Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government is working with the UK Government to explore how the proposed New Homes Ombudsman scheme, within the UK Building Safety Bill, could operate in Scotland. The aims of the scheme are to provide better protection to consumers purchasing new build homes and to make access to remediation simpler and easier. The Scottish Government is committed to continuing to work with the UK Government as the Bill moves through its amendments process, to try to achieve a UK-wide scheme that works for the people of Scotland and respects the devolution settlement.

Full details of the projects funded through the Rural Tourism Infrastructure Fund in 2020-21 can be found on the VisitScotland website.

Rural Development Fund - Funding | VisitScotland.org .

The Scottish Government’s expectations of Scottish Enterprise are set out in a framework document which expands on the agency’s responsibilities and statutory functions under the Enterprise and New Towns (Scotland) Act 1990.

Scottish Enterprise has service level agreements in place with partners which require it to respond to customer enquiries within 5 working days, with more than 90% of enquiries in a normal year receiving a response within 2 working days.

Although no specific standards are in place in relation to the provision of advisory and grant support services, Scottish Enterprise monitors this and seeks regular feedback from businesses accessing the services.

The findings of the Dasgupta Review will inform the development of our National Strategy for Economic Transformation, to be published later this year, and our new biodiversity strategy, to be published in 2022.

Throughout the pandemic the Scottish Government has, where possible, stepped in to help businesses and premises based travel-agents have benefited from a range of support packages including:

• Small Business Support Grant or Retail, Hospitality and Leisure Support Grant (March 2020)
• Strategic Framework Business Fund (November 2020 – March 2021)
• SFBF retail top up (January 2021)
• Strategic Framework Business Fund Transition Payment and Business Restart Grant (April 2021)
• Non-Domestic Rates Relief for the 2020-21 and 21-22 Financial Years.

This is in addition to the Scottish Government’s £5.3 million Travels Agents Support Fund (announced December 2020 as part of a £185 million package of business support) and the Contingency Plus Fund which offered additional funding to Travel Agents, Breweries and Indoor Football Centres in recognition of the specific challenges that businesses operating in these sectors experienced as a result of COVID-19 restrictions and regulations. The Contingency Plus Fund closed on 31 March 2021 and as at 25 June 2021, £3.6 million had been paid to 223 Travel Agent businesses who met the eligibility criteria.

Criminal justice social work statistics show that there were 16,700 CPOs imposed in 2019-20 and of these, 70% had an unpaid work or other activity requirement. While unpaid work or other activity is the most common requirement imposed by the courts, there are eight other requirements that can be given as part of a CPO.

National criminal justice statistics are published annually which include information on the proportion of CPOs with unpaid work or other activity requirements. While the relevant statistics are monitored and analysed on an ongoing basis, the proportion of requirements imposed is a result of decisions taken by the independent courts.

It is up to the independent sentencing judge to decide the most appropriate sentence, including which requirements are most appropriate, based on all of the circumstances of the case – for example, the nature of the crime, information contained in the criminal justice social work report and what is most likely to prevent the individual from reoffending.

In certain circumstances, the court may consider that an order without an unpaid work requirement is the most appropriate sentence to address the offending behaviour and its causes. This is particularly the case where an individual has more complex risks and needs that need to be addressed and unpaid work may not be suitable.

An order without unpaid work must have supervision and may include specific requirements in relation to treatment of alcohol, drugs or mental health or a programme requirement such as the Caledonian programme. Conduct, residence and compensation requirements can also be imposed.

While the proportion of CPOs with an unpaid work or other activity requirement has declined in recent years, the proportion of orders with supervision requirements has increased over the same period. This suggests the needs and issues to be addressed may be more complex and for some unpaid work will not be suitable or appropriate.

The Dasgupta Review is comprehensive and takes a global perspective, and we are not planning to undertake a Scotland specific review. The Scottish Government is committed to enhancing research into biodiversity, as set out in our ‘Environment, natural resources and agriculture research: strategy 2022 to 2027’. This includes plans to establish a Scottish Centre of Expertise in Biodiversity, which will advise policymakers across central and local government and public bodies, on how best to address biodiversity loss.

Close contact and retail premises and other sectors were aggregated from December 2020 in the context of payments of the Strategic Framework Business Fund and thereafter for top-up payments, and that was carried forward to the restart grants paid in April 2021, not least because close contact services tend to operate from adapted retail premises.

It is not possible to provide a definitive costing of the financial implications of increasing the levels of restart grants for close contact businesses. Initial analysis of potential costs was based on estimates of the numbers of close contact services premises developed by Scottish Government analysts, supplemented by further information on close contact service business numbers provided by individual Local Authorities. This analysis suggested that the costs of increasing grant rates for close contact services to those paid to leisure and hospitality premises could have been of the approximate order of an additional £20 million, over and above the package of financial support provided as part of the broader set of restart grants. However, this cost is an estimate, influenced by eligibility criteria, assumptions on uptake, and by information held by individual Local Authorities on the characteristics of the broader retail sector recipients of business support administered by them.

Restart grants were paid in April only.

When beavers became a European Protected Species in May 2019, NatureScot made a commitment to carry out a review of beaver licensing after two years.

This review will be concluded shortly following which Nature Scot will publish updated licence conditions and guidance for applicants on its website.

Following their review of beaver licensing, NatureScot has now issued the majority of the licence renewals, which are valid with effect from 17 August 2021 for a period of 2 years. Licence holders have been informed of the amendments to the conditions of the licence, including the provision of a map and compliance with codes of practice, which have been incorporated following the review.

The information about the number of individuals requesting hospital-based palliative care is not collected centrally.

The following table shows the number of people recorded as receiving inpatient palliative care in 2019-20. However, this information may not reflect the totality of hospital-based palliative care as it only contains the patients recorded under the care of a palliative medicine consultant, in a Palliative care unit or diagnosed with a Palliative care condition.