Chamber and committees

The following table shows the number of care homes with a confirmed case of COVID-19, by week, for residents and staff since 1 January 2023. This data has been supplied by The Care Inspectorate.

Notes:

Data submitted to Care Inspectorate by care homes for adults and older people in "Confirmed case of COVID-19" notifications.

Data based on date of submission.

Data between 1 January 2023 and 24 September inclusive.

The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service utilises the Home Office Incident Recording System (IRS) to capture incident data.

Whilst there is currently no specific category to record incidents caused by lithium-ion batteries, this information can be recorded as “further information” and data can be collected and analysed via keyword search.

Work is ongoing to update the IRS to include more categories to reflect current and future needs in statistical recording and reporting.

The Scottish Government places great importance on community sports and leisure facilities, such as swimming pools. They are crucial to the wellbeing of all our country and most importantly, for our children and young people to be healthy and active.

We are fully aware that local authorities are facing challenging financial circumstances, particularly in the maintenance and operating of facilities such as swimming pools, largely due to energy costs and other cost of living pressures.

The 2023-24 Local Government settlement of £13.5 billion provides a cash increase in day to day spending of over £793 million, a real terms increase of £376 million. As confirmed this week in the Autumn Budget Revision, all consequentials available from the UK Spring Budget have now been allocated, with the Local Government Settlement increasing by £264 million accordingly.

sportscotland are working with local and national partners to help them assess the impact of any potential facility closures and these discussions will continue over the coming weeks and months. It is vital that all avenues are explored to ensure, where possible, that local clubs and communities have access to sport and leisure facilities.

In addition, sportscotland are supporting Scottish Swimming to undertake the Scottish Swimming Facilities Project. This is a detailed piece of work to accurately understand the current pool provision and life cycle, and to predict the landscape in the short, medium, and long term.

We understand that access to facilities is necessary for a range of sporting activities. That’s why our Programme for Government for 2023 to 2024 sets out our intention to convene a working group, including representatives of sports organisations, community organisations and CoSLA, to explore how community access to community facilities, such as the school estate, can be enhanced. This will be a priority action in our refreshed Active Scotland Delivery Plan.

While product safety policy remains reserved, the Scottish Government fully recognises the harm that the misuse of lithium-ion batteries can bring to those using electric micro-mobility vehicles.

I met recently with Electrical Safety First and the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service to discuss the danger that these batteries can cause.

Raising awareness of the risks associated with lithium-ion batteries is particularly important as e-bikes become more popular. The Scottish Government strongly urges consumers to only buy products from reputable retailers that they know and trust.

It is currently illegal in Scotland to use an e-scooter unless on private property.

The Verity House Agreement will better enable local and national government to work together to achieve better outcomes for people and communities across Scotland. The Scottish Government will continue to work in partnership with COSLA to agree a more detailed programme of work, a fiscal framework, and an accountabilities and monitoring framework, to underpin the Verity House Agreement in the coming months.

Decisions on future local government finance settlements will be the subject of negotiations with COSLA on behalf of all 32 local authorities and will be announced as part of the outcome of future Scottish Budgets.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-21565 on 4 October 2023. 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

We are aware of the global issues affecting construction, which are impacting the pace of affordable housing approvals and starts. We are working closely with the construction industry and housing partners to mitigate these issues where possible.

We continue to collaborate with all our partners to achieve our shared goal of delivering more affordable homes for Scotland.

The 10,757 affordable homes delivered to the year to end June 2023 represents the highest annual figure since the statistical series started in 2000.

Local government revenue funding is 2.6 per cent higher in real terms than it was in 2013-14 - as confirmed by the Accounts Commission. Local authorities also have a range of revenue raising powers that are not available to other public services, including newly devolved powers over empty property rates relief.

Scottish councils have been treated fairly throughout UK imposed austerity but we recognise the challenging environment they face and that is why we are committed to a New Deal with Local Government in order to ensure the sustainability of local services.

The Scottish Government believes that every child should be given the opportunity to learn to swim, it is a life skill that can save lives.

In response to terrible tragedies in Scotland’s waterways during 2021, the Scottish Government brought together key water safety organisations to collaboratively develop a Water Safety action plan. The Plan outlines key initiatives to improve education, data, local area water safety planning and incident reviews.

In addition, the Scottish Government have been working with Scottish Swimming, Education Scotland, sportscotland and Scottish Water to develop interventions and approaches to provide opportunities for children to become confident, safer and competent swimmers. Inclusion has been central to the approach and there is a specific focus on targeting areas within quintile 1 of the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation. Four Delivery Pilots have taken place to support schools to understand and consider different approaches on how best to support young people to access school swimming. An evaluation will be published in October and we will work with Scottish Swimming and sportscotland to utilise the learning from these pilots to consider the best approach for a continued roll out of a national framework for school swimming.

The Social Care (Self-directed Support) (Scotland) Act 2013 (2013 Act) Statutory Guidance states that:

“The Statutory Guidance accompanying the Public Bodies (Joint Working) (Scotland) Act 2014 sets out guidance for effective commissioning and procurement processes, including the putting in place of procurement plans providing specific detail to direct those responsible for contracting services.

In addition, best practice guidance on the procurement of care and support services provides further guidance on how procurement considerations can support SDS, where a public contract is the chosen form for funding social care provision.

The authority should seek to use the flexibility within the procurement regulatory regime to meet the legal duties of the 2013 Act. Local authorities should consider how best to develop a procurement strategy that ensure that the ability to ‘self-direct’ is not lost, and that the number of providers is not reduced unnecessarily.