Chamber and committees

Every homicide represents the loss of a loved family member, a friend or a work colleague. The emotional cost of such loss cannot ever be captured by the financial costs arising.

Within this context, the Scottish Government does not make specific assessments of the public financial costs of individual crimes, including homicide. However, it does publish general information on financial costs of the justice system in the ‘Costs of the Criminal Justice System in Scotland’ publication (available at:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/costs-of-the-criminal-justice-system-in-scotland-dataset-2016-17-published-december-2019/ ).

The publication has financial information that may be useful in considering financial costs associated with a homicide (e.g. the average costs of prosecution or a prison place).

Further to this, table 4 of the publication discusses the “economic and social” cost of crime. It explains that UK Government research has estimated the total economic and social costs associated with a homicide in England and Wales at £3.3m. Based on this, it is estimated that the costs associated with all homicides in Scotland are around £200m per anum. However, these “economic and social” costs go far beyond the financial cost to the public sector – including both non-financial costs and impacts outside the public sector.

The Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills announced that the government will create a children and young people’s education council as part of her Parliamentary statement on Scotland’s curriculum on 22 June.

Following that announcement, a meeting was held on 21 July between Scottish Government officials and representatives from the national children and young person organisations, including those who have recently been involved in supporting the Education Recovery Youth Panel and contributing to the Covid Education Recovery Group as young people. This allowed officials to gain the benefit of their insights into the principles, working methods and detailed arrangements for the new council.

The Scottish Government is developing plans for the Council utilising this feedback, with a view to holding the first meeting of the new council as soon as possible in the autumn.

The Scottish Government will fully fund the manifesto commitment to 3,500 additional teachers and classroom assistants over the Parliamentary term. As part of this commitment the Scottish Government has already allocated funding of £50 million in 2021-22 to local authorities to increase teacher numbers by 1,000 and classroom assistants by 500.

A breakdown of this allocation by local authority area can be found on the Scottish Government website https://www.gov.scot/publications/education-recovery-additional-funding-2021---2022-local-authority-allocations---additional-gbp50-million/ This funding will be added into the General Revenue Grant annually from 2022-23, which will provide the certainty that councils need in order to continue to plan their future permanent workforce requirements.

The settings that these additional teachers will be employed in will be determined locally, based on local need.

My officials will conduct a trawl for the information requested and I will write to Mr Mundell when their findings are complete.

The following table provides information on gross revenue expenditure in Scotland per secondary school pupil.

Table 1: Gross revenue expenditure per secondary school pupil across Scottish Local Authorities in 2019-20

HM Inspectors of Education will restart scrutiny activity of schools soon and an announcement will follow shortly. The annual scrutiny programme outlining the range of scrutiny activity, including school inspections which will be carried out by HM Inspectors of education this academic year will also be published on Education Scotland's website.

The programme school and early learning and childcare inspections was paused on 16 March 2020 in response to Covid-19. A pause in the programme inspections was to allow education establishments to concentrate on providing support for learning throughout the Covid-19 pandemic.

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.

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 Scottish Government welcomes the key messages of the Dasgupta Review, which is highly relevant and demonstrates the central importance of biodiversity and environmental sustainability to economic policy. There are no plans to publish an assessment of the Review.

Our National Strategy for Economic Transformation will be published later this year and will focus on building an economy that will maximise Scotland’s economic, social and environmental wellbeing whilst delivering green economic recovery and green jobs, and building businesses and industries of the future. In 2022 we will publish our new post-2020 biodiversity strategy which will outline wider measures being taken to enhance Scotland’s biodiversity and natural environment.

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.