Chamber and committees

Local authorities have statutory responsibility for undertaking assessments of housing need and demand which form a shared evidence base for Local Housing Strategies and Local Development Plans.

The Housing Need and Demand Assessment (HNDA) Tool contains Household projection data prepared by National Records of Scotland (NRS) which captures trends in household formation including where adults are living with their parents. Any trend, upwards or downwards, in the incidence of adult children living with parents, will, along with many other factors that drive change in household numbers, be captured and projected forwards in the projections. The HNDA tool data can be supplemented with robust, local information.

As set out in the answer to S6W-13149 on 10 January 2023, which can be found at Written question and answer: S6W-13149 | Scottish Parliament Website , the available information on average rents across the private rented and social rented sectors is as follows.

The latest Scottish Government Private Sector Rent Statistics, Scotland, 2010 to 2022 , published on 29 November 2022, presents average private rents by property size and Broad Rental Market Areas between 2010 and 2022 (years to end September), based predominantly on advertised rent data. This is the lowest level of granularity available for the Scottish Government Private Rent Statistics, as the data collection method used has not been designed for the purpose of providing local authority level results. In addition, data is not held for the years prior to 2010. The next publication covering the period 2010 to 2023 (years to end September) is planned for November 2023.

Information on average local authority rents is included in the Scottish Government Housing Revenue Account (HRA) Statistics publication, which contains a time series from 1997-98 onwards of average weekly rent by local authority area (Table 8), with the average rent figures presented being based on each Council’s total standard rental income being divided by total HRA stock.

Separate information on average social sector rents is published by the Scottish Housing Regulator, based on average rent figures collected from individual social landlords as part of the Charter Data collection. Results are available in the Scottish Housing Regulator Statistical Information webpages , with social landlord level average rent figures available from 2013-14 onwards, and local authority area level average rent figures published as part of the stock dataset for the most recent two years 2020-21 and 2021-22.

In addition, summary figures on average housing association rents by local authority area across the earlier years 2005-06 to 2012-13 are available in an archived Scottish Government Housing Statistics publication table .

Following the Covid-19 pandemic, the Education Scotland Improving Gender Balance and Equalities team developed new methods for achieving strong engagement with practitioners, as well as adapting to the new and unprecedented needs of schools, settings and local authorities.

In addition to engaging directly with practitioners and education settings, the team developed a national professional learning offer that could be accessed remotely by practitioners.

The national professional learning offer includes a mixture of remote delivery, online courses, podcasts and YouTube videos. As part of this approach, six podcasts were created and released from August 2021 – November 2021. The podcasts have 6,069 views.

Education Scotland has four officers with responsibility for improving gender balance and equality. Building on the success of the IGBE team, a new equalities team has recently been established to continue the IGBE activity as part of a workstream to challenge equalities more broadly. The salary costs for these four staff members in financial year 2023/24, including an anticipated pay award of up to 3%, is £284,000.

(a) These four officers comprise:

• a Senior Education Officer for Equality;
• two Education Officers for Equality; and
• an Education Officer for Improving Gender Balance and Equality.

(b) These officers continue to lead a wide range of work to change perceptions, promote gender balance and challenge unconscious assumptions about gender roles and learner pathways, including in STEM subjects. They have developed an extensive range of resources which are hosted on Education Scotland’s National Improvement Hub. Up to March 2022, Education Scotland’s Improving Gender Balance and Equality Officers engaged with more than 1150 distinct establishments, and reached over 9400 practitioners.

Education Scotland and Scottish Government recognise that much work that remains to be done in this area which is why we’ve invested in a new team of permanent officers with relevant expertise. Through the work of the Gender Equality Taskforce in Education and Learning, which I have agreed to Chair, we will continue to consider how best to effect systemic change which will remove barriers and promote gender balance and equality.

The Scottish Government does not hold the information requested, this is because individual landlords are responsible for the maintenance costs of ensuring their tenant’s homes meet the Scottish Housing Quality Standard.

This is a matter for Local Authorities. This information is not held centrally.

The pilot period for the commitment ran from August 2021 to August 2022, and a final evaluation report has been published on the Transport Scotland website . Support was provided to delivery organisations to continue activities until 31 March 2023.

The total number of bikes issued during the pilot period was 2600, the total figure until March 2023 was 3800 and the final figure is due to be calculated next month.

Cycling Scotland, in collaboration with a number of community cycling organisations and national charities representing young people, have developed a programme for 2023/24 that has received £900,000 to continue offering cycles to young people facing financial barriers. As part of this years programme, they will work with Circular Communities Scotland to continue refining the model for delivery to ensure we can make the most out of reconditioned and recycled bikes and ensure as little waste as possible.

The deployment of officers and their health, safety and wellbeing are matters for the Chief Constable, with oversight by the Scottish Police Authority, (SPA) and scrutinised by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary for Scotland (HMICS).

The Police Negotiating Board and the Scottish Police Consultative Forum negotiate and discuss changes to terms and conditions, before amendments are made to regulations; and then approved by Ministers

As part of the 2022-23 police officer pay deal, a strategic commitment was made to consider ways to reduce the working week and the disruption to police officers lives. Work has been ongoing since then with staff associations and across Scottish Government to look at ways to lower demands on officer time, in particular focussing on attendances at court and supporting mental health needs in the community.

In setting the total level of local government support, Scottish Ministers consider local authorities' on-going responsibilities and any new burdens or transfers of responsibility, including those imposed by Parliament through changes in statute. These issues are discussed on a regular on-going basis between the Scottish Government and COSLA.

The Scottish Government does not hold the information requested. There are currently no requirements for Local Authorities to report to the Scottish Government on the number of damp surveys completed.