Chamber and committees

The skills required to manage, nurture and enjoy the whole of the historic environment, which include but are not limited to those required to undertake physical conservation works, are a key priority within the overarching strategy for the Historic Environment, Our Place in Time. The forum which oversees the delivery of the strategy (and which met for the first time on 23 June 2014) has already identified ‘skills’ as an issue for immediate collective action and, as a first step, has recommended an audit of historic environment conservation skills training provision in Scotland to help inform our collective strategic approach to this issue over the coming years.

Historic Scotland are delivering a Traditional Building Skills Strategy, a significant element of which is the creation of the Engine Shed in Stirling as a focus and showcase for traditional building skills and will be a resource for the whole sector.

Our Place in Time was published in March 2014 and is available at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2014/03/8522

The Traditional Building Skills Strategy was published in 2011 and is available at:

http://www.historic-scotland.gov.uk/skillstrategy.

There are no special rights, over and above the general rights of access contained in the access code and its underlying legislation. This issue was considered as part of the process of bringing forward new legislation to create a new lead body for the historic environment, the Historic Environment Scotland Bill, which is currently before Parliament.

Important sites of heritage interest may be designated as scheduled monuments under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979; or as listed buildings under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997; or as Historic Marine Protected Areas under the Marine (Scotland) Act 2010; or they may be recognised by being added to the Inventory of Historic Battlefields or Inventory of Gardens and Designed Landscapes.

The stakeholders consulted during designation of a heritage asset vary considerably depending on the type of designation and the nature of the asset. They normally include owners, occupiers and the relevant local authority. Depending on the case type, they can also include other relevant community or special interest groups, and persons and organisations that may be affected by the specific designation.

Ministers are under a duty to schedule monuments which are found to be of national importance. Historic Scotland, an executive agency of the Scottish Government, is currently responsible for discharging this duty and has developed operational policy which determines what constitutes national importance. This is set out in the Scottish Historic Environment Policy:

http://www.historic-scotland.gov.uk/index/heritage/policy/shep.htm).

If the Historic Environment Scotland Bill is enacted, revision of the operational policy for scheduling will be a matter for a new body, Historic Environment Scotland.

The Scottish Government is completely opposed to blacklisting and is committed to ending the practice in Scotland. Scottish Procurement Policy Note SPPN 4/2013 sets out our belief that a company which has engaged in blacklisting has committed an act of grave professional misconduct, and should be excluded from bidding for public contracts, unless the company has taken appropriate remedial measures. This guidance was developed in partnership with relevant trades unions.

It is for individual public bodies, rather than the Scottish Government, to decide, on a contract-by-contract basis, whether or not to exclude a company in these circumstances. Such a decision must be proportionate, given the circumstances of the specific case.

It is also for individual public bodies to assess, given all the circumstances of the case, whether any remedial measures taken by the company are sufficient to allow them to bid for the contract.

We will continue to work with trades unions as we develop statutory guidance and regulations to implement the provisions of the Procurement Reform (Scotland) Act 2014, and to transpose the three new European procurement directives. In doing so, we will aim to tackle blacklisting as robustly as possible.

The Scottish Government has no plans to amend the rules governing housing revenue accounts to include the recording of amenity blocks on local authority owned Gypsy/Traveller sites.

Local authorities are responsible for decisions regarding the provision of Gypsy/Traveller sites in their area, including any decision to close a Gypsy/Traveller site. The Scottish Government is not directly involved in assessing the impact of such a closure. However, a local authority has to consider the accommodation needs of Gypsy/Travellers as part of a Housing Need and Demand Assessment and when developing its local housing strategy and development plan. Each Local housing strategy goes through a review process, with input from Scottish Government officials, and comments are provided as appropriate. These comments can cover Gypsy/Traveller site provision.

The Scottish Government has no plans to introduce such legislation.

Accommodation needs for Gypsy/Travellers are assessed at a local level. A local authority has to consider the accommodation needs of Gypsy/Travellers as part of its Housing Need and Demand Assessment and when developing its local housing strategy and development plan. Each local housing strategy goes through a review process, with input from Scottish Government officials, and comments are provided. These comments would cover Gypsy/Traveller site provision, as necessary.

Local authorities are responsible for decisions regarding the provision of Gypsy/Traveller sites in their area. Need is identified through a Housing Need and Demand Assessment and is considered by the local authority as part of developing its local housing strategy and development plan. Local housing strategies go through a review process, with input from Scottish Government officials. Feedback from the review process is provided to the local authority, and where required this feedback will cover Gypsy/Traveller site provision (for example where the accommodation needs of Gypsy/Travellers have not been sufficiently taken into account). The Scottish Government has also recently collected data on the number of Gypsy/Traveller sites local authorities provide.