Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government supports Ferguson Marine through the provision of parent company guarantees when these are required to support new vessel and steel fabrication contracts. Scottish shipyards can also utilise the Shipbuilding Credit Guarantee Scheme delivered by UK Export Finance that provides a partial guarantee to a lender making a loan to a ship-buyer or operator, so that new vessels, or refits, retrofits or repairs of existing vessels can be procured from UK. Commercial shipyards and financial institutions in Scotland have not raised the Spanish tax lease system or the use of other international tax leasing frameworks with the Scottish Government.

The Scottish Government published the ‘Preventing Harm, Promoting Recovery: Scotland's Alcohol & Drugs Strategic Plan’ in March 2026, which commits the Scottish Government to a long-term public health approach to reducing alcohol and drug-related harm, including the publication of an Alcohol Harm Prevention Action Plan setting out the next steps for addressing alcohol-related harm in Scotland.

Work is currently underway to develop that Plan, which will set out the next phase of action to prevent and reduce alcohol-related harm. As part of this work, we will continue to assess the evidence on measures that could help reduce alcohol-related harm.

No decisions have yet been taken on specific measures, and further details will be published in due course through the Alcohol Harm Prevention Action Plan.

The Scottish Government recognises the importance of ensuring that gill net fisheries operate in a sustainable manner and minimise unintended impacts on the marine environment, including interactions with non-target species.

The current permitted soak time of up to 72 hours reflects existing management arrangements. However, we keep all fisheries management measures under review and consider the best available scientific evidence, stakeholder views and operational considerations when assessing whether changes are required.

Any proposal to amend soak-time limits would require careful assessment of the likely environmental, economic, and practical impacts on affected fisheries and coastal communities.

At present, the Scottish Government has not taken a decision to reduce the permitted soak time from 72 hours to 36 hours, but we will continue to consider emerging evidence and engage with stakeholders as part of our ongoing fisheries management work.

The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) is an Executive Agency of the Scottish Government and has responsibility for operation of prisons including staffing.

The safety of all those who live and work in Scotland’s prisons is a key priority for SPS and this government.

SPS has a range of measures in place to support the safety of people working in prisons. These include robust recruitment and vetting processes, close partnership working with Police Scotland, mandatory professional boundaries training for all Prison Officers and a comprehensive Anti-Corruption Policy. Staff are supported to identify and report concerns through confidential reporting processes, with all concerns thoroughly investigated.

SPS is also introducing Body Worn Video Cameras (BWVCs), with implementation currently being rolled out across all establishments. The use of BWVCs will help enhance the safe and secure running of prisons across the estate, supporting both staff safety and any criminal investigations where appropriate.

The Scottish Government supports Ferguson Marine through the provision of parent company guarantees when these are required to support new vessel and steel fabrication contracts. Scottish shipyards can also utilise the Shipbuilding Credit Guarantee Scheme delivered by UK Export Finance that provides a partial guarantee to a lender making a loan to a ship-buyer or operator, so that new vessels, or refits, retrofits or repairs of existing vessels can be procured from UK. Commercial shipyards and financial institutions in Scotland have not raised the Spanish tax lease system or the use of other international tax leasing frameworks with the Scottish Government.

The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) is an Executive Agency of the Scottish Government and has responsibility for operation of prisons including staffing.

Information on health outcomes is not held by SPS as responsibility for prison healthcare services rests with NHS Boards.

SPS has worked proactively in partnership with the Trade Union Side to develop and implement protocols designed to support and protect staff who may encounter situations involving potential exposure to unknown substances. This collaborative approach helps ensure appropriate safeguards are in place for staff and supports a consistent operational response across the prison estate. SPS continues to review how such incidents are recorded with a strong focus on staff safety, welfare and support.

The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) is an Executive Agency of the Scottish Government and has responsibility for operation of prisons including staffing.

As confirmed in the recent letter to the Criminal Justice Committee, as of 3 September 2026, SPS employed 4009 operational (frontline) staff, equating to 3797.09 full-time equivalent (FTE) posts.

(a) 3442.18 FTE Operational staff were available for duty.

(b) SPS does not currently record information on the number of Prison Officers undertaking roles with reasonable adjustments or restricted duties. SPS is reviewing its workforce data arrangements to consider how this information could be captured and reported in the future.

(c) 354.91 FTE prison officers were unavailable for operational duty. This includes absences due to sickness, parental leave, suspension, special leave, other authorised absences, and staff temporarily undertaking non-frontline roles.

SFRS was formed in April 2013 and the Resource budget for its first year of operations in 2013-14 was £277.23 million. Adjusting that figure using the GDP deflators that are published by the OBR at UK fiscal events, means the equivalent annual budget for 2026-27 would be £399.99m.

The SFRS Capital budget for 2013-14 was £15.292m. Using the same adjustments means the equivalent annual budget for 2026-27 would be £22m.

The non-fiscal element of the SFRS budget has not been included for the comparison of the impact of inflation. For reference, this figure was £22.02 million in 2013-14. Whilst this element is included in the total budget allocated to SFRS each year, the amount is allocated on the basis of actual cost to SFRS to cover accounting elements such as depreciation. As such, this element of the SFRS budget is not subject to inflationary pressures.

Scottish Government officials regularly meet representatives from the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) and the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service (SCTS) to discuss the implementation of the sexual offences court (SOC). Central themes of this engagement have included the increase in the number of sexual offence cases being prosecuted; the projected caseload for the SOC; and how to most effectively sequence the establishment of the SOC with wider reforms in the criminal justice system.

Scottish Government officials have also met a range of other stakeholders to discuss necessary preparations for delivering the court, I have discussed the SOC with the Law Officers, the Lord President and the Chief Executive of SCTS.

The Scottish Government has also engaged with the Scotland Office and the Ministry of Justice on the preparation of necessary secondary legislation to support the implementation of the SOC.

There is no publication date set for the remand outcomes project because the project is in the scoping stages only.

Scottish Government (SG) analysts receive a subset of information from the records held by Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service (SCTS) to produce the Criminal Disposals Dashboard. SG analysts also receive a subset of information from the prisoner records held by Scottish Prison Service (SPS) to produce the official statistics on the prison population. On their own these datasets do not allow the tracking of outcomes in cases where individuals are held on remand.

To address this gap in analysis, SG analysts have been developing a research project to link the data in these subsets to determine outcomes in cases where the accused was held on remand during proceedings. Scoping work has revealed challenges. Individuals held on remand can have multiple charges across different criminal cases, so determining if and how the outcomes for specific charges or cases relate to time spent on remand is not straightforward.

If analysts are able to reach a suitable method for linking the data and producing meaningful outputs, notification of intent to publish will be provided here: Official statistics: forthcoming publications - gov.scot.