Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government has no current plans to introduce any new targets for waiting times for community mental health support over and above those already in place for child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) and psychological therapy.

In February we announced an additional £120 million for a Recovery & Renewal Fund to ensure the delivery of the commitments set out in the Mental Health Transition & Recovery Plan. The Fund will support the development of an integrated culture of mental wellbeing and prevention within local communities and across Scotland, and promote the capacity and role of third sector organisations to deliver this.

We are committed to improving access to community mental health and wellbeing support. This year we have provided local authorities with an additional £15 Million to fund over 200 new and enhanced supports and services for children and young people.

These services are guided by a Framework, developed by the Scottish Government and COSLA chaired Children and Young People’s Mental Health and Wellbeing Programme Board, and now overseen by the Joint Delivery Board.

A key part of the Framework is to ensure access to services is as easy as possible so children, young people and their families get the right support at the right time without delay.

Community supports and services should work closely with CAMHS and relevant health and social care partners, children’s services and educational establishments to ensure that there are clear and streamlined pathways to support. Services should also be accessible via self-referral, and the hours of operation not solely 9-5 or weekdays.

The Children and Young People’s Mental Health and Wellbeing Joint Delivery Board are currently evaluating the impact of these community mental health services.

Charges for National Qualifications have remained unchanged since 2012-13 despite changes in costs. While charges contribute towards the cost of awarding National Qualifications they do not cover the full costs. In addition, 2020 and 2021 late entry fees have been waived and there have been no charges for appeals. There are therefore no plans to reimburse National Qualifications payments.

For 2021, SQA estimates that the costs of providing certification for national qualifications was £41.7m, while income from local authorities, colleges and independent schools is expected to be £30.5m. The remaining cost is covered by SQA’s grant in aid budget from the Scottish Government.

Under the terms of the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) between the UK and EU the Scottish Government is unable to set subsidy rules that restrict support solely to domestic manufacturers. Scotland is bound by TCA and World Trade Organisation rules as is the rest of the UK.

Arrangements have been made so that the settlement of these costs will not affect the operational effectiveness of COPFS, and will not require to be met from the COPFS resource budget allocation.

Any overall funding changes required to support expenditure come from careful budget management across the Scottish Government budget. Budget transfers are reported to Parliament as part of the Autumn and Spring Budget revisions.

The 2019-20 Programme for Government outlined our commitment to phase out the need for all petrol or diesel cars in the public sector fleet by 2025 and for all other new petrol and diesel vehicles by 2030.

Crown office and Procurator Fiscals office (COPFS) is committed to moving its entire fleet to zero emission vehicles by 2025, has begun to install EV charging stations and will purchase its first zero emission vehicles before the end of the financial year.

In 2016, SEPA developed and implemented an automated tool to capture and summarise commercial and industrial waste data from data returns. This automation reduces errors and allows revision of historical data to account for resubmissions of data more easily.

We are working with SEPA and other governments and regulators in the UK to develop and implement an electronic waste tracking system. This will provide a step change in the quality and timeliness of waste data. A joint consultation on the implementation of a mandatory electronic waste tracking system is planned for autumn on behalf of all four nations of the UK.

Since 2016 - which is when a specific food waste support programme came in - up to April 2021, approx. £1.23 million has been spent.

Table 1 also provides a breakdown of Scottish Government’s advertising spend targeted at food waste prevention and reduction since 2013.

This information is publically available through the SEPA Recyclate Quality Reporting Tool, which can be accessed here: https://informatics.sepa.org.uk/RecyclateQuality/

The tool presents data from samples taken from material streams entering and exiting material recovery facilities (MFRs). The tool reports the percentage of materials collected that are considered to be ‘target’ materials for recycling.

In April 2019, we published the Waste Markets Study which assessed the treatment options for Scottish biodegradable municipal waste. The study is available here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/waste-markets-study-full-report/

We have also commissioned work to assess the residual waste treatment capacity needs up to 2025, in light of our commitment to end the practice of landfilling biodegradable municipal waste by 2025. This work is ongoing and we will publish it in due course.

The Scottish Government has committed to extend the Connecting Scotland programme over the course of this Parliament to reach a total of 300,000 people. Work is underway to scope the future service, including how best to reach priority groups who we know are most likely to be digitally excluded, including refugees and asylum seekers.