Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government welcomes that the British Veterinary Association sees advantages and opportunities in the creation of a Scottish Veterinary Service (SVS), and also agrees with the veterinary profession's representative body that there are risks that must be managed. To do so, a Programme has been put in place to manage the work required to establish an SVS.

Animal diseases do not respect borders, and Officials in the Programme have identified areas where communication, cooperation and interoperability between the future Scottish Veterinary Service and its counterparts in the rest of GB or the UK is required for effective delivery, such as data sharing, science and research, contingency planning and mutual assistance for major incidents and disease outbreaks.

Scottish Government Officials liaise regularly with the Animal and Plant health Agency, as well as Defra, Welsh Government and Northern Ireland Executive officials to ensure that suitable arrangements are in place, in due course, to mitigate against any risks to animal health and welfare as a result of different arrangement for the delivery of veterinary controls in Scotland.

Scottish Ministers, the Chief Veterinary Officer, and officials communicate with the British Veterinary Association regularly on this and other animal health and welfare matters, and will continue to do so as the Programme develops.

The Scottish Government is committed to the creation of a Scottish Veterinary Service (SVS) to ensure there are highly trained staff to provide Scotland with good animal health and food safety to meet all our needs across the public and private sector for animal health issues.

Animal health and welfare matters are devolved, and were so before the creation of an Scottish Veterinary Service was considered. The Scottish Government is satisfied that any future changes to the arrangements for the delivery of veterinary controls will be purely operational and have negligible implications for the operation of the Internal Market Act 2020.

Nevertheless, animal diseases do not respect borders, and there will be areas where communication, cooperation and interoperability between the future Scottish Veterinary Service and its counterparts in the rest of GB or the UK will be required for effective delivery, such as data sharing, science and research, contingency planning and mutual assistance for major incidents and disease outbreaks.

Scottish Government Officials liaise regularly with the UK Government and the other Devolved Administrations on animal health and welfare matters, including the SVS, through the mechanisms established under the UK Framework for Animal Health and Welfare.

Transport Scotland consider all enquiries regarding harbour orders, and provide feedback for applicants to consider how the requirements of becoming a Statutory Harbour Authority could be met. Transport Scotland officials have corresponded with and provided advice to the Annan Harbour Action Group at various junctures over the last 3 years and continue to correspond with the Group on its proposals.

The Scottish Government has regular discussions with the UK Government regarding pet travel rules through a number of forums. The rules require all dogs entering the UK to be treated against Echinococcus multilocularis (tapeworm) unless they are entering from a tapeworm free country. Risk assessments are undertaken for zoonotic diseases, including tick-borne diseases, to ensure pet travel disease prevention measures remain relevant in protecting public and animal health.

While the Scottish Government does not currently hold land use data for land as categorised in the question, it does hold information in relation to land use for specific purposes. For example, the Scottish Government's Rural Payments and Inspections Division hold data on the use of land parcels where farmers make applications for funding. The claimant may not, however, be the owner of the land.

Individual land holdings of over 500 hectares will often have a mixture of uses. For example, Scottish Forestry has engaged with 324 separate areas of privately owned land over 500 hectares that are under forest cover and used primarily for timber production and carbon sequestration. These can be broken down as:

• 4 forest management plans over 500 hectares have been approved by Scottish Forestry (Scottish Government agency) since 2011;
• 310 Long Term Forest Plans over 500 hectares have been approved by Scottish Forestry since 2009; and
• 10 Forestry Grant Scheme Woodland Creation cases over 500 hectares have been approved since 2015.

These areas of land will also contribute to natural heritage and nature recovery as they all include areas of native woodland and other habitats.

As outlined in the Scottish Government’s consultation for the forthcoming Land Reform Bill, proposals for compulsory Land Management Plans for large land holdings will require land holders to detail the use and management of their land. This will further improve transparency of land ownership and empower communities.

Scottish Ministers and SG officials meet with NRS on a regular basis, to discuss a wide range of matters, such as the Census. Most recently, the Minister for Community Wealth and Public Finance met with the interim Chief Executive on 5 July 2023 and I met with her on 20 July 2023.

The Scottish Government expects all NHS Boards in Scotland to consider the recommendations in the Scottish Health Technologies Group report, published on 23 March 2023, and take steps to ensure that women who require access to placental growth factor (PlGF) based tests as part of their maternity care can do so.

The Scottish Government has recently written to all NHS Boards for an update on progress towards implementation of PlGF testing. We will be able to give an update on this in due course.

Deer management covers a range of work, including culling deer and other damage mitigation actions such as deer fencing which can have an effect on deer movement and impacts.

We do not hold figures for the overall breakdown of deer management actions undertaken in Scotland. However, the annual cull data collected by NatureScot, plus estimates of unreported private sector deer culls, suggests that culling estimates that in 2020-21 approximately 20% of deer culled in 2021 were culled by Scottish Government agencies and 80% by private land managers and non-governmental organisations.

The Scottish Government recognises that it will be necessary to undertake detailed analysis, including costing and cost-benefit analysis of this wide-ranging report before it is possible to make definitive statements about individual recommendations. A team is being recruited to undertake this work.

Deer management covers a range of work, including culling deer and other damage mitigation actions such as deer fencing which can have an effect on deer movement and impacts.

The estimated cost to public agencies for all deer management actions in 2022-23, including culling, provision of fencing, deer larders and other equipment was £8,838,400. The total number of deer culled by public agencies in 2022-23 was recorded as 38,242.