.

The last report on the carbon footprint of Scotland’s waste [from all sources] was published by Zero Waste Scotland in 2021, reviewing 2018 data. Due to the SEPA cyber-attack, and limited waste data from all sources available for 2019 and 2020, producing carbon impact reports for these years in 2022 and 2023 was not feasible.

The final carbon metric report was published in 2023, on the 2021 carbon footprint of Scotland’s household waste.

In 2024 Zero Waste Scotland published the first Scottish Waste Environmental Footprint Tool (SWEFT) report. SWEFT is the successor to the Carbon Metric, and reports on the carbon impacts of waste alongside results of other environmental damage indicators such as biodiversity loss and air pollution. It is a vital tool in our work to address the climate and nature emergencies.

Currently SWEFT is only available for household waste, and Zero Waste Scotland intend to report on this on an annual basis. ZWS is currently reviewing the technical feasibility of SWEFT reporting on waste from all sources in the future.

The review of potential methodological changes to the Material Flow Accounts was completed in early 2024. This review concluded that converting the Material Flow Account to an environmentally extended input-output model was both desirable and possible. This revised model is currently being developed and is expected to be released by June 2025.

With regards to the 2019 update, I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-23191 on 7 December 2023 by Lorna Slater MSP. This update to the old model will not be published to ensure clear communication of Scotland’s current material consumption. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.

The revised Material Flow Accounts model is currently being developed and is expected to be released by June 2025. This will draw on the most recent dataset available from 2020.