Chamber and committees

The total full time equivalent staff employed on Home Energy Scotland at the end of July is 208. This figure includes:

• All staff within each Home Energy Scotland advice centre working on Home Energy Scotland activity, and teams and specialists managed directly by the Energy Savings Trust including the Extended Hours team, renewables specialists and private sector landlord advisors.
• All staff within Energy Saving Trust who are covered by Home Energy Scotland funding.
• Management time within the centres and Energy Saving Trust allocated to management of Home Energy Scotland.

The number of Home Energy Scotland Loans that were accepted/rejected in 2020-21 and 2021-22:

The number of Home Energy Scotland Loan applications received during 2020-21 and 2021-22 were:

As at August 2022, the number of Home Energy Scotland Loan applications currently awaiting processing is 303.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-10269 on‎ 5 September 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

To ask the Scottish Government how much of the Scotland Loves Local Fund has been (a) allocated and (b) spent to date, on the Scotland Loves Local gift card scheme.In 2021-22, more than £2m of funding was allocated to the Scotland Loves Local programme including £1.5m to the Scotland Loves Local fund. The fund was available for a range of initiatives including local support for the Scotland Loves Local gift card scheme. A full list of grants awarded from the Scotland Loves Local Fund, including details of what that funding has been used for, is available on the Scotland Loves Local website, Media - SLL Fund 2021 (lovelocal.scot) .

The Scottish Government does not hold this data. Whilst there is data available on numbers of patients who receive blood transfusions each year, the majority of these patients would be unlikely to be able to donate blood due to underlying health conditions, even if they had not received a transfusion.

A number of candidates are being considered at present to take on the role of the Women’s Health Champion. The Government expects to make an announcement about an appointment soon.

Whilst work is underway to appoint a champion, we have been prioritising improving information and services for women, including launching a new women’s health platform on NHS Inform, initiating new research on endometriosis, and increasing the choices that women have to access contraception at community pharmacies.

The Scottish Government has a precautionary approach to vaping products. Vapes and other nicotine products are part of a range of cessation tools available to existing smokers to help stop tobacco use. They should not be used by non-smokers, in particular by children and young people. They should not been used or promoted as a lifestyle accessory.

Our recent vaping consultation, which closed at the end of April, sought views on tightening rules on advertising and promoting these products. The results of this consultation will be published soon and will inform our Tobacco Action Plan refresh.

We will continue to work with the UKG and other devolved administrations over issues such as the taste and smell of vaping product to help reduce their appeal to children and young people.

In 2004, the UK Advisory Committee on Microbiological Safety of Blood and Tissues for Transplantation (MSBT) advised that people who have received a blood transfusion since 1980 should no longer be allowed to donate blood in order to reduce the risks of transmission of variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease (vCJD) via a blood transfusion. The then Scottish Executive accepted those recommendations.

The Scottish Government now takes its advice on blood safety from the Advisory Committee on the Safety of Blood, Tissues and Organs (SaBTO), which has replaced MSBT as the expert Committee advising Ministers on these matters. This matter is therefore for SaBTO to advise on and they have not suggested that this policy should change. In 2019, SaBTO advised (in its Paediatric Components Working Group report) that certain measures originally implemented to reduce risks of transmission of vCJD were no longer required; however, it advised that all other vCJD risk reduction measures should remain in place.