Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government is committed to dualling the A9 between Perth and Inverness. We have underlined this commitment by commencing procurement of construction the section of the A9 between Tomatin and Moy. The procurement for this £115M section commenced with publication of a contract notice on the Public Contracts Scotland Portal on 19 August 2021, and the contract for construction is expected to be awarded in the second half of 2022.

Design work is progressing well with the statutory process well underway for seven of the remaining eight schemes. Made orders for two adjoining schemes, Glen Garry to Dalwhinnie and Dalwhinnie to Crubenmore were published on 30 July 2021. An additional two schemes, Tay Crossing to Ballinluig and Pitlochry to Killiecrankie, are due to be published in the coming weeks. The only section not to have started the statutory process is between Pass of Birnam and Tay Crossing, which was the subject of a co-creative process with the local community. Work is currently underway to identify the preferred route for this section.

A market consultation exercise commenced earlier this year to inform assessment of procurement options for remaining sections when the statutory processes are complete. Determination of the optimal procurement option is a complex exercise which is considering a pipeline of work in a form that can be delivered by the industry, supports the economic recovery post COVID and minimises disruption to users if this lifeline route.

It is expected this analysis will be completed in the coming weeks and will inform decision making on our procurement approach and phasing.

All planning applications are required to be determined in accordance with the relevant development plan unless material planning considerations justify a departure from the development plan.

Whilst it is for decision makers to decide what considerations are material to, and what weight to attach to each consideration in, the determination of a planning application, Scottish Government Planning Policy is a significant material consideration in the planning system.

Currently, our National Planning Framework 3 and Scottish Planning Policy aim to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and facilitate adaptation to climate change. Responding to the global climate emergency is at the heart of the preparation of National Planning Framework 4, that we will lay in Parliament and consult on widely this autumn.

The information requested is held by Caledonian Maritime Assets Ltd who considers this to be commercially sensitive and that its release could make it more challenging to achieve value for money for Scottish taxpayers. In addition the Scottish Government could potentially be held responsible for any detrimental effect to the market value of the those vessels that remain available, should it be known it had decided against their purchase.

The first six-monthly update report on the progress of the pipeline of projects and programmes within the new five-year Infrastructure Investment Plan will be provided to Parliament in autumn 2021. The first full annual progress report of the Plan will be provided to Parliament in spring 2022.

As we have done in previous years, the Scottish Government flew the Red Ensign from its main buildings on 3 September as a sign of respect and recognition of the sacrifices made by our Merchant Navy Seafarers. In addition, we issued social media via the Scottish Government’s Veterans account to raise awareness of the key role played by the men and women of the Merchant Navy both today and throughout its illustrious history.

The proportion of the total estimated Scottish Government investment at Annex D of the Infrastructure Investment Plan between 2021-22 to 2025-2026 in relation to a) utility networks, b) transport and c) digital communications is 8.7%, 27.2% and 5.4% respectively.

Further details relating to this estimated five-year planned investment are contained within the following table noting that gas and electricity network policy and regulation as well as digital infrastructure is reserved to the UK Government. The Low Carbon Infrastructure Transition Programme (LCITP) funding covers a range of projects relating to low carbon infrastructure, some of which include heat networks. For the purposes of this answer, the full LCITP allocation has been included within the table as it is not currently possible to say what share is dedicated to utility networks.

Transport Scotland remains committed to working with key industry partners to achieve, by 2026, the 20 minutes journey time saving between Aberdeen and Edinburgh (average journey time of 2 hours 10 minutes for express services). This outcome was agreed at the final meeting of the Aberdeen to Central Belt Reference Group.

The Reference Group also endorsed a service specification, previously set out in Network Rail’s 2016 Scotland Rail Study of:

1. an average journey time of 1 hour 10 minutes or less for inter-city services between Aberdeen and Dundee;

2. an average journey time of 2 hours 30 minutes or less for inter-city services between Aberdeen and Glasgow;

3. half-hourly services from local stations into Aberdeen and Dundee during peak times;

4. an hourly stopping service between Aberdeen and Dundee; and

5. new freight paths.

There were two specific reasons for the £4.1 million reduction. The 2021-22 budget maintained all existing funding commitments. The Other Arts budget continues to maintain support for important ongoing commitments such as Scottish Screen, the Youth Music Initiative, and our major Festivals.

The first reason was that no provision was made for loans under the Financial Transactions (FT) mechanism as there was no requirement for FTs to be administered by Creative Scotland in 2021-22. This has resulted in a £1.09m decrease.

The second change was in relation to the ‘Other Arts’ line where revenue funding fell by £3.17m year on year. The decrease of £3.1 million was due to a technical change agreed with Creative Scotland, whereby Scottish Government moved £3.1 million of grant funding for Regularly Funded Organisations into 2020-21 from 2021-22. This enabled Creative Scotland to carry over the National Lottery funding in to 2021-22, therefore over the two years Scottish Government is maintaining funding. Creative Scotland confirmed in a statement on 28 January 2021 that they would honour their Regularly Funded Organisations commitment to 2021-22.

The management of deer and invasive non-native species are fundamental to our efforts in tackling the twin challenges of climate change and biodiversity loss. Action to address threats to native woodland condition is being taken on a number of fronts, in particular to address key threats such as overgrazing and invasive species, principally Rhododendron .

While NatureScot and other public bodies take an operational lead supporting the control of invasive non-native plants in priority areas, the main responsibility for the management of invasive non-native species rests with landowners. The Scottish Government makes funding available for rhododendron control projects under the Scottish Rural Development Programme’s (SRDP) Forestry Grant Scheme (FGS). To date more than £730,000 has been committed for this purpose.

Scottish Forestry (SF) has worked with NatureScot to develop ‘ An approach to prioritising rhododendron control in Scotland ’ which encourages landscape-scale partnership work and helps guide funding to those areas where it will achieve the greatest benefit to biodiversity.

Since 2011 Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS) has undertaken rhododendron control in forests, mainly in protected areas. FLS’s future rhododendron control will be co-ordinated with the Alliance for Scotland’s Rainforest and other land managers, with the aim of achieving effective long-term control at a landscape scale.

Addressing overgrazing by deer in woodland has been identified as one of the six Strategic Priorities for ‘ Scotland’s Wild Deer: A National Approach’ . This will require Government departments and agencies to work together with land managers to implement actions using a mixture of incentive and regulation to improve the health of our woodlands.

An independent review by the Deer Working Group into the management of wild deer sets out 99 recommendations to improve the management of wild deer in Scotland, including a number of legislative changes. The Scottish Government has set out our commitment to take forward recommendations in this parliamentary term.

SF offer a number of grants through the FGS that support the management of ecosystems. This includes support to restore plantations to native woodland and active management to expand native woodlands through natural regeneration.

Trees for Life are surveying Caledonian Pinewood remnants on Scotland’s national forests and land and FLS will develop a programme of management to address the threats it identifies.

The contract notice for the third section of the A9 to be dualled, Tomatin to Moy, was published on the Public Contracts Scotland portal on 19 August 2021. We anticipate the contract for this section to be awarded in the second half of 2022 with construction work starting thereafter.

It is also expected that the procurement process for the A737 Improvements at Beith project will commence later in 2021-22.