- Asked by: Willie Rennie, MSP for North East Fife, Scottish Liberal Democrats
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Date lodged: Friday, 27 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Paul McLennan on 8 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government how much of the £97.1 million in Barnett consequential funding, which it received as a result of the UK Government’s announcement in March 2020 to remediate additional residential cladding, was allocated to the Single Building Assessment delivery team, and to which other areas of spending the money was allocated.
Answer
Under devolution, consequentials of this kind become part of the Scottish Government’s overall budget for that year. As part of the Scottish Budget process, it is for Scottish Ministers to propose funding levels for specific programmes in Scotland, and when the budget is required.
In the case of cladding remediation, we have said that we will spend whatever is necessary to address the problems created by unsafe cladding, that we will make provision for that at the appropriate time, and that we expect the cost of that in Scotland to be at least the quoted amount of consequentials – that is, £97.1 m.
The Cladding Remediation Programme has spent £9 m as of 30 June 2024. We publish updated information on programme spend on a quarterly basis at https://www.gov.scot/publications/single-building-assessment-spending-information/.
- Asked by: Ash Regan, MSP for Edinburgh Eastern, Alba Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 27 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Jim Fairlie on 8 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the reported goal to cull an additional 50,000 deer annually, whether it has explored plans to implement infrastructure in the Central Belt and Lowlands, similar to that established in the Highlands, including community hubs.
Answer
The Scottish Government is committed to reducing high deer numbers in order to help us to achieve our biodiversity and carbon objectives. We are pursuing a range of actions to deliver this commitment including the provision of community deer larders and the three pilot incentive schemes led by NatureScot and the Cairngorms National Park Authority which launched in early autumn to financially support deer managers to control numbers of deer in specific parts of Scotland.
One of these pilots is in Central Scotland and focusses on lowland and urban roe deer management, as well as expanding red deer populations. We will work closely with NatureScot and the Cairngorms National Park as these pilots progress, and the findings from the pilots will be used to inform future deer management policy.
- Asked by: Pam Gosal, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 27 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Neil Gray on 8 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to reduce waiting lists for people seeking audiology appointments.
Answer
The Scottish Government accepted, in principle, the recommendations set out by the Independent Review of Audiology Services in Scotland and are fully committed to seeing improvement in Audiology services.
Audiology is now being considered as a clinical priority area, and work is being progressed through the National Planning and Delivery Board arrangements led by the Chief Operating Officer – NHS Scotland.
In order to support with long waits, our NHS Recovery Plan sets out our plans for health and social care over the course of this parliament. The plan will support an increase in inpatient, day case, and outpatient activity to address the backlogs of care, which will be supported by the implementation of sustainable improvements and new models of care.
- Asked by: Willie Rennie, MSP for North East Fife, Scottish Liberal Democrats
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Date lodged: Friday, 27 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Paul McLennan on 8 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government what Barnett consequential funding it (a) has received and (b) anticipates it will receive as a result of the UK Government's announcement in July 2023 of £5.1 billion of funding for the Cladding Safety Scheme.
Answer
(a) £97.1 million in cladding specific consequentials were received in 2021-22.
(b) In the Spending Review 2021, the UK Government confirmed £5 billion funding (£3 billion over the Spending Review period to 2024-25) for remediation of the highest risk buildings with unsafe cladding. This was the funding referred to in the July 2023 statement.
Cladding funding is factored into the Barnett Settlement for the Spending Review. However, as the Scottish Government does not, except in certain circumstances, receive a full breakdown of consequentials at programme level from the UK Government, it is not possible in this case to determine how much was received from individual programmes such as cladding.
- Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 27 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 8 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to reports that the Forties Pipeline System may close as early as 2030.
Answer
Offshore oil and gas licensing and consenting and issues pertaining to fuel security, as well as the associated fiscal regime, are currently reserved to the UK Government.
Our Energy System and Just Transition: Independent Analysis highlights the need for careful management of the North Sea energy transition, including the fields linked to the Forties System.
- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 8 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government what steps it has taken to tackle the so-called evidence gap in assessing rural poverty and deprivation, as described in the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation’s
Rural deprivation: Evidence summary, which was published in November 2016.
Answer
The Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation rural deprivation evidence summary included sections describing the main issues associated with using SIMD in rural areas, as well as ways of overcoming these through using the wide range of available data sources alongside SIMD for exploring particular topics or communities of interest. The evidence summary was published alongside two case studies Fuel poverty in Dumfries and Galloway and Child poverty in the Orkney Islands which illustrated how this could be done. The SIMD 2020 introductory booklet included a case study on using SIMD in a rural area.
Scottish Government has also published (or funded) a number of reports and resources on poverty and deprivation in rural areas, including Poverty in rural Scotland: evidence review, The cost of remoteness - reflecting higher living costs in remote rural Scotland when measuring fuel poverty: research report, National Islands Plan Survey: final report, Improving our understanding of child poverty in rural and island Scotland, A design based approach to understanding and tackling rural child poverty,Scottish Islands Survey 2023: main findings,Rural Scotland data dashboard: overview and Review of evidence on rural community interventions.
The Scottish Government Office of the Chief Social Policy Adviser has recently funded a UKRI/ESRC Policy Fellow to carry out research on trends in rural and island poverty.
National Records of Scotland are in the process of developing the 2022 Census-based household level deprivation indicator which will allow analysis of key household variables by deprivation for very small geographies.
There are numerous other reports and resources produced by a range of external stakeholder organisations.
- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 24 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 8 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government whether it has made any assessment of the domestic shipbuilding sector’s ability to meet future demand for (a) new ferries and (b) ferry-related infrastructure in (i) Argyll and Bute and (ii) the Western Isles.
Answer
This analysis has not been carried out by the Scottish Government or by Caledonian Maritime Assets Limited (CMAL) on our behalf, although CMAL are aware of the shipyard capabilities in the UK. There is a UK Department for Transport body called the National Shipbuilding Office which has carried out this assessment for both military and commercial shipbuilding capabilities - CMAL are well connected with them and share information and best practices for the benefit of exploring future opportunities.
New vessel and infrastructure tenders are usually let by CMAL to enhance and improve the Clyde & Hebrides Ferry Services fleet and associated infrastructure and these are procured on the open market. These tenders are international and cannot be focussed on a subset of UK only contractors or yards. So, when CMAL tender, they invite UK as well as Global yards to submit interest.
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 24 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Natalie Don-Innes on 8 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the financial situation regarding support services for victims of historic forced adoption practices.
Answer
The Scottish Government, along with public sector bodies across the UK, face a very challenging environment as we manage our finances through the current financial year and set our budget for 2025-26. We are continuing to fund the charity, Health in Mind, in 2024-25, to deliver a specialist peer service to those affected by historic forced adoption. We also fund the charity Birthlink to manage the Adoption Contact Register for Scotland which helps facilitate connections between individuals and families affected by adoption. Decisions on funding other related historical forced adoption activities have not yet been made.
- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 27 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Neil Gray on 8 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government whether it is able to directly attribute any decline in rates of teenage (a) smoking, (b) drinking and (c) drug-taking to either (i) the Planet Youth pilot scheme or (ii) pre-existing anti-substance abuse health campaigns.
Answer
No. We are investing in Planet Youth over 2 years, from 2023-2025. Planet Youth, sometimes referred to as the Icelandic Model, is an approach to prevention which empowers communities to support their young people to reduce the risk of substance use and harms. In Iceland, this approach instigated a decline in teenage substance use. Whilst Planet Youth in Scotland is in its early stages, Winning Scotland who lead on this initiative, are currently developing evaluation tools to measure outcomes.
- Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 27 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 8 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government what it anticipates the impact will be on employment in the event that the Forties Pipeline System closes in 2030.
Answer
I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-30259 on 8 October 2024. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.
