Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government has published the National Carers Strategy today: https://www.gov.scot/isbn/9781805253037

The National Carers Strategy sets out actions on COVID-19 recovery, the cost crisis and improving carer support in a meaningful and sustainable way. The strategy focuses on carers and their needs, setting out how policies across the Scottish Government can work together with other public bodies to support carers as we recover from the pandemic and beyond.

The Scottish Government will deliver a statement to parliament in the new year, subject to the agreement of the Parliamentary Bureau.

We have been clear since the introduction of our emergency legislation that we would work with the social rented sector to seek an agreed way forward as an alternative to the continuation of the rent cap in the social rented sector beyond March 2023. To support this we have been working with a range of social rented sector organisations including landlord representative bodies COSLA, the Scottish Federation of Housing Associations and Glasgow and West of Scotland Forum of Housing Associations.

Statements of Intent have now been published by COSLA, confirming local authorities’ commitment to keeping rent increases in April 2023 to an average of no more than £5 a week, and by the Scottish Federation of Housing Associations, who report that their members are consulting with tenants on a set of increases in April 2023 that will average 6.1%.

The agreement to set out average figures, rather than set a fixed cap, allows flexibility for landlords to respond to their consultations with their tenants.

While we anticipate that many rents will be increased at a level below these average figures, there may be some social sector landlords who will for specific reasons go beyond this level, for example to allow planned improvements or maintenance to proceed.

This will allow for the statutory tenant consultations currently taking place to be taken into account for housing associations’ business plans and local authorities’ housing revenue accounts.

No social landlord is consulting on a rent increase at or above CPI inflation, which was 11.1% at the time of the data being collected.

Given the voluntary agreements reached we anticipate that the first statutory report on the Cost of Living (Tenant Protection) Act 2022, due by 14 January, will formally confirm our intentions to expire the social rented sector rent cap provisions from March 2023.

Today the Scottish Government has published the Onshore Wind Policy Statement, which can be accessed on the Scottish Government website ( https://www.gov.scot/isbn/9781805253754 ). This is the result of careful consideration of the 162 responses received during the consultation period.

The Onshore Wind Policy Statement sets out our ambition for 20GW of onshore wind to be operational by 2030. This challenging ambition, which will see Scotland’s onshore wind capacity more than double, is needed now more than ever, to provide clean, affordable, renewable energy.

The Scottish Government will ensure Scotland’s people benefit from this potential, and to this end will form an Onshore Wind Strategic Leadership Group tasked with pushing forward progress against the issues set out in the Policy Statement and with the development of a Scottish Onshore Wind Sector Deal, to be developed over the first half of 2023.

In addition, we will follow the onshore wind policy statement with our draft Energy Strategy and Just Transition Plan in early January which will set out our approach to the energy transition.

I continue to discuss the Properties in Care, and their management, with Historic Environment Scotland. I can confirm that Historic Environment Scotland has been continuing to focus on managing the national High Level Masonry inspection programme, and undertaking repairs wherever possible.

We are consulting more broadly on a refreshed strategy for Scotland’s historic environment. This seeks to prioritise activity that supports economic recovery and renewal, focuses on creating a more resilient and sustainable historic environment, and helps to communicate the contribution that the historic environment makes to the nation.

The consultation will run until 20 February 2023 and is designed to gather views to make sure the strategy sets appropriate ambitions for the historic environment sector for the next 5 years. The consultation can be found at: https://haveyoursay.historicenvironment.scot/development-partnership/our-place-in-time-refresh-consultation/

We are working closely with NHS Boards to support a range of local initiatives designed to meet the basic and practical needs of junior doctors, and their teams. This includes access to quiet spaces to support health and wellbeing, the installation of lockers and further support to facilitate out of hours catering. The Scottish Government is determined to deliver the recommendations of the Expert Working Group’s report on junior doctor wellbeing and have begun introducing further improvements to working conditions. We are on track to meet the key recommendation of limiting consecutive days of long shifts, with 99% compliance achieved in August 2022.

Energy debt is a matter reserved to the UK Government, so the Scottish Government does not hold this information. I suggest contacting Ofgem in the first instance.

Scottish Government analysts have estimated that the UK Government’s current price cap (Energy Price Guarantee) of £2,500 puts 860,000 (34%) of households in Scotland in fuel poverty and 600,000 (24%) in extreme fuel poverty. In line with the Energy Price Guarantee rising by £500 from April 2023, we estimate that there will be around 980,000 fuel poor households in total (39%) and 860,000 in extreme fuel poverty (34%).

The Scottish Government remains absolutely committed to incorporating the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child into Scots law, as far as possible within devolved competence.

Our intention is to bring the Bill back to Parliament for Reconsideration Stage. Preparations for that are well underway and include engagement with the UK Government to try assess whether they are broadly content that the amendments bring with the Bill within legislative competence and to reduce the risk of another referral to the Supreme Court.

We will lodge the motion to reconsider the Bill and publish the amendments to the Bill as soon as possible but cannot yet confirm a timetable.

The Scottish Government does not hold this data. However, some 126,339 properties are connected to Scottish Water’s sewer network in the North region (which includes Highlands and the Western Isles). In 2021, the National Records of Scotland reported the total number of households in the Highlands and Islands as:

• Highland Council – 110,743
• Na h-Eileanan Siar – 12,925
• Orkney Islands – 10,758
• Shetland Islands – 10,554

Therefore approximately 13% of domestic properties may have private sewerage arrangements in the Highlands and Islands. Overall, the Scottish Government estimates that 8% of households across Scotland have private sewerage arrangements.

The Scottish Government intends to achieve the required Aberdeen to Central Belt project outputs by the end of 2026.

“Approval in principle, Asset Manager accepts design” is an internal Network Rail approval stage. This signifies the point at which designs are at a sufficient level to be approved to move forward to be designed for construction. A revised date for when the design will be approved following the refinement of the scope referred to in answer to question S6W-12919.

I therefore refer the member to the answer to question S6W-12919 on 21 December 2022. 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