Chamber and committees

The local flood risk management plans, which are due to be published by December 2022, will provide more detail on how the actions set out in the flood risk management plans for 2022-2028 will be delivered including who will lead them and how the actions will be coordinated with other organisations. They will also provide further information on when the actions will take place and how they will be funded.

As with all infrastructure projects, it can take many years for flood schemes to progress from option appraisal to completion . Given the impacts on individuals, communities and the environment, it is right that flood protection schemes are carefully and thoroughly planned - and balance the interests of the whole community.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-07958 on 9 May 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

Transport Scotland officials maintain awareness of developments in railways in other countries, including those which are in public ownership – for example in England. This appreciation is used to inform analysis of options for the development of Scotland’s Railways in line with the priorities of the Scottish Government.

Opportunities for international travel between December 2019 and March 2022 were very much restricted by the pandemic. Accordingly there were no official visits made to countries outside the UK by Scottish Ministers and/or officials in this period.

The Scottish Government expects all relevant organisations to comply with the requirements of the Equality Act 2010, including published guidance and codes of practice. The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is the body responsible for regulating matters related to the Equality Act 2010 and publishing associated guidance. The Scottish Government has not discussed with Police Scotland their obligations in relation to recording the sex of suspects under the 2010 Act; questions relating to obligations of public bodies under the 2010 Act could be raised with the EHRC.

Guidance published in September 2021 by Scotland’s Chief Statistician, makes it clear that the collection of data on sex and gender is a matter for public bodies. As such, the operational recording of information of those involved in crime is a matter for Police Scotland. It is intended that all Public Bodies would use this guidance to help them determine how best to record information they collect for their operational matters. In 2019, Scotland’s Chief Statistician established a working group to consider what guidance should be offered to public bodies on the collection, disaggregation and use of data on sex and gender, of which Police Scotland were a member. The office of the Chief Statistician continues to engage with a range of public bodies, including Police Scotland, to support their application of the guidance. In addition, the Scottish Government have an Equality Data Improvement Programme in place to undertake wider work on data and we will be working with Justice bodies as part of that, to support improvements in the range of the equality information that is published.

The Scottish Government is currently funding two research projects into land values, landownership, and land use change, through the Environment, Natural Resources and Agriculture Strategic Research Programme (SRP) 2022-27. One is at the James Hutton Institute on supporting community engagement in land use decision-making. The second at Scotland’s Rural College, is on impacts of land-based funding mechanisms on land values, and related outcomes for landownership diversification and land use change. These are multi-year projects which will provide a range of outputs over the coming years to inform Scottish Government policy and the wider public debate. Details of all of the projects commissioned through the SRP will be published on the Scottish Government website by the end of June 2022.

In April 2022 the Scottish Land Commission also published research on Scotland's Rural Land Market which is available on their website https://www.landcommission.gov.scot/ .

The following formal flood protection schemes are complete.

The following schemes are at various stages of development but are not yet under construction:

Heat networks have an important role to play in meeting the targets set out in our Heat in Buildings Strategy, including contributing to ensuring that at least 1 million homes and the equivalent of 50,000 non-domestic buildings are connected to zero emission heating systems by 2030. Our climate change targets are supported by the Heat Networks (Scotland) Act 2021, which sets out a target of supplying 6 terawatt hours of thermal energy through heat networks by 2030.

Funded by the Scottish Government and West Dunbartonshire Council, the Queens Quay District Heat Network is already being held up as an excellent example, having won multiple industry awards. It’s important that the lessons learned and successes are carried forward to future heat network projects by the partners and contractors involved, including the Scottish Government. However, we should also remain open to other types of heating systems utilising other sources of heat, such as recovering waste heat, to ensure our heat networks are as efficient and affordable as possible.

We are providing a platform for this by increasing our investment in heat networks with the launch of the £300 million Scotland’s Heat Network Fund. The Fund offers long-term support to enable the rollout of new zero emission heat networks and aims to stimulate investment. We have recently launched Scotland’s Heat in Building Development Funding Invitation, making £1 million of pre-capital support available. This will close to new applications on 31 st May 2022. We recognise the importance of providing this development support and will establish a fuller heat network support unit later this year.

We recognise that our targets for heat network deployment will require a substantial growth in supply chains. Our significant investment through the Heat Network Fund will help kick start the supply chain in Scotland, creating high quality and green jobs.

The Heat Networks Delivery Plan, published March 2022, outlines further steps that the Scottish Government will take to accelerate the development of heat networks across Scotland. We will work with local government to put in place Local Heat and Energy Efficiency Strategies which identify areas particularly suitable for heat networks, and to designate heat network zones for development. We will also implement the Heat Networks (Scotland) Act 2021, putting in place a functioning regulatory regime by early 2024.

We would anticipate that industry will make extensive use of digital technology in delivering our Deposit Return Scheme (DRS), for example by developing an IT system to track payments made and received, adopting state-of-the-art reverse vending technology to prevent fraud, and using digital media to communicate with the public regarding DRS.

We are aware of the so-called ‘digital DRS’ as a proposed approach to delivering deposit return whereby consumers redeem deposits on scheme articles by scanning them with a smartphone before placing them in their kerbside recycling. We considered this approach during the policy-development process for DRS and the strong feedback from both industry and environmental NGOs was that the technology is not sufficiently mature for implementation on the timetable for our DRS.

We, and Circularity Scotland Ltd as scheme administrator, are monitoring developments including trials of ‘digital DRS’ in Wales. However, we are focussed on delivering a return-to-retail DRS, in line with international best practice, that will make it as easy to return a bottle or can as it was to buy it.