Chamber and committees

We have increased our investment in rural areas this year to nearly £80 million which will fund more than 1,400 affordable homes. The percentage share of the housing investment programme allocated to rural areas now stands at a record high - 28% in 2004-05 compared with 20% in 1999-2000. Other important measures include the development of new models for low-cost home ownership and action to improve land supply for affordable housing through land banking and the preferential use of land managed by Forestry Commission Scotland.

The Scottish Executive is today publishing the Scottish farm income figures. There are two separate data series published at this time, each of which looks at agriculture from a different perspective.

The Total Income from Farming series is an aggregate measure and relates to Scottish agriculture as a whole over the calendar year. The figures show that Total Income From Farming (TIFF) is estimated to have risen by 2.5% in 2004 to £505 million. Finished cattle and sheep markets continue to improve, as shown by the 3% and 5% increase in cattle and sheep respectively. Cereals are down slightly due to weather conditions and exchange rates.

Due to its method of construction, the TIFF figures cannot be broken down into different types of farming. The second data series known as Net Farm Income is designed to enable comparisons to be made across different farm types. Net Farm Income is a narrower measure and is based on farm financial years rather than calendar years. Thus Net Farm Income captures movements in prices and costs that are different to those in TIFF because of the differing time periods accounted for by the two measures. For these reasons the two series should not be directly compared with each other.

Average net farm income (NFI) for all farm types rose by 90% between 2002-03 and 2003-04, from £10,400 to £19,800. There was a considerable rise for most farm types, with cereal and general cropping farms showing significant increases. Net farm incomes are forecast to fall by about 47% in 2004-05 to £10,500 mainly as a consequence of lower cereals prices reflecting the poorer quality of the 2004 harvest. Detailed estimates of the outputs, inputs and income for 2004 at both aggregate level and by farm type will be published this morning. A copy of which will be place in the Parliament’s Reference Centre (Bib. number 35602).

There is no portion of the general allocation provided to NHS boards that is specifically ring fenced for the provision and fitting of prosthetic limbs, which forms part of Rehabilitation Technology Services. It for each NHS board to decide how best to apportion the resources available to it so as to best meet the needs of the whole of the population within its area of responsibility.

Within the National Grid for Learning programme the Executive is providing all primary schools with membership of Gridclub, a web education resource for children aged 7-11. This includes a safe online environment in which primary children can interact and message each other both at school and at home under the supervision of trained and vetted adult monitors.

Procurement of the Scottish Schools Digital Network, a national intranet for schools, is under way. Part of the specification for this will ensure that pupils are able to access most, if not all, of the resources and services from any location, including school, the home, libraries and other public access points.

A range of ICT projects including one in Glasgow and one in West Dunbartonshire addresses the issue of the use of ICT in the home.

I refer the member to the question S2W-12746 answered on 16 December 2004. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.

We have increased our investment in rural areas this year to £80 million which will fund more than 1,400 affordable homes. Other important measures include the development of new models for low-cost home ownership and action to improve land supply for affordable housing through land-banking and the preferential use of land managed by Forestry Commission Scotland.

The Scottish University for Industry will become an Executive non-departmental public body with private limited company status from 1 April 2005. The Scottish University for Industry was established in 2000 and has made an important contribution to learning in Scotland through its learndirect Scotland services and collaboration with a wide range of partners involved in post-school learning. Recently it has markedthe 500,000th call to the learndirect scotlandhelpline.

As a result of changes to the corporate structure of the Scottish University for Industry, it is the responsibility of Scottish ministers to make board appointments. Accordingly, and after an appointment process following the Code of Practice of the Commissioner for Public Appointments in Scotland, I am making the following appointments. All appointments have effect from 1 November 2004:

Billy Allan as Chairperson	to 31 October 2008
John Ramsay	to 31 October 2008
Asif Haseeb	to 31 October 2008
Anne McNeill	to 31 October 2008
Bill Stevely	to 31 October 2006
Brian Curle	to 31 October 2006
Ralph Palmer	to 31 October 2006
Jayne Stuart	to 31 October 2006

 

I was delighted to host the first meeting of the first Regional Advisory Council (RAC), the North Sea RAC, in Edinburgh on 4 November. We expect two further RACs in which Scotland has a major interest, the North Western Waters and Pelagic RACs, to be established in the course of next year.

Earlier this year, ministers decided that there was a compelling case for change in Scotland’s tourism support arrangements, based on the need to better integrate and focus public sector support on strengthening Scotland’s tourism and related businesses and growing their revenues in support of our shared ambition to grow the sector by 50% by 2015. That decision was based in part on the views of most respondents to the review of area tourist boards (ATBs), who stressed the need for better integration between national tourism strategies and their delivery locally.

The Executive accordingly commissioned VisitScotland to design and deliver, under the leadership of the Executive, an integrated tourism network by merging the 14 separate ATBs with VisitScotland. A project team involving over 100 people from ATBs, local authorities, COSLA, the STUC, tourism businesses, VisitScotland and the Executive was set up to do this. It has worked hard over the last six months to design an integrated network which will be responsive to the needs of tourism businesses and visitors, and will work closely with key partners including local authorities and the enterprise networks. That design work has beensummarised in the Tourism Network Implementation Framework Document, copies of which have been placed in the Parliament’s Reference Centre today (Bib. number 34275). I am very pleased that this important milestone has been achieved on target, although I am conscious of the huge amount of work that is still to be done as the project moves into the implementation phase.

The priority of the staff in the offices across the tourism network will be to provide high quality information to visitors, and to work closely with tourism related businesses of all kinds, helping them to grow by linking them directly with national and local marketing and quality strategies, and by offering commercially attractive marketing and other opportunities. These offices will have delegated powers and budgets to respond to circumstances in their own areas, and at least 80% of industry engagement by VisitScotland will be deliveredthrough them. Another very important network activity will be the strengtheningof local partnerships, especially with local authorities. The wholehearted supportof local authorities will continue to be needed for tourism to grow in every partof Scotland, and they will be closely involved in tourism decision making at local and national level. The partnership activity of the network will be focussed through the development for each area of an Area Tourism Plan in collaboration with local partners meeting regularly as an Area Tourism Partnership; local authorities will have strong representation on these bodies and on the proposed city convention bureaux.

I know that there is a concern about retaining good, knowledgeable ATB staff in the new structure, and about potential redundancies. The tourism network project is committed to open and fair treatment of all staff. Because we are building on the strengths of the existing ATBs, VisitScotland plan, subject to funding continuing to be available from local authorities, to transfer staff into the new network in April 2005 on terms and conditions (including pension rights) no less favourable than those which they currently enjoy.

The content of a local plan is a matter for the planning authority for that particular area. There is no specific local plan policy on public access to golf courses. However, National Planning Policy Guideline 11: Sport, Physical Recreation and Open Space encourages planning authorities to include a policy of protecting rights of way and other permissive access routes in local plans.