Chamber and committees

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-42331 on 16 December 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.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-42335 on 16 December 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.

We have a robust framework in place, through the Environmental Authorisations (Scotland) Regulations 2018, for the regulation of wastewater activities.

The Scottish Government has not undertaken an analysis of the impact of the SEPA not publishing Controlled Activities Regulations (CAR) licence compliance data since 2019. However, there is no evidence of any significant increase in non-compliance with respect to CAR authorisations in recent years.

SEPA historically published annual compliance data under its Compliance Assessment Scheme (CAS), which rated licences under CAR and other regimes. This publication stopped during the COVID-19 pandemic but SEPA has continued to check compliance and tackle non-compliance where necessary, and some authorisation information is available on request.

SEPA has consulted on a new Environmental Performance Assessment Scheme (EPAS) for reporting on performance against regulatory requirements. Reporting under EPAS is expected to start during 2027. More information is available on SEPA’s website at Environmental Performance Assessment Scheme | Beta | SEPA | Scottish Environment Protection Agency.

In parallel, SEPA transitioned from CAR licencing to Environmental Authorisations (Scotland) Regulations 2018 on 1 November 2025. This will create a more streamlined and integrated system for environmental authorisations in Scotland by bringing together the processes for authorising, enforcing and managing activities that may impact the environment.

The Mossmorran Fife Ethylene Plant Taskforce will be led by Fife Council. The information requested is therefore a matter for Fife Council.

As this is an operational matter for Scottish Water I have asked them to respond. Their reply is as follows:

"Environmental Standards Scotland has recently welcomed that Scottish Water and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) are working to develop an approach to identify overflows where action is needed to prevent dry weather spills from happening.

In the first instance, Scottish Water responds to and carries out any operational interventions to check for blockages, misconnections or other potential faults where any overflow events appear to be happening in dry weather. Scottish Water has also proposed a definition for dry day overflow events and is working in the background to investigate overflows using data from Event Duration Monitors installed as part of commitments made in its ‘Improving Urban Waters Route map’. Where overflow events are confirmed to be occurring in dry weather because of insufficient capacity in the sewerage system, a process is being developed whereby these will be identified as Unsatisfactory Intermittent Discharges (UIDs) and will be agreed with SEPA as a priority for improvement."

The Scottish Government expects all healthcare to be safe, effective and person-centred. On the occasions where non-standard care areas have to be used, it is the NHS Boards who are responsible for ensuring that effective and documented risk assessments, that detail the mitigating measures, are in place to support staff who are required to deliver care to patients in these areas.

The use of non-standard areas of care is scrutinised by Healthcare Improvement Scotland as part of their inspection process. HIS has encouraged NHS Boards to implement strategies to enhance patient flow and eliminate the routine use of non-standard care areas for patient care.

Currently there is no requirement or ability for NHS Boards to record and submit data on corridor care to Public Health Scotland for publication, not least as there is not an agreed definition for ‘corridor care’.

We accept that caring for patients in non-standard patient areas is sub-optimal and we are clear that no patient should be treated in a space not fit for clinical care.

We recognise the need to improve the acute care experience for patients and work has been underway over the course of 2025 to develop enhanced frailty services through the Healthcare Improvement Scotland - Frailty at the Front door standard. As a result, all NHS Health Boards have a frailty service which includes Multi-Disciplinary teams which support our front doors.

The Hospital and Community Services for Older People Living with Frailty in Scotland HIS report shows that Scotland has made significant progress in ensuring older and vulnerable patients receive timely, specialised care from the moment they arrive.

This year the Scottish Government published our Operational Improvement Plan and we continue to work with local system leaders to support their health and social care improvement reforms to improve access to treatment and shift the balance of care from acute hospital services to the community, and to ensure people receive the right care in the right place.