Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government currently has no plans to undertake a consultation on the introduction or piloting of bans or other restrictions on Heavy Goods Vehicles (HGVs) over 7.5t in weight from overtaking on Scottish trunk roads.

The Scottish Government expects communities to gain from green ports. The joint bidding prospectus , delivered in partnership by the Scottish Government and the UK government, provides details on Planning requirements and advises on place-based tools to inform the delivery of appropriate development in green port areas. It also required applicants to outline how their proposal would ensure compliance with all applicable environmental regulations and standards, as well as submitting an outline decarbonisation plan for the green port. These elements form part of the assessment of proposals.

Through our £1 million partnership with the Climate Justice Resilience Fund (CJRF) we have begun to support communities to address the impacts of loss and damage in Bangladesh, the Pacific Region and Malawi. This includes supporting the rights and needs of climate-forced displaced people, as well as helping families make more informed decisions about migration as a means to diversify livelihoods. Separate to the CJRF funding, the Scottish Government is also providing £500,000 to support communities in Malawi facing losses and damages resulting from recent tropical storms. The Scottish Government is funding research on needs assessments and case studies as part of our commitment to build evidence around how to most effectively address loss and damage.

The First Minister and I will be hosting a conference in October [11 & 12] in partnership with the High Level Champions and Global Resilience Partnership, which will explore how we can mobilise finance, drive solutions and develop best practice for addressing losses and damages. We hope to demystify how to fund loss and damage by establishing clear routes to action with the outputs of the conference synthesised into a report launch at COP27.

Asylum is reserved to the UK Parliament and handled by the Home Office. The Scottish Government does not have access to Home Office systems or hold data on individuals who are in the asylum system or who hold refugee status, which could be used to identify how many people who arrived before 24 February 2022 are living in temporary accommodation.

The Landlord Register came into effect following the Antisocial Behaviour Act 2004, with associated monitoring information available from 2007. Local authorities are responsible for the administration and enforcement of landlord registration, and are the data controllers of the information on the landlord registration IT system for landlords in their area. The Scottish Government receives monthly aggregate information extracted from the system, including on the total number of active registrations and the number of properties that these relate to, which are set out in the tables below for each of the years in which these figures are available between 2007 and 2022. However the Landlord Registration System is an administrative system used primarily to manage the registration of landlords and rental properties, and has not been designed to produce robust statistical figures on the sector. The figures presented should therefore be considered in the context of data quality issues which include impacts from changes to IT systems over time, a risk of duplicated data and double counting of rental properties in certain instances for joint owners, as well as data issues stemming from any potential lags in the provision of information by landlords on changes to circumstances to existing registrations, and we would advise caution in the use of these figures if making any specific comparisons over time or between local authority areas especially the number of properties within the 2017 – 2019 period which have been subject to significant data quality issues and are not considered to be accurate counts of the number of properties across these years .

associated monitoring information available from 2007 onwards which have been subject to significant data quality issues and are not considered to be accurate counts of the number of properties across these years

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-10694 on 27 September 2022. 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

Follow-up scans are agreed on a local basis. Women over 71 who have a history of breast cancer have the option to self-refer for screening.

However, with the development of the Scottish Cancer Network we are working towards the development of clinical management pathways, with breast cancer being one of the first three in development. The Scottish Cancer Network is a dedicated national resource to support and facilitate a ‘Once for Scotland’ approach to cancer services, which will assist in enabling equitable access to care and treatment across Scotland.

The Scottish Government wants green ports to promote regeneration in local economies and communities by driving inclusive and sustainable growth locally, regionally and nationally, unlocking the potential of our regions for the benefit of the national economy, businesses, workers, and local communities.

The joint bidding prospectus , delivered in partnership by the Scottish Government and the UK government, confirmed successful applicants should explain the steps taken or planned to engage with local communities to consider how proposals will maintain and, where possible, enhance the quality of the locality.

Engaging effectively with people and stakeholder organisations is a key part of our public engagement and we always seek to follow Public Guidance for Consultation.

The consultation process for the National Islands Plan and Islands Communities Impact Assessments was led by the Scottish Government’s Islands Team and was designed to encourage island communities to help shape the polices that were published on 27 December 2019 in the National Islands Plan.

The member will know that Angus Campbell, Chair of the Ferries Community Board, has agreed to lead the work on stakeholder engagement for Project Neptune. I look forward to meeting Mr Campbell next week to discuss a timescale for the engagement required.

The Rural Entrepreneur Fund was a 2021-22 Programme for Government (PfG) commitment to invest £20 million over the lifetime of the current parliament.

In light of the challenging financial environment, we need to prioritise our investments to ensure that they are deliverable, impactful and affordable. Consequently, there has been no money made available for Rural Entrepreneur Fund to date.

Our PfG 2022-23 prioritises support for households, businesses and public services. Following the UK Government’s Emergency Budget we will carry out a budget review to assess opportunities to redirect additional resources to those most in need.