Chamber and committees

According to reports provided by local authorities, the number of children, young people and family members accessing the funded Community Mental Health and Wellbeing Supports and Services in each local authority area in the first half of 2023 was as follows (reports for the second half of 2023 are not due to be provided before May 2024):

The Scottish Government and CoSLA’s Suicide Prevention Action Plan contains a commitment to work with The Promise Scotland to engage with care experienced people to better understand what action is needed to embed suicide prevention activity in our support to children and young people in care and care leavers, whom we know are at elevated risk of suicide.

During 2023-24, this has included work to build in suicide prevention across policies which tackle the social determinants of suicide, as part of our whole of government and society approach, and maximising opportunities to support care experienced people who are suicidal through their contact with services, such as homelessness and Social Security Scotland. Our innovative partnership-led delivery model is driving the implementation of our action plan and helping to extend our reach and impact in preventing suicide among care experienced groups by bringing together partners to share resources, learning and expertise. Central to this model is our Youth Advisory Group which includes care experienced young people affected by suicide. The Group is helping to shape our suicide prevention work to ensure it can best support and meet their needs.

We are now intensively developing our 2024-25 delivery plan, working collectively with The Promise Scotland as part of the development process, and considering how together we can achieve closer alignment across our outcomes measurement. The Scottish Government and COSLA will sign-off this delivery plan in coming months.

The Scottish Government takes an evidence-based approach to tackling child poverty by ensuring that plans are underpinned by evidence and that we carefully monitor progress. The evaluation strategy summarises the approach which is split across three key areas:

(1) Careful monitoring of the four child poverty targets(relative poverty, absolute poverty, low income and material deprivation, and persistent poverty).

(2) Examination of the three drivers of poverty via the child poverty measurement framework (income from employment, cost of living, and income from social security and benefits in-kind) and

(3) monitoring impact of key interventions on child poverty.

The hyperlinks to all key documents mentioned above are included in the background note.

There is currently no reason for Transport Scotland officials to consider the closure of the M74 Junction 1 Kingston Interchange, which is likely to have significant adverse impacts on the wider local road network given the volume of traffic on the M74 and M8. A clear rationale for changes to the strategic transport network, such as this, need to emerge from a robust business case in line with Scottish Transport Appraisal Guidance and Transport Scotland's Guidance on the Development of Business Cases . If this change was for planning or land use change purposes, I would expect this to be initiated by Glasgow City Council.

Local authorities receive funding via the local government block grant to enable them to meet their statutory obligations, including the provision of home to school transport. Local authorities are responsible for decisions about the purchase of vehicles. The Scottish Government’s guidance on home to school transport encourages local authorities to procure zero emission vehicles for use in home to school transport services. Local authorities and bus operators that provide home-to-school transport services were eligible to apply to our recent round of ScotZEB 2 funding. This programme provides funding to increase the number of zero emission vehicles and their supporting infrastructure by encouraging collaborative working within the bus sector.

The Scottish Government does not collect information on the number of electric school buses purchased by local authorities.

Local authorities receive funding via the local government block grant to enable them to meet their statutory obligations, including the provision of home to school transport. Local authorities are responsible for decisions about the purchase of vehicles. The Scottish Government’s guidance on home to school transport encourages local authorities to procure zero emission vehicles for use in home to school transport services. Local authorities and bus operators that provide home-to-school transport services were eligible to apply to our recent round of ScotZEB 2 funding. This programme provides funding to increase the number of zero emission vehicles and their supporting infrastructure by encouraging collaborative working within the bus sector.

The Scottish Government does not collect information on the number of electric school buses purchased by local authorities.

The Scottish Government has not given any consideration to developing qualifications for those wishing to train to become pet groomers as we do not consider it to be the role of Government to develop such courses.

There are already various organisations and individuals that offer specific training in dog grooming, with more formal providers delivering training which leads to the award of SQA or City and Guilds recognised qualifications in dog grooming. Other training of relevance to those offering dog grooming services is available through a number of colleges covering animal care, animal husbandry etc.

Colleagues with adjustment passports can wear Sunflower lanyards and/or pins or badges but must also wear a parliament issued purple lanyard.

It’s estimated that 70-80% of disabilities are hidden, including physical and mental health, sensory such as visual, auditory and processing difficulties, chronic conditions, and rare diseases. The SPCB want to make it easier for staff and visitors who have a non-visible disability to get the support they need. SPCB staff have been trained to recognise the Sunflower and offer help or adjustments as part of our existing reasonable adjustment process.

Childcare voucher schemes were part of UK-wide tax legislation on employer supported childcare. They were closed to new entrants in 2018 and as such, parents and carers who are taking up new employment are not able to access them. While some Scottish families may still be using them, they have largely been replaced by Tax Free Childcare. As the Scottish Government is not involved in the administration or regulation of childcare voucher schemes, we have not conducted an assessment of them.

We are aware of the wealth of evidence that shows that access to affordable and flexible childcare can improve standards of living and address child poverty through reducing pressures on family income and enabling parents and carers, particularly women, to participate in work, education or training. There is more information on this evidence base in ‘Best Start - strategic early learning and school age childcare plan 2022 to 2026: https://www.gov.scot/publications/best-start-strategic-early-learning-school-age-childcare-plan-scotland-2022-26/pages/10/

In the Plan, we have also set out our commitment to continue to engage with and seek to influence the UK Government to deliver better outcomes for children and families through childcare policy.

Our national guidance on recording and monitoring incidents of bullying in schools makes clear that all schools and local authorities are expected to record all incidents of abusive or violent behaviour.

In 2019, we introduced a consistent approach to recording and monitoring incidents in schools. The SEEMiS system was identified as the most appropriate tool for schools and local authorities to record incidents. The Scottish Government does not have any plans to introduce a new system.

We are currently considering the guidance as part of the review into the national anti-bullying guidance, ‘Respect for All’. The updated guidance will be published in late 2024.

In the meantime, I made clear in my statement to Parliament on 29 November and also reiterated in the strongest possible terms in the opposition debate on 6 March, my position on the need for more accurate recording of all incidents of inappropriate, abusive or violent behaviour in our schools. I continue to encourage all schools to do that, recognising that recording of physical or verbal incidents is a matter for individual local authorities.