Chamber and committees

Flytipping is a criminal offence. People who flytip can be issued with a fixed penalty notice up to £200. If prosecuted, a person who is caught flytipping can face a fine up to £40,000. SEPA are engaging with the Scottish Sentencing Council on behalf of the Serious Organised Crime Taskforce to help develop sentencing guidelines on environmental offences.

In December 2021, Scottish Government launched a consultation on potential additional measures to tackle flytipping in Scotland, including actions to further strengthen enforcement. Proposals include raising fines, extending local authorities' enforcement powers and exploring the use of civil penalties to enforce flytipping offences.

Responses to the consultation, which is open until 31 March 2022, will inform the development of the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy.

This information is not held centrally. You may wish to contact the Health Boards for the four NHS Assisted Conception Units in Scotland who may be able to provide this information. Contact details for each Health Board is set out below.

NHS Grampian – for the Aberdeen Assisted Conception Unit

By Email: [email protected]

By Post:

NHS Grampian
‎ Summerfield House
‎ 2 Eday Road
‎ Aberdeen
‎ AB15 6RE

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde – for the Glasgow Assisted Conception Unit

By Email: [email protected]

By Post: NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde

Board Corporate Headquarters

JB Russell House

Gartnavel Royal Hospital

1055 Great Western Road

GLASGOW

G12 0XH

NHS Lothian – for the Edinburgh Assisted Conception Unit

By Email: [email protected] By Post: Lothian NHS Board

Waverleygate

2-4 Waterloo Place

Edinburgh

EH1 3EG

NHS Tayside - for the Dundee Assisted Conception Unit

By Email: [email protected]

By Post: Information Governance

Maryfield House (South)
‎ 30 Mains Loan
‎ Dundee
‎ DD4 7BT

The Scottish Government has given full consideration to ensuring Distance Aware badges and lateral flow device (LFD) tests are available across Scotland, including in rural, remote and island areas.

As well as Distance Aware products being available in ASDA stores and online from a number of charities, we have also ensured badges and lanyards are available in all community and mobile libraries across Scotland. We will monitor and evaluate awareness, uptake and impact of the initiative over the coming weeks.

People living in rural and remote areas can also access LFD tests online, or collect from participating local pharmacies and dispensing GPs. Additionally, we have provided local partners with LFD tests, signage and posters, to establish additional LFD test community collection points over the winter period. These sites range from transport hubs to vaccination centres and are advertised on local authority websites.

Lord Advocate’s guidelines to Police Scotland on the use of Recorded Police Warnings have been in place for a number of years. My statement to the Scottish Parliament on 22 September 2021 was reflected in a corresponding amendment to the guidelines.

The current guidelines permit a police officer to issue a Recorded Police Warning in relation to an offence involving simple possession of all classes of controlled drug.

We know that some homeowners may not be able to meet the cost of fitting the necessary alarms which is why we provided £500,000 through Care and Repair Scotland to help elderly and disabled people. We have also made available a further £500,000 to Care and Repair to extend this support beyond 1 February 2022.

This is in addition to the £1m funding provided to SFRS for its Home Fire Safety Visit programme to owner occupied properties assessed to be at high risk from fire.

We also provided £15m loan funding to social landlords to support them to fit compliant alarms for all tenants.

Flexibility is built into the existing legislation through a provision setting out that the work should be done “within such period as is reasonable in all the circumstances”, allowing flexibility for home owners unable to install alarms by 1 February 2022.

The Non-Domestic RHI (NDRHI) scheme closed to new applicants on 31 March 2021. The Domestic RHI (DRHI) scheme is set to close on 31 March 2022. The Scottish Government has set out in its Heat in Buildings Strategy a number of grant schemes which will continue to support the deployment of zero emission heating systems post RHI closure.

In total, the Scottish Government has committed £1.8 billion for heat decarbonisation for this parliamentary session, which will be delivered through various delivery schemes. This includes a £400m successor programme to the Low Carbon Infrastructure Transition Programme, which will be launched early this year. It will provide funding to heat projects such as large scale heat pumps and heat networks whilst also prioritising new technologies for decarbonising multi-tenure buildings and retrofitting whole buildings with low carbon heating systems.

Support for homeowners to install zero emissions heating systems and improve energy efficiency is available through the Home Energy Scotland (HES) Loan and Cashback Scheme, which offers interest-free loans with up to 75% cashback. Scottish Ministers have committed to continuing our loans-with-cashback schemes for homeowners and SME businesses to support energy efficiency and zero emissions heat improvements, and will replace the cashback offer with a grant scheme during 2022-23.

Scottish Government is in discussion with the Scottish Funding Council to explore the resource needs it requires to fulfil its mission now and into the future. This includes how we can best support SFC in 2022-23 financial year.

We will continue to work with the Scottish Funding Council to ensure that it has the capacity it needs to operate effectively.

I meet jointly with the Chairs and Chief Executives of both agencies to discuss progress in collaborative working on skills every 6 weeks.

This is supported by an assurance group, chaired by Senior Civil Servants and including the Senior Responsible Officers for all collaborative skills projects.

A Shared Outcomes Framework that defines the collaborative projects, sets out strategic objectives, key milestones, deliverables, impacts and measures is currently being developed by the Scottish Government and both agencies to enable more effective monitoring and reporting of joint action in this area .

The information requested is not held centrally. The recording of absences, in relation to Police Scotland’s workforce, is a matter for the Chief Constable.

Letters of Guidance are issued by the Scottish Government to its public bodies annually. The letters set clear Ministerial expectations on our priorities for the year ahead.

The letters to both Skills Development Scotland and to the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) will have a clear emphasis on the need for shared working on skills planning; recognising the commitment as set out in the Scottish Government’s response to the SFC Review of Coherence and Sustainability to build capacity and a more systematic approach to the way we collectively plan coherent tertiary education and skills provision and investment, so that it responds better to current and future needs. The Letters of Guidance will draw on the Shared Outcomes Framework that is currently being developed and which will set out clearly the intent for collaborative projects, connected to the National Performance Framework and the National Strategy for Economic Transformation priorities, and include milestones, objectives, impacts and measures for each of these projects.

We expect that the letters will be issued in Spring 2022 once the budget for 2022-23 has been approved by parliament.