Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government places great importance on leisure facilities, particularly swimming pools and believes everyone should have access to these services locally.

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

The Scottish Government received consequentials of £5.816m from the UK Government from their swimming pool fund. These consequentials are added to the Scottish Block as a whole and it is ultimately for Ministers to decide how to utilise available funding in the context of a challenging financial backdrop and existing budgetary pressures.

In 2023-24 the Scottish Government provided nearly £13.5bn in the Local Government Settlement and increased the resources available to local government by more than £793 million, including £100 million of additional funding at Stage 3 of the Budget Bill, funded in part by consequentials provided at the UK Budget. This was a real terms increase of £376 million or 3% compared to the 2022-23 Budget figures. In addition, Scottish Ministers allocated a further £55m ahead of the summer. This follows on from the additional £1 billion of funding provided to Local Government in 2022-23.

The funding of local sports and leisure facilities, including swimming pools is the responsibility of our local authorities and, as independent corporate bodies, it is for local authorities to manage their own budgets and to allocate the total financial resources available to them on the basis of local needs and priorities.

The Scottish Government attaches great importance to winter sports. Scotland’s fantastic outdoors is a huge draw for visitors and sporting enthusiasts, especially over the winter months.

The snowsports sector is a key part of Scotland’s rural economy, worth an estimated £30 million per year and providing over 600 jobs. sport scotland, our national agency for sport, is providing Snowsports Scotland with an investment of £424,350 this year, an increase of 2.6% from the previous year.

We also recognise the value of ice sports in Scotland and understand the important role that ice sporting facilities play in improving people’s lives, whether it is taking part socially, developing, progressing, or achieving success. sport scotland’s annual investment of £742,300 into Scottish Curling for the period 2023-24 represents an 8.3% increase in funding from the previous year.

The Scottish Government provided a £7 million ski centre fund during the pandemic to safeguard Scotland’s commercially run snow sport centres, including four of its five mountain resorts – Nevis Mountain Range, Glencoe Mountain Resort, The Lecht Ski Centre and Glenshee Ski Centre, and four artificial snow sport centres. In addition, thirteen ice rinks across Scotland also received £2 million financial support from the ice rink support fund.

The Scottish Government places great importance on indoor sport facilities, such as ice rinks. 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 aware of the current challenges and difficult financial circumstances facing many operating indoor sports facilities due to the cost of living crisis. We have repeatedly called on the UK Government to use all the powers at its disposal to tackle this cost of living crisis and to provide appropriate energy bill relief to leisure facilities.

Where indoor sports facilities are operated by the local authority or leisure trust, it is for local authorities to manage their own budgets and to allocate the total financial resources available to them on the basis of local needs and priorities. In 2023-24 the Scottish Government provided nearly £13.5bn in the Local Government Settlement and increased the resources available to local government by more than £793 million, including £100 million of additional funding at Stage 3 of the Budget Bill, funded in part by consequentials provided at the UK Budget. This was a real terms increase of £376 million or 3% compared to the 2022-23 Budget figures. In addition, Scottish Ministers allocated a further £55m ahead of the summer. This follows on from the additional £1 billion of funding provided to Local Government in 2022-23.

The Scottish Government 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.

In our response to the Scottish Mental Health Law Review we committed to establish a Mental Health and Capacity Reform Programme to further enhance and protect human rights within legislation, policy and practice. This includes a commitment to enhance carers’ rights and role in practice through further developing and promoting carer awareness training for staff working with people with mental or intellectual disability across health and social care settings, by 2026.

These actions will also be set out in the Mental Health and Wellbeing Workforce Action Plan, which will be published in Autumn 2023.

We have funded NHS Education for Scotland (NES) to develop three training modules for the health and social care workforce, including those working with mental or intellectual disability across health and social care settings, to help them to identify, include and support unpaid carers. We expect those to be launched by the end of 2023.

We understand from regular contact with colleagues in UK Government that the third round of the Levelling Up Fund is in development however we have no further information or clarity on when or how the funds will be allocated.

The Scottish Government maintains that this funding should be devolved to us to distribute in line with our regional economic policy arrangements.

I have asked Teresa Medhurst, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS), to respond. Her response is as follows:

Serco who currently operates HMP Kilmarnock are not contractually obliged to install Body Worn Video Cameras (BWVCs). There are currently no plans to retain BWVCs currently in use by Officers at HMP Kilmarnock, post-transfer in March 2024.

The feasibility of a pilot to test the introduction of BWVCs across the SPS estate is however being considered in partnership with Trade Union Partners.

I have asked Teresa Medhurst, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS), to respond. Her response is as follows:

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-21088 on 21 September 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

As the Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice updated in her statement to Parliament, local authorities have a statutory responsibility to ensure that their schools are safe for pupils, staff and their users. In line with this responsibility, they continue to carry out assessments of their school buildings, and Ministers have been clear to authorities that those must be carried out as a matter of the highest priority. At present, I am meeting with COSLA on a weekly basis to review the position.

It is imperative that there is transparency around the schools where RAAC has been identified and the mitigations that are in place. This is why, on 8 September, a list of the 16 local authorities where reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) has been found in some schools was published in a Scottish Government news release ( Local authorities publish RAAC data - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) ). Local authorities have now published a list of any schools where RAAC has been identified, and it would be for those individual local authorities to decide if they publish the projected cost to remedy any issues within their school estate.

The 2023-24 Programme for Government and Pay Strategy maintains our commitment to a four-day working week public sector pilot to assess environmental, health and wellbeing benefits and productivity gains this could bring.

The pilot and the concluding report will ensure meaningful insights are gained on the benefits and risks of a four-day working week approach.

We are currently seeking an expert partner organisation to support pilot participants, assist with the pilot design and produce an evaluation report. The work of the expert partner organisation will define the framework to judge the effectiveness of the public sector four-day working week pilot proposal.

This issue affects a range of sectors, including hospitality. We recognise that delivering affordable housing in rural areas presents different challenges. We are committed to delivering 110,000 affordable homes by 2032, of which 10% will be in our remote, rural and island communities, and are making available £3.5 billion this Parliament for affordable housing across Scotland. We will publish a Rural and Islands Housing Action Plan this autumn to help retain and attract people in rural and island communities – making available up to £25 million through our Affordable Housing Supply Programme over the period 2023-2028 to deliver homes for key workers in rural communities.

Our short-term lets regulations, including control areas, give local authorities the powers to manage high numbers of short-term lets, and our consultation on second and empty homes invites views on local taxation and existing housing to inform policy development to ensure sufficient, safe and secure housing stock.

We are also working to explore solutions to staff shortages in collaboration with the sector, through our Tourism and Hospitality Industry Leadership Group.