Chamber and committees

The Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2003 clarified the law on the physical punishment of children. A leaflet about the new legislation was distributed widely to parents and staff working with children and families.

We recognise the importance of monitoring the impact of the legislation on public attitudes and parental behaviour and will consider this further in deciding future research programmes.

Employment is a reserved matter. However, the Scottish Executive is in regular contact with the UK Government on work-life balance issues, including the recently introduced Work and Families Bill which will benefit working parents in Scotland.

Dried sewage sludge pellets are presently used as fuel. Plans for the use of sewage sludge in the future are an operational matter for Scottish Water and, where relevant, its contractors.

Since the introduction of the Emergency Workers (Scotland) Act 2005, procurators fiscal have commenced court proceedings in respect of 92 charges under that act.

Note: This information has been extracted from the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service’s Case Management Database. The database is a live, operational database used to manage the processing of reports submitted to procurators fiscal by the police and other reporting agencies. The database is charge-based. The figure quoted therefore relates to the number of charges rather than the number of individuals charged or the number of incidents that gave rise to such charges.

We are working with regional transport partnerships and local authorities to promote the uptake of sustainable travel plans, of which such schemes may be an element.

Average weekly costs of secure and non-secure residential care for a child need to be considered separately. The latest available information is as follows.

The average weekly cost of non-secure residential care for a child was £1,647 in the 2003-04 financial year.

The average weekly cost of secure residential care for a child was £3,458 in the 2004-05 financial year.

The information requested is not held centrally.

Scottish Water and, where relevant, contractors acting on its behalf, are responsible for the disposal of sewage sludge.

I understand that Scottish Water is in the process of updating its sludge strategy, and that it intends to consult on a strategic environmental assessment of it shortly.

Scottish Development International (SDI) and its partners, including Scottish Enterprise Tayside, target global decision makers in key industries to highlight business opportunities and secure investment into Scotland. This includes traditional foreign direct investment (FDI) projects but also research investment and new technology partnerships. The high international regard for this work can be seen in the fact that in October 2004 the Financial Times’ FDI Magazine awarded Dundee the title of “European Cities of the Future – Best FDI Promotion Strategy”.

The Scottish Executive and its agencies continue to work to attract the kind of inward investment to Dundee which has helped make it an internationally recognised location for the life sciences and creative industries, attracting companies such as US-owned drug discovery firm Upstate and medical imaging specialists Kestrel 3D. Dundee is also home to long-standing inward investors such as NCR which continues to make high-value investments in the area assisted by public sector support.

The Scottish Executive operates a range of measures to assist manufacturing throughout Scotland. The Executive’s strategy, Smart Successful Scotland, is delivered through local enterprise companies including Scottish Enterprise Tayside in Dundee which works closely in conjunction with the Business Gateway and also its partners in the Dundee Community Planning Partnership. Together they offer manufacturers business support services which are available to all types and sizes of business and Scottish Enterprise Tayside also provides intensive support to key companies with the best potential for sustainable growth.

The Executive provides direct financial support for investment projects through Regional Selective Assistance which, in the past two years, has provided 11 companies in Dundee over £2.7 million of grant aid creating 182 jobs and securing the employment of 206. Other direct Executive grant schemes such as Smart and Spur, which encourage product and process innovation, have delivered £1.68 million to 14 Dundee companies.

The Scottish Manufacturing Advisory Service - designed specifically to improve productivity in manufacturing industry will be introduced later this year.