Chamber and committees

Waste management and collections are the responsibility of local authorities and they are best placed to make decisions regarding the provision of waste and recycling services in their area. As democratically elected bodies it would not be appropriate for Scottish Ministers to get involved in the day to day running of Scottish Councils.

We continue to work closely with local authorities, COSLA and other partners to support waste reduction, increased reuse and recycling and responsible waste management. This includes making our first investments from the £70m Recycling Improvement Fund to support local authorities in improving recycling infrastructure, and developing a route map to help achieve our 2025 targets and beyond. We are also working with local government to review the Household Recycling Charter’s Code of Practice, to help make it easier for householders to recycle the right things and encourage high levels of citizen participation in waste prevention, recycling, and reuse.

The COVID-19 Education Surveillance dashboard is updated and published every week by Public Health Scotland and includes weekly data on the rate of COVID-19 PCR testing among children and young people of educational age (2-19 years), the number and rate of positive cases and the percentage of tests taken that are positive.

These figures are not broken down to the level of individual school, and there is an overlap between the age groups and the type of school where nearly all 5-11 and 12-15 are primary and secondary school pupils respectively, and 16-17 year olds a more mixed group.

However, the number of individuals who tested positive for COVID-19 by PCR test at the end of August, compared to w/e 10 October were as follows:

Age range (yrs)   W/E 30 August     W/E 10 October

5-11       12     3151

12-15       20     1905

16-17       12     382

I intend to write to the Education, Children and Young People’s Committee later in October with a fuller update on local authority progress with regard to CO2 monitoring and ventilation in school buildings. At this point in time, I can confirm the following:

A) The Scottish Government confirmed a total of £10m funding allocations to local authorities in its grant letter on 14 October 2021. The funding allocations for all local authorities have been agreed and grant payments will be made in line with standard processes and timelines. Local authorities have confirmed that they have been progressing purchases of CO2 monitors on the basis of confirmed funding allocations. We plan to request formal confirmation that all funding provided has been, or will be, used for the specified purposes at a later date.

B) The following table shows the breakdown of how the £10m funding was allocated to each local authority. We do not hold a detailed breakdown of how each local authority will spend their allocation. However the grant letter to local authorities states that the funding should only be used for specified purposes, including the purchase of CO2 monitors, associated additional staffing costs, and to contribute to any remedial action identified as being necessary following CO2 monitoring.

The Turnaround Director of Ferguson Marine, updated the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee on the delivery timetable for vessels 801 and 802 on 30 September 2021. The delivery date for MV Glen Sannox remains the same as was reported in the Turnaround Directors June 2021 update to the committee, between July 2022 and September 2022.

No visits have been made to night club premises on this topic. Discussions on vaccine certification have been, and continue to be, conducted with sector representatives remotely, the latest of which took place with Ministers on 12 October 2021.

Following previous calls from stakeholders, I carefully considered the position and concluded that there was no way to reopen, or widen out grounds for appeal for the 2020 appeals process in a fair and equitable manner to all learners.

This decision was announced via a parliamentary question on 21 June 2021 and can be found at: https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers/question?ref=S6W-00913 .

The EHRC’s findings refer to historic omissions at the SQA. Learners can be assured that SQA complied with its equalities duties regarding the awarding of National Qualifications over the last two years including those relating to the 2020 appeals process.

This information is not held centrally.

SEPA’s Waste Data Flow website contains data on the amount of waste prepared for reuse by each Local Authority.

From 2017 to the end of 2021 we have received a total of £194.8m in EU Exit preparation consequentials.

Spend, both in preparation and post-EU Exit, has been on staff supporting activities such as legislative preparations, and supporting stakeholders and partners, including businesses, cultural bodies, higher education institutes, local government and the third sector.

We have consistently targeted our spending responsibly and appropriately to mitigate against the negative impacts of exiting the EU and we have allocated our spend to deal with the concurrent impacts of Covid and EU exit.

We currently have no plans to amend the existing waiting times standards although recovering our NHS and improving waiting times for patients is a top priority for this Government.

In response to the pressures on NHS services caused by the pandemic the NHS Recovery Plan was launched on 25 August 2021. The Plan which is backed by more than £1 billion of investment, sets out the Scottish Government’s key headline ambitions and actions to be developed and delivered now and over the next 5 years. While recovery is the immediate task, the Plan is fundamentally about ensuring that the process of recovery focusses on alternative pathways of care that allow people to be treated sooner and closer to home .

Through the £463 million Digital Scotland Superfast Broadband (DSSB) programme we delivered fibre broadband to over 951,500 premises across Scotland with over 841,600 of those now capable of accessing superfast speeds of 30 Megabits per second (Mbps). Of these, over 27,000 fibre connections have been delivered in North Ayrshire.

Through the Reaching 100% (R100) programme we will build upon this by delivering universal access to superfast broadband, regardless of remoteness or rurality – including rural communities in North Ayrshire.

Through a combination of the £600 million R100 contracts, the R100 Scottish Broadband Voucher Scheme (R100 SBVS) and continued commercial coverage we will ensure that anyone who wants a superfast connection of 30Mbps and above by the end of 2021 can have one.