Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government has not held discussions with the UK Government regarding seafarer welfare on drill ships currently moored in the Port of Hunterston. Shipping safety and seafarer welfare are matters reserved to the UK Government.

Transport Scotland officials recently consulted with the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) and the Statutory Harbour Authority regarding a drill ship at the Port of Hunterston which had become adrift.

As a consequence of the incident, the MCA undertook General Inspections on the Ensco DS-8 vessel and on the Valaris DS-4 vessel. During these inspections, a number of deficiencies were noted and enforcement notices issued. Full and separate investigations have been completed by Clydeport as the Statutory Harbour Authority and by the ships’ management companies.

The Harbour Authority has been liaising closely with the Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) and its report on the investigation has been submitted to the MAIB.

The Scottish Government expects the highest shipping safety and crew welfare standards and for these to be applied in the case of those vessels and personnel accessing our ports and coastal areas.

As of 15 March 2021 52% of regulated public appointments were held by women, 48% were men. The Public Appointments monitoring system does not hold information about the protected characteristic of gender reassignment. A new monitoring system will be delivered in 2021 and will introduce questions about gender identity and gender reassignment.

The Public Appointments process or regulated public appointments does not ask or require applicants to declare any previous or current trade union membership. No records are held by the Public Appointments Team as to which current Board members of regulated public bodies are affiliated to a trade union.

There are currently 723 people who have been appointed to public body boards. In line with a target set by the Ethical Standards Commissioner, the Scottish Government collect and report on numbers of public appointees who are aged under 49. As of 15 March 2021 there are total of 120 people who are aged under 49 : 82 (11.3%) women and 38 (5.3%) men.

The Scottish Government supports the development of carbon capture, utilisation, and storage (CCUS) as a common whole-system decarbonisation infrastructure with the flexibility to adapt over time to play a central role across the decarbonisation strategies of key sectors such as heat, industry and power.

Scottish Government officials regularly engage with UK counterparts on CCUS policy; I have also engaged directly with UK Government Ministers on this subject. The UK Government have confirmed they are carrying out a suite of CCUS work packages and developing related policies throughout 2021, which includes creating a Supply Chain Plan, scheduled to commence in Quarter 2. The Scottish Government will continue to highlight the importance of a CCUS supply chain in Scotland as the work progresses.

It is essential we identify opportunities for a just transition for our skilled oil and gas supply chain in line with the new opportunities in a zero-carbon world. The Scottish Government are also undertaking work on the development of a CCUS supply chain in Scotland; we commissioned an Economic Impact Assessment, along with Scottish Enterprise, in October 2020 to examine the specific economic and market development opportunities presented from the development and deployment of CCUS.

The study includes a specific work package to identify the skills base and capabilities required for the development of a CCUS supply chain in Scotland, and a database of existing organisations in Scotland with the ability to deliver this. The study undertaken by Element Energy and Vivid Economics will complete in summer 2021 and will provide a springboard to identify areas of support and development for the supply chain.

The Scottish Government’s Programme for Government committed to the development and implementation of a Women’s Health Plan. The aim of the plan will be to reduce women’s health inequalities by raising awareness around women's health and improving access to healthcare for women throughout life. Development of the plan is well underway and the present Government plans for it to be published later in 2021.

To inform the development of the plan we have brought together experts from a range of specialties, in the public and third sectors, who work on women’s related health issues to share their expertise. This work has also been informed by lived experience engagement, facilitated and led by the Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland (the ALLIANCE).

A lived experience survey, which received over 400 responses, and a series of lived experience engagement events have been held to ensure women’s voices and experiences are central to development and implementation of the Plan. A report from the survey has been published on the ALLIANCE website and a report from the engagement session will be published when finalised.

The Ministerial Working Group met in October 2020 to discuss the development of the non-statutory statement of policy on food. Work on the statement is in the initial stages and has been delayed by Covid-19 and Brexit resourcing issues. Further updates will be provided once this work has been progressed further.

The views of stakeholders are an important part of the development of any government policy and officials have spoken to Defra about the stakeholder engagement process that formed part of the National Food Strategy work and which will help inform the approach taken to develop the statement of policy on food by the Scottish Government.

As part of the review on extending concessionary travel across all modes of public transport to those under the age of 26 an assessment framework has been developed to undertake multi-criteria analysis to assess their contribution to delivering the National Transport Strategy as well as considering other factors such as assessment of cost and deliverability.

As part of the strategic options used for appraisal the Scottish Government has carried out analysis on a range of options including the cost of extending free bus travel to under-26.

The review on extending concessionary travel across all modes of public transport to those under the age of 26 was paused as a result of the impacts on resources of COVID-19 and EU Exit, but is nearing completion and Scottish Government will publish the findings in due course.

Since the original commitment to carry out a review was made Scottish Ministers have gone further and confirmed the extension of free bus travel to approximately 770,000 young people young people under the age of 19. Once the scheme starts, as soon as practicable in financial year 2020-21, under 19s will join the third of Scotland’s population who already benefit from free bus travel. Public consultation has demonstrated strong support for the scheme.

We have also committed to make as much progress as possible during 2021-22 to deliver free bus travel to under 22s and have allocated an additional £17 million in the Budget for this purpose.

The wider review on extending concessionary travel across all modes of public transport to those under the age of 26 was paused as a result of the impact of COVID-19, but is nearing completion.

As part of the review on extending concessionary travel across all modes of public transport to those under the age of 26 an assessment framework was developed to undertake multi-criteria analysis to assess their contribution to delivering the National Transport Strategy. This framework has been used to assess a range of options as well as considering other factors such as assessment of cost and deliverability and once the review has been finalised the Scottish Government will publish the findings.