Chamber and committees

The Pollution, Prevention and Control (Scotland) Regulations 2012) (the “PPC regulations”) require that permits for the incineration or co-incineration of municipal waste contain such conditions as SEPA considers necessary to ensure, where practicable, that no waste including non-ferrous metals or hard plastics is incinerated or co-incinerated.

The recently published report on the Review of the Role of Incineration in the Waste Hierarchy makes a provisional recommendation on strengthening requirements for pre-treatment for residual waste. We are carefully considering all recommendations made in the report and will set out our initial response in June.

The document confirming which Scottish minister agreed to proceed with offering Ferguson Marine Engineering Limited a contract for the building of new ferries in October 2015 has been located. Suggestions that records had been deliberately destroyed are completely unfounded.

It has been provided to Parliament and can be found on the Scottish Government website here .

We are pleased to have funded the significant 50% discount through the scheme since 2016, helping residents of our remote and island communities that rely on these connections. We anticipate over £10 million of discounts being provided in 2022-23 and believe that this substantial expenditure is an important investment in islands connectivity. We currently have no plans to increase the discount rate for the Air Discount Scheme.

We are determined to ensure that NHS dental services emerge well-placed to care for the oral health of the whole population and we are now moving forward with NHS dental recovery.

We have seen in April that the revised payment arrangements combined with the relaxation of IPC measures are having a substantial positive impact in improving NHS patient access and ensuring the sector is able to quickly return to more normal levels of activity and clear the backlog.

Scottish Government funds a Scottish Dental Access Initiative Grant for Health Boards to provide capital funding to dental practices looking to set up or increase their facilities in areas where NHS dental provision is less available. Qualifying areas include remote, rural and island locations, with the number of areas increased at the last annual review in December 2021.

The Recruitment and Retention Allowance has recently been reviewed to ensure that Boards with more rural geographies have the opportunity to attract newly qualified dentists. The new arrangements mean that newly qualified dentists joining the list of a Classification 1 area can receive additional payments of up to £25,000 over two years, with vocational trainees attracting payments of £12,500 over one year. The full details can be found at UPDATE: Amendment No. 155 to the SDR – Recruitment and Retention Allowance | Scottish Dental .

All Covid-19 or presumed Covid-19 deaths where the deceased may have contracted the virus in the course of their employment or occupation or where the deceased was resident in a care home when the virus was contracted fall to be reported to COPFS. A specialist Covid-19 deaths investigation unit has been set up and continues to receive and consider all such reports and direct further investigations, where appropriate, into the circumstances of each death.

It would not be appropriate, at this stage, to comment on the potential outcome of its investigations or the course which those investigations will take. This includes any individual or collective actions or otherwise of those involved in Covid-19 deaths. However, in appropriate cases where criminal proceedings are in contemplation, all relevant charges will be considered.

No assessment has been undertaken by the Scottish Government or VisitScotland.

VisitScotland does not create driving routes but rather, promotes successful ones on its website. Its website outlines that the route begins over the Border. VisitScotland is not however responsible for signage for such routes which is managed by the relevant authority. In the case of local roads, this falls to local authorities.

VisitScotland does not hold information on visitor numbers to businesses based outside of Scotland. VisitEngland may however hold this data.

VisitScotland’s summary of statistics in relation to pre-pandemic visitors to Dumfries & Galloway can be found here: Dumfries & Galloway - Tourism Statistics & Research | VisitScotland.org

In relation to (a), (b) and (c)(i), the Care Inspectorate does not hold data in relation to care homes that have closed. However, the number of adult care home services in the public, private and third sectors which have had their registrations cancelled in each of the last five years is in the following table:

COPFS collates data based on reports to each Procurator Fiscal (PF) office, not by local authority area and so, based on geographic proximities, for (a) South Ayrshire the relevant PF office is Ayr and (b) East Ayrshire, the data is based on reports received at PF office Kilmarnock.

COPFS can provide the number of charges reported to COPFS and of those, the number that were convicted. A further breakdown of charges convicted excluding any with a disposal of prison sentence has also been provided.

Although most charges were prosecuted with the majority convicted, others resulted in no conviction or no further action and a number are still live and ongoing.

Other charges received an alternative to prosecution such as diversion to social work department or referral to children’s reporter or were marked “no action” for example, in cases where there was insufficient admissible evidence.

The information requested is provided in the following table: -

COPFS collates data based on reports to each Procurator Fiscal (PF) office, not by local authority area and so, based on geographic proximities, for (a) South Ayrshire the relevant PF office is Ayr and (b) East Ayrshire, the data is based on reports received at PF office Kilmarnock.

COPFS can provide the number of charges reported to COPFS and of those, the number that were convicted. A further breakdown of charges convicted excluding any with a prison sentence has also been provided.

Although most charges were prosecuted with the majority convicted, others resulted in no conviction or no further action and a number are still live and ongoing.

Other charges received an alternative to prosecution such as diversion to social work department or referral to children’s reporter or were marked “no action” for example, in cases where there was insufficient admissible evidence.

The information requested is provided in the following table: -