Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government has a precautionary approach to vaping products. Vapes and other nicotine products are part of a range of cessation tools available to existing smokers to help stop tobacco use. They should not be used by non-smokers, in particular by children and young people. They should not been used or promoted as a lifestyle accessory.

Our recent vaping consultation, which closed at the end of April, sought views on tightening rules on advertising and promoting vaping products. The results of this consultation will be published soon and will inform our Tobacco Action Plan refresh.

We are working with a range of stakeholders to ensure that our Tobacco Action Plan discourages and reduces the use and visibility of vaping products by all non-smokers, including children and young people.

The Scottish Government will launch a national marketing campaign to promote the new Young Persons’ Free Bus Travel scheme in the coming weeks. The Scottish Government has allocated £400,000 to promote this campaign during this financial year.

On promoting public transport more broadly, Transport Scotland continues to work with operating partners and stakeholders to encourage people to use public transport, as a sustainable way to access work, education and services.

The number of Home Energy Scotland Loan applications received during 2020-21 and 2021-22 were:

As at August 2022, the number of Home Energy Scotland Loan applications currently awaiting processing is 303.

The total full time equivalent staff employed on Home Energy Scotland at the end of July is 208. This figure includes:

• All staff within each Home Energy Scotland advice centre working on Home Energy Scotland activity, and teams and specialists managed directly by the Energy Savings Trust including the Extended Hours team, renewables specialists and private sector landlord advisors.
• All staff within Energy Saving Trust who are covered by Home Energy Scotland funding.
• Management time within the centres and Energy Saving Trust allocated to management of Home Energy Scotland.

In August the average processing time was 8 days and the longest processing time was 10 days.

The Scottish Government wants to improve opportunities, outcomes and support for autistic people, people with learning disabilities, and neurodivergent people. To this end, we have committed to introducing a Learning Disability, Autism and Neurodiversity Bill. This Bill will ensure that the rights of autistic people, people with learning disabilities, and neurodivergent people are respected and protected.

To help make sure the new legislation is championed when it is implemented, we intend to consult on the creation of a Learning Disability, Autism and Neurodiversity Commissioner through the new law.

Further details about the timing of the public consultation on the Bill will be announced in the Programme for Government in September 2022.

A decision on the timing of the Bill’s introduction to Parliament will be taken by Cabinet in the context of setting the content of future legislative programmes.

As of 16 August 2022, 16,478 cards have been purchased. In addition, in week commencing 15 August, Glasgow City Council issued 85,000 pre-paid Scotland Loves Local cards to eligible households within the local authority in receipt of Council Tax Reduction as at 1 June 2022. Five other local authorities, which have indicated they will also issue pre-paid cards, have yet to confirm their proposals for distribution.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-10269 on‎ 5 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

The number of passenger complaints received by ScotRail, through their official complaints process, is set out on the following table for the period 1 July to 31 July 2022. The complaints may involve incidents that occurred before 1 July 2022.

The figure for 1 July to 31 July 2022 is 1192. This complaints figure is likely to reflect the point in time when several services were impacted due to driver shortages and the subsequent reduction in services as a result of the temporary timetable in place from 23 May to 20 July 2022. In this period there was also a GB-wide strike by Network Rail staff on 27 July which significantly impacted services in Scotland, with ScotRail only able to run a very limited service as a result.

The temporary timetable that was in place until 20 July 2022 aimed to provide the best available service to as many passengers as possible.

Complaints from staff are not included in figures due to these being customer relation figures. However, ScotRail do have a system in place to record staff grievances within their HR team.