Chamber and committees

Scottish Government has estimated that for the directly employed public sector workforce in Police Scotland, additional costs to Police Scotland from the changes to employer National Insurance Contributions may be £25 million in the financial year 2025-2026. This estimate is published and available online at this web address: https://www.gov.scot/publications/national-insurance-contributions-public-sector-costs/

The Scottish Government holds or has access to multiple datasets relating to land use. However, these datasets are not exhaustive and are not held in a compatible format that would enable us to provide the information requested.

The Scottish Government does not collate information regarding land use capability in this manner. Information on Scotland’s land capability is available at a National Scale through the Land Capability for Agriculture map and can be accessed here: National scale land capability for agriculture | Scotland's soils (environment.gov.scot).

Please note that the land capability for agriculture assessment was carried out in 1981 using data collected between 1978 and 1981 and is not broken down by local authority area.

The Scottish Government holds or has access to multiple datasets relating to land use. However, these datasets are not exhaustive and are not held in a compatible format that would enable us to provide the information requested.

We will work with victim support organisations and justice partners to take forward reforms to the Victim Notification Scheme to make use of resources and expertise that already exist, including within Scottish Government. The current work of the Victim Centred Approach workstream of the Victims Taskforce may also be relevant in terms of the model for victim support.

This will include exploring costs in the context of ensuring the best possible support and information for victims to be aware of the VNS, understand how it operates in their case, and to receive ongoing support if necessary. Much of this is likely to be possible through more effective joint working and the role of third sector support providers in providing practical and emotional support and engaging directly with victims will be recognised.

Since 2016, we have invested funding of over £4.8 million in work to tackle sectarianism as we believe that the direct involvement of communities is central to delivering positive outcomes which make our communities safer. This funding supports the delivery of education projects in schools, colleges, prisons, communities and workplaces, providing learning opportunities for thousands of children and adults across Scotland.

Details of Tackling Sectarianism project funding and local authorities worked in from 2016 to 2024 can be found in the following tables:

We can currently only provide information on mitigations or remediation works that we have funded for entries to the pilot phase of the Cladding Remediation Programme. Developers or other organisations may have carried out such works on other buildings without informing us.

We have funded work to remediate the external wall cladding system of one pilot entry. We have recently commissioned a Single Building Assessment to confirm that all works have been identified and completed.

Works to mitigate or remediate risks have also started for another five pilot entries. In this context, ‘work’ refers to any action taken to address known cladding related risks. This includes what are described as ‘Urgent Interim Measures’.

We have also commissioned Single Building Assessments for 13 pilot entries. This is made up of 12 recently commissioned following an Invitation To Tender (including the one noted above), and another that has now reached the reporting stage. We are fully funding these assessments at no cost to homeowners or residents.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) does not recommend manual ear syringing.

The management of Reinforced Autoclaved Aerated Concrete (RAAC), including assessing its condition and any decision for removal, is a matter for building owners. Information on buildings identified as having RAAC, including its management, can be found in the Scottish Government report available here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/raac-in-the-public-sector/ and also from individual building owners and authorities. The Scottish Government has not provided specific funding for RAAC remediation as it is primarily a building maintenance issue.

We have previously estimated that around 350 high-rise and up to 500 medium-rise buildings across Scotland may require assessment and some level of remediation, across all tenure and building ownership types.

We continue to use this data as an outline planning assumption. However, we are working through a number of routes to enhance both the quality and efficacy of our estimate of potentially affected buildings in Scotland.