The Minister for Public Finance, Planning and Community Wealth met with representatives from Scottish Renewables on 21 July 2021 to discuss the renewable energy industry’s vision for NPF4.

We are working collaboratively with Community Learning and Development providers to support safe practices and behaviours through the Advanced Learning COVID-19 Recovery Group and to deliver guidance that will support the Strategic Framework. This will include encouraging local/community facilities to permit access to organisations and groups working within this sector, operating in line with their own requirements under the terms of the Strategic Framework.

We have also prepared safer workplaces guidance and the organised activities for children guidance to support and accelerate these organisations ability to safely reopen these buildings. However, the responsibility for reopening youth and community facilities ultimately rests with the owners.

We plan to consult over the next year on our proposals for minimum energy efficiency regulations in private rented homes (and owner occupied homes). This consultation will include details of any proposed exemptions within the regulatory system and matters relating to compliance.

The Scottish Government is aware of the increased production costs faced by independent publishers and their impact across the publishing sector. It is providing a range of business support through activities delivered by our enterprise and creative agencies. This includes: regular business surveys; support accessed through the FindBusinessSupport website; and XpoNorth, the year-round support programme for the Highlands and Islands.

Independent publishers may be eligible for financial support from Creative Scotland through the new Recovery Fund for Cultural Organisations; and Creative Scotland’s Open Fund. Further information about these funds can be found on Creative Scotland’s website.

The Scottish Government remains committed to Keeping The Promise by 2030, working in partnership with Local Authorities, The Promise Scotland, third sector, health boards and importantly the care community.

On 18 February the First Minister announced that the Scottish Government would publish its Implementation Plan for Keeping The Promise before Easter. The Implementation Plan will set out our routemap to 2030 as well as key actions we will take to Keep The Promise.

That information is not held centrally.

There is no statutory requirement for local authorities to separately collect garden waste and charging for its collection is not a new option available to councils. Garden waste is included in Schedule 2 of the Controlled Waste Regulations 1992 which contains the types of waste for which a charge for collection may be made. It is up to individual councils whether to charge or not.

As set out in our update to the Climate Change Plan, we will consult on requirements to separately collect garden waste by 2023, to further promote recycling.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-05935 on 7 February 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

The Full Business Case Stage 1 for Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme (DRS), published on 8 May 2019 (pp36-37), considered the costs and benefits of including glass within the scheme and concluded that glass should be included due to the substantial environmental and economic benefits.

We do not consider that there will be extensive switching away from glass containers to other materials as a result of DRS. Format decisions are driven by a range of considerations including practicality, convenience, brand preference and presentation of the product. Indeed, the impact on material choice could be greater if glass were left outside the scope of DRS, creating an incentive to switch towards glass.

The terms of reference for the Scottish Covid-19 Public Inquiry task it with considering the strategic elements relating to 12 distinct areas of investigation. They do not name specific groups affected by the pandemic, ensuring that no groups’ experiences are excluded from the Inquiry’s remit, provided the experiences relate directly to the impact of devolved areas within the Inquiry’s scope.

It is a matter for the Chair of the Inquiry to decide how to investigate specific issues.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Scottish Government Chief Scientist Office (CSO) launched a call for Rapid Research in COVID-19 on 25 March 2020 and a second call specifically addressing longer-term effects of COVID-19 infection on 5 October 2020. Following independent expert review, 65 projects were funded in total, 56 through the Rapid Research programme and 9 through the long COVID call.

None of the projects specifically address microemboli and long COVID. Many of the projects are still active and include research on vascular aspects of COVID-19.

The full list of funded projects is available from the CSO website

https://www.cso.scot.nhs.uk/covid-19-research/

The CSO's Translational Clinical Studies Committee and the Health Improvement, Protection and Services Research Committees each meet twice per year to consider funding applications. Details of the application process are published on the CSO website.

Grant Funding – Chief Scientist Office (scot.nhs.uk)

Applications looking at links between microemboli and long COVID may be submitted to the CSO funding committees. In common with all other applications, these would go through the CSO's standard independent peer review process.