Chamber and committees

SPS will publish information on the releases under the changes to sentencing for short-term prisoners on their website and SPS has previously published information on releases under the emergency release legislation also on their website.

SPS continue to be as open and transparent as possible, whilst continuing to meet their statutory obligation to ensure that those in their care have their personal information protected; as such SPS cannot publish a breakdown of establishments as some of the data could relate to a small group of individuals, which may lead to their inadvertent identification.

Local authorities are responsible for the management of their school estate including decisions about the closure of schools. Scottish Ministers do not receive requests for school closures from local authorities.

Local authorities are however required by the Schools (Consultation) (Scotland) Act 2010 (“the 2010 Act”) to submit school closure decisions for Ministerial review. Ministers can then “call-in” the decision for review by an independent school closure review panel if it appears to Scottish Ministers that the local authority may have failed, in a significant regard, to comply with the requirements imposed on it by the 2010 Act, or to take proper account of a material consideration relevant to its decision.

The following table sets out the number of school closure decisions for rural schools only, received by Scottish Ministers for their review from each local authority over the last four years.

Local authorities are responsible for the management of their school estate including decisions about the closure of schools. Local authorities are required by the Schools (Consultation) (Scotland) Act 2010 (“the 2010 Act”) to carry out a full public consultation where they are proposing a permanent school closure.

Local authorities must also undertake specific additional steps when they propose to close a rural school. These include clearly demonstrating that they have considered alternatives to closure, an assessment of the likely impact on the community and impact on travel to school arrangements for local pupils. The local authority must also set out the educational benefit of the closure which is subject to an independent report by HM Inspectors. The local authority must respond to HM Inspectors’ assessment of the educational impact on those affected. If a proposal to close a school is rejected, then the local authority cannot repeat the process for five years, providing stability for the local community. These protections are intended to ensure that local authorities think very carefully before closing a rural school and consult extensively with the local community about their proposal.

Where it appears to Scottish Ministers that the local authority may have failed, in a significant regard, to comply with the requirements imposed on it by the 2010 Act, or to take proper account of a material consideration relevant to its decision they may “call-in” the decision for review by an independent School Closure Review Panel.

The Respiratory Care Action Plan has another year left in its current lifespan. We will continue to implement the commitments in the Plan over the coming year, alongside our work to explore a new long term conditions strategy to ensure equitable and sustainable access to the services that all people with long term conditions need, while still allowing for targeted action on condition-specific care and support where appropriate. We will take the progress of this work into account as we consider the best way to continue work to improve care and support for people with respiratory conditions in the future.

The Respiratory Care Action Plan has another year left in its current lifespan. We will consider how best to report on its impact as it continues into 2026.

There have been two instances where groups of prisoners have been granted early release from their sentence at the order of Scottish Ministers in the last five years – firstly in May 2020, and secondly in June and July 2024.

Data was made available on the number of individuals who returned to prison custody (either held on remand or sentenced) amongst the individuals released in those processes. For the May 2020 Coronavirus specific emergency early release process, as of November 2020, 142 of the original 348 individuals who were released early had returned to custody.

For the June and July 2024 emergency early release process, as of December 2024, 61 of the 477 individuals who were released early had returned to custody before their original date of liberation.

The information requested on reoffending is not held centrally by the Scottish Government and could only be obtained at a disproportionate cost.

I refer the member to the answer to the question S6W-33255 on 23 January 2025. 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

There is no obligation on private companies to inform the Scottish Government of redundancy figures, therefore this information is not held centrally. The Scottish Government will continue to engage regularly with both the oil and gas industry and the relevant trade unions, including in relation to workforce planning matters. We will also continue to monitor company announcements.

In the unfortunate event of any employees facing redundancy, the Scottish Government will always offer and provide support through our initiative for responding to redundancy situations, Partnership Action for Continuing Employment, PACE. Through providing skills development and employability support, PACE aims to minimise the time individuals affected by redundancy are out of work.

A decision has been made by the Environment Agency to replace some of the Quality Protocols (QP) which only apply in England and Wales, including the QP for Tyre Derived Rubber Materials, with a ‘Resource Framework’. The outcomes of the review of the Tyre Derived Rubber Material QP (published in 2009) are yet to be published therefore we do not know to what extent the Resource Framework will mirror or amend the approach currently set out in the QP.

In Scotland, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency's (SEPA) approach to end-of-waste is similar to the QPs. SEPA has equivalent end-of-waste positions for many of the materials covered by QPs, including compost, anaerobic digestate and aggregates. They do not currently have a published end-of-waste position for Tyre Derived Rubber Materials but have discussed the possibility with tyre recyclers in the past.

The Environment Agency is currently working with representatives from the tyre recycling industry on the design and contents of the new Resource Framework and SEPA will consider the Framework’s findings, once it is understood what the Framework for this material contains. While awaiting the outcome of the QP review, SEPA remains open to approaches from any business seeking to agree an end-of-waste position.

SEPA’s end-of-waste positions take the approach that the storage of recovered materials remains a regulated waste activity until they are dispatched to their end user. This is to ensure that the recovery of the material is genuine and that the material is not just stockpiled with no actual prospect of an end use.

Following clarification, this question refers to multi-establishment leadership models.

The following table shows the number of schools which share a headteacher with at least one other school, known as multi-establishment leadership models, by Local Authority. This does not include Grant-Aided schools or centrally employed headteacher posts. Data from before 2007 is not available.

Table 1. Schools in a multi-establishment leadership model, by Local Authority, 2007-2023.