Chamber and committees

Scottish Water is currently progressing over £23 million of investment in the Highlands and Islands to improve wastewater treatment, enable growth and to maintain its wastewater assets throughout the area. This is primarily to upgrade and improve existing assets as previous investment periods were focused on building new treatment works in many areas across this region to ensure a high standard of treatment and improve environmental water quality.

Scottish Water continues to work with developers that require new sewerage infrastructure in order to extend the public sewer network, with Scottish Water making a financial contribution to a reasonable contribution level established in regulatory guidance.

The following table shows the number of bed days occupied by people delayed in their discharge in hospitals in NHS Highland for all delay reasons over the period April 2017 to March 2022 by financial year. The hospital of delay represents the location of delay as recorded at the monthly data submission date to which all bed days within the month are assigned. The figures for 2020-21 and
‎2021-22 will have been impacted by the measures put in place to respond to COVID-19.

Number of delayed bed days occupied in NHS Highland hospitals, 2017-18 to 2021-22

The Scottish Government does not hold this data. However, some 126,339 properties are connected to Scottish Water’s sewer network in the North region (which includes Highlands and the Western Isles). In 2021, the National Records of Scotland reported the total number of households in the Highlands and Islands as:

• Highland Council – 110,743
• Na h-Eileanan Siar – 12,925
• Orkney Islands – 10,758
• Shetland Islands – 10,554

Therefore approximately 13% of domestic properties may have private sewerage arrangements in the Highlands and Islands. Overall, the Scottish Government estimates that 8% of households across Scotland have private sewerage arrangements.

Of the £2 million previously committed at COP26, £1.7 million has been delivered through grants. £1 million was grant funded to the Climate Justice Resilience Fund (CJRF). Created in 2016, CJRF is one of the first major funding initiatives framed explicitly around climate justice, and one of few philanthropic players that works internationally on climate resilience. They have been selected as they have extensive experience of delivering rapid, community-based finance to address climate justice.

Through the Scottish Government’s partnership with the CJRF, five project in the Global South have been grant funded grants to date; £233k to Young Power in Social Action (YPSA), £228k to Helvetas Bangladesh, £205k to Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC), £182k to Churches Action in Relief and Development (CARD) and £136k to the Loss and Damage Youth Coalition Youth Grantmaking Council (LDYGC).

Furthermore, £500k of the initial £2 million has been granted to The Scottish Catholic International Fund to directly support communities in our partner country, Malawi, facing losses and damage resulting from recent tropical storms. With participation and co-design at the heart of their programming, SCIAF and partners have built long-term relationships through the delivery of the SG funded Climate Challenge Programme Malawi with communities who are now experiencing severe loss and damages. SCIAF’s experience and existing relations will ensure Scottish Government funding has an immediate and much needed impact in Malawian communities.

Alongside grant funded projects on the ground, the Scottish Government identified a gap in global knowledge and understanding through extensive stakeholder engagement and as such, allocated part of the £2 million funding to further research on loss and damage. £75k has been awarded to the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) to investigate operationalising finance for Loss and Damage. A further £150k has been granted to the International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) in Bangladesh for further research on loss and damage.

Given Bisphenol A is not currently required to be monitored in drinking water, there are no recorded incidents. However, it has been introduced as a new parameter to be monitored from the 1 January 2023 as part of the Public Water Supplies (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2022. Monitoring information will be published by Scottish Water in line with the requirements of the Regulations. As part of the phased introduction of the recast Drinking Water Directive, forthcoming legislation will cover requirements in relation to the protection of drinking water catchments and remedial measures.

The following table shows the number of communities which have registered an interest in acquiring land, and the number of communities which have acquired land, under the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 (the Act) only, each year since 2003. Communities may receive funding from a variety of sources, including the Scottish Land Fund (SLF). The Scottish Government has funded the SLF since 2012.

The table also shows the amount of funding granted by the SLF each year to communities who acquired land under the Act. Note that not all communities which acquired land under the Act may have received funding from the SLF, and communities which acquired land through other means may have received SLF funding.

The Scottish Government undertakes monitoring and evaluation of all funded programmes once they are live. Monitoring and evaluation is used to assess progress against agreed targets so can only be done once a project has started and there is progress to assess.

For the £1.7 million worth of funded projects, and in line with standard Scottish Government grant-management practice, we hold monthly update conversations and formally assess progress on a quarterly basis based on formal progress reports. Project specific monitoring and evaluation plans are developed based on each individual grant’s objectives to determine indicators that will accurately measure progress.

Our programmes seek to empower communities to identify the priorities to be addressed through climate justice support and to build resilience to the local material and social impacts of climate change that they have identified. Fundamental in achieving that resilience is through our future programmes mainstreaming communities participation in programme implementation, monitoring and evaluation. This means communities, including the most marginalised within communities, participate in determining and monitoring the metrics and baselines by which a programme is deemed a success.

Our future programmes seek to mainstream communities participation in programme implementation, monitoring and evaluation. Our upcoming £24m Climate Just Communities programme will ensure that communities, including the most marginalised within communities, participate in determining and monitoring the metrics and baselines by which a programme is deemed a success.

Scottish Water is required to test both drinking water and wastewater in line with legislative requirements and to submit these to the relevant regulator. Annual reports are provided by both the Drinking Water Quality Regulator for Scotland and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency which provide a commentary on the levels of compliance with mandatory standards. Scottish Water also publishes water quality information which is searchable by postcode.

Progressing work to enable the establishment of a US pre-clearance facility is primarily a commercial matter for Edinburgh Airport and would ultimately need to be approved by the relevant authorities in the United States.

The Scottish Government works closely with Scotland’s airports to help grow international connectivity, while not returning to previous levels of emissions. Direct connectivity between Scotland and the United States has improved significantly in recent years but there are other US routes where a direct link would be positive for Scottish businesses, the tourism sector and the economy as a whole. Pre-clearance would help ensure the ongoing success of established routes and encourage the development of new ones.

In July, I wrote to the then UK Secretary of State for the Home Office to invite the UK Government’s view on Edinburgh Airport’s ambition to establish pre-clearance for outbound flights to the US given the role they would need to play in the process. While the Minister for Safe and Legal Migration recognises that this is a commercial matter, I am pleased that the response from the UK Government indicates that the Home Office, together with the Department for Transport, would be keen to explore this matter further should there be a commercial decision to proceed. We also remain in close contact with Edinburgh Airport.

The Drinking Water Quality Regulator for Scotland publishes extensive information about drinking water quality in all regions across Scotland on its website, including but not limited to annual reports, water quality incidents and enforcement notices. This can be found at www.dwqr.scot .