Chamber and committees

Launched in August 2021, the Green Jobs Workforce Academy provides an important step in preparing our current and future workforce for green careers. Through the online resource, individuals can access information and careers advice on green jobs and the skills required to enter into or progress in them, and identify courses and funding available to support their upskilling or retraining. While the Academy is online, through greenjobs.scot individuals can access a range of virtual and in-person training opportunities.

The Energy Saving Trust maintains the Renewable Heat Database for the Scottish Government. The following table extracts domestic renewable heat installations over the period 2016-2020. Data for 2021 are not yet available. These data are derived from registrations under the Microgeneration Certification Scheme, and as such likely underestimate the total number of installations due to lower coverage of new build homes.

During Eating Disorder Awareness Week 2022, we welcomed the training offer that Beat, the UK’s eating disorder charity, has developed to ensure that our future workforce feels confident to support anyone who comes forward with concerns about disordered eating. We are pleased to see that all our medical schools in Scotland are in discussions with Beat to deliver eating disorder training, or are already delivering it.

We were also pleased to announce additional funding for Beat which includes Beyond the Symptoms Training for GPs and healthcare professionals, which will support them to identify when a patient has an eating disorder, and confidently intervene early. This training will be available from April.

The Independent Review into the delivery of Forensic Mental Health Services in Scotland, published at the end of February 2021, made 67 recommendations for improvements to the delivery of forensic mental health services, including several on community forensic mental health.

The Scottish Government supports the recommendations of the review, agrees that community provision is a crucial component of the forensic mental health system and that forensic community mental health teams are key to supporting mental wellbeing in the community. Recommendations 18 and 19 of the Review recommend that work be undertaken to define the service remit of community forensic mental health teams and to ensure they are appropriately resourced to meet demand. The Forensic Mental Health Services Managed Care Network is gathering information on current provision to establish a baseline to take this work forward.

The Scottish Government does not collect or hold this information. You may wish to contact the Scottish Housing Regulator who collect a range of information from all social landlords as part of their Annual Return on the Scottish Social Housing Charter or individual Local Authorities.

Due to the local elections period, it is expected that the national rail conversation will get underway after 5 May local elections. Decisions on a more definitive timescale will be arrived at when agreement has been reached with Trade Union partners and other interested stakeholders.

It is envisaged that the national conversation will engage a wide ranging group of stakeholders including passengers, regional transport partnerships, rail unions, disability groups, businesses and educational interests.

Transport Scotland officials are currently considering the details on the most effective and productive engagement programme to deliver the national rail conversation.

The Scottish Government takes seriously the responsibility to ensure those going through the criminal justice system with mental health issues are appropriately supported, treated and cared for, while ensuring their rights are being maintained, especially during these challenging times that may have a significant impact on people’s mental wellbeing.

A new national standard for Psychological Services and Therapies, which will describe what good quality psychological care looks like, is currently under development with a publication date of Summer 2022. This will include describing the provision of care in forensic and prison services. This will help ensure that Psychological Therapy services and therapies are delivered and measured in equitable ways across the prison estate in Scotland.

The Scottish Government has invested £9 million in 2021-22 for Psychological services in Scotland to grow the Applied Psychology, and Psychological Therapies workforce. Further funding will be provided for 2022-23 to support services to provide Psychological care to all clinical areas of care detailed in the Psychological Services and Therapies standard.

The National Strategy for Economic Transformation sets out our vision to make Scotland a world-class entrepreneurial nation that encourages, promotes and celebrates entrepreneurial activity in every sector of our economy. The strategy’s programme for action details how we will make Scotland one of the best countries to start and grow a business.

We will shortly publish a refreshed Town centre Action plan and City Centre Recovery Taskforce report to support action to revitalise town and city centres respectively, and we have provided £80 million Covid Economic Recovery funding to local authorities to consider the needs of local businesses, communities and households and to target support to maximise economic recovery in their areas.

In August we announced the Scotland Loves Local Programme. The aim is to encourage people to support their local businesses and communities, to build wealth in local communities, revitalising town, city and neighbourhood centres and increasing footfall.

We have provided over £1.85 million additional support for Business Improvement Districts since the start of the pandemic, with a further £500,000 for 2021-22.

Increasing the number of people living in town centres was one of the themes in the Scottish Government's Town Centre Action Plan (TCAP) and is also one of the recommendations made by the independent review of TCAP 'A New future for Scotland's Town Centres', which was published in February 2021. We are working with COSLA and partners to respond to the review with a revised action plan which will be published later in the spring.

The Draft national Planning Framework 4 contains a new policy, dedicated to town centre living, calling on planning authorities to proactively encourage and support opportunities for town centre living.

Our Housing to 2040 strategy puts ambitions for place at its core, investing in town centres and making it easier for homes to be at the heart of thriving communities by: investing in a rolling programme of demonstrator locations, providing expertise, resources and matched funding to help illustrate what future Town Centre Living and 20 minute neighbourhood models can look like. We will also continue to support partners through our Affordable Housing Supply Programme to deliver affordable housing in town centres where this has been identified as a strategic priority.

Psychological Therapies (PT) delivered in any service setting is already included within the 18-week PT waiting time standard and delivery of PT in forensic services should be counted in the PT standard. This is not consistently happening at the moment and to help ensure that services deliver and measure Psychological Therapies across in a more standardised way across Scotland a new national standard for Psychological Services and Therapies is currently under development with a publication date of Summer 2022.

Additionally, in order to ensure consistency in the quality of service delivery across Scotland, Scottish Government has worked with NHS Education for Scotland (NES) to produce the Psychological Therapies 'Matrix' - a stepped guide to planning and delivering evidence-based psychological therapies within NHS Boards in Scotland. Matrix - A guide to delivering evidence-based psychological (scot.nhs.uk)

The Matrix is published by NES, in partnership with the Scottish Government and provides a summary of the information on the current evidence base for various therapeutic approaches, guidance on well-functioning psychological therapies services, and advice on important governance issues.