The Independent Review is seeking views from across the education landscape on how a system of qualifications and assessment can uphold the rights of all learners, including those with additional support needs, to have their achievements recognised. I understand that Professor Hayward has met Angela Morgan, Chair of the Review of Additional Support for Learning Implementation, and is in the process of visiting a range of schools where this issue will also be discussed. Ensuring our system of qualifications and assessment meets the needs of all learners has also been discussed within the Independent Review Group and the various community groups the Review is supporting.

I know Professor Hayward remains open to new ideas in this and in other areas. The Review’s public consultation closes on 13 January 2023 and I look forward to receiving a final report before the end of May 2023.

In 2022-23, we distributed £32m across all Children’s Services Planning Partnerships (CSPPs). The purpose of this funding was to build local service capacity for transformation and to support the local scaling of existing transformational practice of holistic whole family support. This is being provided on a recurring, multi-year basis to 2025-26.

A package of activity aimed at supporting local transformation has commenced, including establishing collaborative partnerships between 3 CSPPs and a dedicated, multi-disciplinary national support team for transformation. A Learning into Action network is also being established. The aim is to ensure that all CSPPs are supported to come together to share learning and approaches, facilitate peer support, collaborate, and have solution focused discussions around the barriers and opportunities around whole system change in holistic family support.

Whole Family Wellbeing Funding (WFWF) is being used to support the resource and staffing requirements of this work; as well as the commissioning of external evaluation. This will evaluate the implementation and initial impacts of the programme to help shape and develop activity across WFWF going forward. Additionally, research has been commissioned to support continuous improvement of the transformation support provided to the CSPPs as well as to generate learning about how transformational capability is built. The final costs associated for this work in 2022-23 will be confirmed following the end of the financial year.

Multi-year funding allocations are also being finalised which will support wider transformational activity across Scottish Government portfolios which will support the preventative, person-centred ambitions and outcomes of the WFWF.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-13151 on 6 January 2023. 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 role of the Education Reform Strategic Programme Board is to provide advice and support to the programme, ensuring its successful and safe delivery.

The strategic board and three delivery boards have been established to lead, design and deliver work to establish three new national education bodies to replace the Scottish Qualifications Authority and Education Scotland. The arrangements for education reform governance include a wide range of external stakeholders to provide a broad and diverse range of views and to put critical challenge at the centre of this work. Minutes of the Education Reform Strategic Programme Board, including attendance, can be found at www.gov.scot/groups/education-reform/.

Engagement with education reform stakeholders and users will continue to be a core part of the education reform programme whose delivery this board oversees. This engagement will provide all those with a stake and interest in the success of education reform with opportunities to provide further input and challenge to inform the design and delivery of the three new national education bodies and the wider education reform programme.

The vast majority of funding available to councils is provided by means of a block grant from the Scottish Government. It is then the responsibility of individual local authorities to manage their own budgets and to allocate the total financial resources available to them, including on maintenance of local roads and bridges, on the basis of local needs and priorities, having first fulfilled their statutory obligations and the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities.

The Scottish Government has provided an additional £570 million to local government in 2023-24, however it is for locally elected representatives to manage the allocation of resources and the level of services that are delivered to their local communities.

While there are not any plans to reopen the Local Bridge Maintenance Fund at this time, the Scottish Government will continue to meet with COSLA and individual local authorities on a regular basis to discuss the issues affecting local government.

The Scottish Government has increased funding to local government by over £570 million in 2023-24, including an additional £147 million of capital funding.

n September 2021, the Scottish Government published the National Neurodevelopmental Specification for Children and Young People which sets out seven standards for service providers to ensure that children and young people, who have neurodevelopmental profiles with support needs, receive the support that they require. The Neurodevelopmental Specification is purposefully inclusive and includes support for those with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), as such there is no separate guidance for ASD and ADHD.

A neurodevelopmental diagnosis is not required in order for a child or young person to receive support that meets their needs. For many children and young people, such support is likely to be community or school based, and should be quickly and easily accessible.

To support implementation of the Neurodevelopmental Specification, we have provided funding to NHS Boards to build capacity to provide access to specialist neurodevelopmental professionals.

In March 2022, funding was also provided to allow five local areas to take forward Tests of Change on the implementation of the Neurodevelopmental Service Specification, specifically to test and implement aspects of the Standards and Principles of Care outlined in the Specification. Learning and evidence will be shared from these Tests once concluded to support other local partners to implement the Specification successfully.

The standards outlined within the National Neurodevelopmental Specification will continue to be reviewed on a regular basis in light of any new research and recommendations made to Scottish Government, particularly in relation to learning emerging from the Neurodevelopmental Tests of Change.

The inflation rate for construction work will vary from project to project.

The Office for National Statistics Construction Price Indices dataset provides an estimate of inflation within the UK construction industry. In the 12 months to April 2022 there was annual growth in the all construction Output Prices Index of 8.8%.

Source: Construction output price indices - Office for National Statistics

We are supportive of community wealth building, and the opportunities it presents to act as a conduit for supporting our Net Zero ambitions, in particular supporting a just transition. The land and property pillar of community wealth building is particularly relevant to land reform, and is very much in line with both existing land reform mechanisms (such as the Community Right to Buy) and our proposals for the next Land Reform Bill.

Measures put forward for inclusion in the Bill include a requirement for owners of large-scale landholdings to prepare and publish Land Management Plans. In the consultation we propose that one of the purposes of these plans should be to show how the management of the landholding contributes to relevant land use, economic and community development priorities and opportunities, as set out in community plans, regional land use strategies, and national policy. Management plans could be used to identify areas of land suitable for disposal to local community organisations seeking to develop projects that will meet local needs. We sought views in the consultation on whether people agree that the Plans should provide information on developments/activities that will contribute to local and inclusive economic development or community wealth building.

We received over 540 responses to the consultation, and will consider views submitted on how management plans could contribute to community wealth building, as we develop the measures that will be included in the Bill. In addition, to support the development of legislation we have established a CWB Steering Group chaired by the Minister for Public Finance, Planning and Community Wealth. Representatives across the public, private and third sectors have been invited to provide ideas and insight as we develop legislative proposals. This includes consideration of issues linked to the use of land and property assets in both rural and urban areas.

The public consultation on the Bill, “Land Reform in a Net Zero Nation”, was open from the 4 July until the 30 October, and received over 540 responses. The responses were published on 22 December 2022, and we aim to publish the analysis of them in early spring 2023. This analysis will inform the development of the proposals and we remain committed to the introduction of the Bill by the end of 2023.