Chamber and committees

The Young Person’s Guarantee – Implementation Progress Report was published on 28 July and outlines the progress made against each of the initial recommendations within Youth Guarantee - No-one Left Behind: initial report, published on 2 September 2020. The progress report also provides an outline of the next steps against the commitments made in the supporting Activity Plan and is accompanied by the Key Performance Indicators, which are part of the broader Measurement and Evaluation Framework underpinning the Young Person’s Guarantee. The Framework will support our understanding of the impact of the Young Person’s Guarantee across a range of economic, education and equalities outcomes, enabling the targeting of future resource and to ensure that no young person is left behind.

As Minister for Higher Education, Further Education, Youth Employment and Training, I will be leading this work, alongside Sandy Begbie, partners and stakeholders to continue to build on progress to tackle youth unemployment and to improve the life chances of young people. This includes the delivery of relevant manifesto commitments contained within First Steps , which are to:

• Appoint a Minister specifically tasked with supporting youth employment;
• Invest £45 million through local partnerships to provide training and employer recruitment incentives;
• Fund colleges to deliver around 5,000 more short, industry-focussed courses to help young people train for jobs in key industries;
• Roll-out new school coordinators across the country to support young people access education, work, or training; and,
• Establish a new graduate internship scheme and increase places on volunteering and third sector programmes.

Scottish Government officials regularly meet with Alcohol and Drug Partnerships which allows for discussion on a wide range of issues as part of our shared commitment to reduce drug deaths.

Meetings with officials have taken place in May, June and July 2021. Most recently I met with Cathie Cowan, CEO of NHS Forth Valley, on 6 July discussing drug deaths, MAT implementation, Buvidal and workforce culture. I also met with Carol Chamberlain, Strategic Lead for South Lanarkshire ADP, on Wednesday 23 June as part of a joint meeting with stakeholders to discuss residential rehabilitation.

The next meeting with all ADPs is scheduled to take place in August 2021 and will focus on funding the national mission to reduce drugs deaths.

We give careful consideration to representations made by small producers regarding our proposals for Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme (DRS), including most recently in relation to the impact of COVID-19.

We believe that we have taken account of their concerns in our design for DRS, including by introducing an exemption from the annual £360 fee to register with SEPA for producers with a turnover of £85,000 or less.

As set out on page 52 of the Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment (BRIA) for Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme (DRS), we expect any impacts on the ability of smaller drinks producers to compete in the Scottish market to be minor. The BRIA is available here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/deposit-return-scheme-scotland-full-business-regulatory-impact-assessment-2/documents/ .

The Scottish Government continues to follow the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) guidance for the rollout of our vaccination programme.

The JCVI has from the start advised a rollout of COVID-19 vaccination targeting the most vulnerable first, resulting in an age based rollout, with the oldest, and those with conditions which make them susceptible to COVID-19 being offered vaccinations first.

COVID-19 vaccinations are now open to everyone over the age of 18, who can register for a vaccination online via NHS inform here : Registering for a coronavirus vaccine | The coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine (nhsinform.scot)

Health boards are now also offering drop in clinics, with no pre arranged appointment required. Details of which are different per board area, with further information available here : Vaccine drop-in clinics | The coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine (nhsinform.scot)

Scottish Government officials met with representatives of small drinks producers on 2 July 2021. We will consider their views alongside the findings of the Gateway Review into Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme.

The Scottish Government only collects school pupil attendance and absence information every 2 years, so no data is available for 2017-18. In addition, the structure and format of data gathered in 2018-19, as well as some partial data gathered in 2019-20 (due to the Covid pandemic) does not enable the necessary analysis to be undertaken to answer this question.

For the 2020-21 school year, the Scottish Government does have daily attendance and absence data that would enable such analysis to be undertaken. However, this could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

However, information we do have in relation to school pupil attendance and absence can be found here

Summary statistics for schools in Scotland no. 10: 2019 edition - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

Covid19ELCandHubs | Tableau Public

COVID19 - Schools and Childcare Information 2021 | Tableau Public

Coronavirus (COVID-19): daily data for Scotland - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

Coronavirus (COVID-19): trends in daily data - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

COVID-19 Education Recovery Group: children and young people infographic - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

This information includes the attendance and absence rates over the course of the entire 2020-21 school year (when schools were open for all pupils to return from specific stages).

It shows that attendance generally started at around 95% when schools fully reopened after a lockdown (i.e. August 2020 and April 2021).

On any given day, more children and young people were not in school due to non-Covid reasons, and that most pupils not in school due to Covid-related reasons was due to pupils being required to self-isolate. The actual number of pupils who were absent due to having tested positive for Covid (or displaying Covid symptoms) was generally under 1,000 pupils (out of approximately 700,000 pupils) on any given day over the course of the entire 2020-21 school year.

Since my appointment to the role of Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills I have had a number of introductory discussions with the Chief Examining Officer to develop my understanding of matters pertaining to the alternative certification model and to discuss issues being raised by stakeholders.

The meeting of 24 May informed my understanding of the ACM and the approach to 2021 appeals.

On the phone call of 3 June I discussed my priorities and the upcoming publication of the OECD review ahead of my Parliamentary Statement that day.

At the meeting of 24 June SQA were invited to share thoughts on the Reform of SQA and Education Scotland.

These meetings were informal and as a result no minutes were taken.

No. Absence rates for pupils were never 50% or greater when schools were fully open for all pupils during the 2020/21 school year.

The Scottish Government have published information in relation to school pupil attendance and absence throughout the 2020/21 school year, which can be found here:

COVID19 - Schools and Childcare Information 2021 | Tableau Public

Coronavirus (COVID-19): daily data for Scotland - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

Coronavirus (COVID-19): trends in daily data - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

COVID-19 Education Recovery Group: children and young people infographic - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

SEPA has not yet published information on its Compliance Assessment Scheme results for 2019 and expect to publish the results later this year. As such, no discussions have been held with SEPA or Ineos in relation to the assessment.

The draft result for Ineos Kinneil Terminal was included in the information stolen from SEPA in the cyber attack and was subsequently published in the press. The information stolen was an draft of this assessment - and had therefore not been subjected to all the necessary verification processes to finalise the assessment.

The Scottish Government does not have the information you require in a readily available format in order to answer this question. In order to answer your question would therefore incur disproportionate costs.

However, information we do have in relation to school pupil attendance and absence throughout the 2020/21 school year can be found here:

COVID19 - Schools and Childcare Information 2021 | Tableau Public

Coronavirus (COVID-19): daily data for Scotland - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

Coronavirus (COVID-19): trends in daily data - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

COVID-19 Education Recovery Group: children and young people infographic - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

This information shows the attendance and absence rates over the course of the entire 2020/21 school year (when schools were open for all pupils to return from specific stages).

It shows that attendance generally started at around 95% when schools fully reopened after a lockdown (i.e. August 2020 and April 2021). However, attendance rates slowly fell throughout each term.

However, on any given day, more children and young people were not in school due to non-Covid reasons, and that most pupils not in school due to Covid-related reasons was due to pupils being required to self-isolate. The actual number of pupils who were absent due to having tested positive for Covid (or displaying Covid symptoms) was generally under 1,000 pupils (out of approximately 700,000 pupils) on any given day over the course of the entire school year.