Chamber and committees

Our 2013 strategy, Creating a Tobacco-Free Generation, committed us to making all hospital grounds tobacco-free. This was implemented across the NHS Scotland estate in April 2015.

However, smoking still persists around many hospitals. To address this, offences and penalties will be introduced for smoking around hospital buildings in 2018.

Eliminating smoking from all hospital settings will protect patients, staff and visitors from the harms of second-hand smoke. It will further de-normalise smoking which should help prevent future generations taking up the habit and reinforce the nature of hospitals as health-promoting environments.

The number of Whole Time Equivalent (WTE) staff working in NHSScotland has increased from 127,061.9 WTE as at 30 September 2006 to 139,430.9 WTE as at 31 March 2017 – a record high increase of over 12,300 WTE, or 9.7 per cent under this Government.

(Source: ISD Scotland)

As outlined in S5W-10034, the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) requested information from Principals and Chairs of college buildings and from the Scottish Association of University Directors of Estates (SAUDE) about the use of Aluminium Composite Material (ACM) in Scottish colleges and universities.

All institutions have now responded to the SFC providing information on cladding across the college and university estate. In addition, all institutions have responded to the additional request for information on privately-owned student residences. Due to the technical nature of some of the responses received, SFC is seeking professional advice to help assist them analyse the information received in order to determine whether any further action is required. The SFC will remain closely engaged with SAUDE throughout this process.

Ministers continue to monitor the situation and are in close contact with the SFC to ensure that all necessary action is taken once the responses have been fully analysed.

The Scottish Government does not have access to specific information on the growth of microbreweries in Scotland due to the structure of the Standard Industrial Classification.

For statistical purposes, data is collected for businesses where their main activity is in the manufacture of beer. The following tables set out the number of enterprises and number of employees within the category of Manufacture of Beer Enterprises by employee size band in Scotland for the period March 2011-2016. This data is sourced from the Inter-Departmental Business Register (IDBR). The IDBR, maintained by the Office for National Statistics, is a database of all enterprises registered for VAT and/or PAYE. Those excluded are small businesses with no employees and an annual turnover below the VAT threshold (£82,000 as at March 2016).

Number of 'Manufacture of Beer' enterprises by employee sizeband*, Scotland March2011-2016

Employment in 'Manufacture of Beer' enterprises by employee sizeband*, Scotland March2011 - 2016

Note: Totals may not equal the sum of the consitiuent parts due to rounding.

^ Not available due to confidentiality constraints

* Sizeband is based on the number of employees that the enterprise employs across the UK

The Scottish Government's Fairer Scotland Action Plan (FSAP), published in October 2016, sets out a number of commitments to ensure that older people can enjoy a thriving "third age". This means supporting people who want to keep on working, and ensuring that older people have access to high quality advice on maximising their incomes and reducing costs where possible.

It is, however, important that people in the general population are aware of the importance of saving for the future. That is why the Scottish Government is committed to improving levels of financial knowledge and capability across the generations. In Scotland, opportunities to develop financial education are available to our young people in the senior phase of school based learning. The FSAP sets out our commitments to financial inclusion for all, including ensuring that advice services provide accessible and high quality advice to those who need it, and introducing a Financial Health Check Service for pensioners and those on low incomes, to be rolled out in 2018.

I wrote to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury on 27 June to request an urgent meeting of the Scottish, Welsh and UK Governments to discuss this issue. That request was declined, but the Chief Secretary had separate telephone discussions on 6 July with me and with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government in the Welsh Government.

I believe this deal is a clear breach of the Statement of Funding Policy and has resulted in the Scottish Government losing out on almost £3bn of additional funding over the next 5 years. The Chief Secretary currently takes a different view. If we are unable to reach a satisfactory resolution which results in a fair and reasonable funding allocation across Scotland, Wales and the rest of the UK, I will look to the formal dispute resolution mechanism.

The Scottish Widows Retirement Report 2017 sets out a range of interesting findings about attitudes and behaviours around saving for retirement; a vital issue for current and future generations. The recommendations of the report relate, in large part, to improvements which could be made to auto-enrolment in pension schemes, and the public's level of knowledge about the pensions system.

State Pension policy is currently reserved to the UK Government and administered by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). As such, Scottish Ministers do not have any power to affect State Pension legislation. However, the Scottish Government is committed to improving the levels of financial knowledge and capability in the general population. In Scotland, opportunities to develop financial education are available to our young people in the senior phase of learning, and the Scottish Government's Fairer Scotland Action Plan sets out our commitments to financial inclusion for all, including ensuring that advice services provide accessible and high quality advice to those who need it, and introducing a Financial Health Check Service for pensioners and those on low incomes, which will be rolled out in 2018.

The Scottish Funding Council (SFC) have requested information from Principals and Chairs of Scotland’s college buildings and from the Scottish Association of University Directors of Estates (SAUDE) about the use of Aluminium Composite Material (ACM) cladding systems used in all Scottish colleges and universities including student accommodation.

SFC have requested the information to be provided by 13 July and will liaise with Universities Scotland, SAUDE and College Principals to determine whether specific action is required.

Through our partner agencies - Creative Scotland, Scottish Funding Council, Skills Development Scotland and the enterprise agencies - we have supported a range of actions through grant funding, including developing leadership and business skills through the Skills Investment Plan; innovation support from Scottish Funding Council and a broad range of activity delivered through the Creative Scotland Creative Industries Strategy. The latter has included workshops on investment, business training programmes for emerging creative graduates, supporting the development of affordable studio provision, and encouraging innovation within creative business activity. In recent years, we have seen employment in the sector grow to 73,600 which is a 2.5% increase on 2014 and a 15% increase since 2011.