Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government continues to strive towards developing a sustainable healthcare workforce in NHS Scotland. This is why we have established a Nursing and Midwifery Taskforce (NMT), which works collaboratively with a range of stakeholders including the RCN. The NMT will publish its recommended actions early in the New Year.

It is worth noting that workforce statistics experience seasonal variation so looking at the data over the last 6 months will include figures from the end of the financial year where we expect to see a decline in the workforce as staff are more likely to retire at this time. This will be followed by an increase in the September release, as we have seen, following an influx of students joining the workforce.

The Scottish Government highly values youth work in Scotland. The Scottish Government published its budget for 2025-26 on 4 December 2024. Scottish Government budgets are published on an annual basis and information can be found here: https://www.gov.scot/budget/

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-31342 on 26 November 2024. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.

The Scottish Government highly values youth work and continues to fund youth work across Scotland in a variety of ways. Local Authorities are required to provide adequate and efficient Community Learning and Development (CLD), which includes youth work, as set out in the Requirements for Community Learning and Development (Scotland) Regulations 2013. In line with the Verity House Agreement, Local Authorities have the autonomy to allocate resources to meet the specific needs of young people in their areas.

In addition to the block grant given to Local Authorities, the Scottish Government directly funds a range of youth work initiatives, projects and programmes. These initiatives aim to support diverse youth work models, promote partnership working and enhance the quality of youth work.

Further to the published answer to question S6W-31416 there were 35 students who had not taken up a GPST post in Scotland (including three still in foundation training).

The data below indicates the destination of these students:

Guidance on enforcement powers for local authorities in the Building (Scotland) Act 2003 is provided in the Building Standards Enforcement Handbook and the Building Standards Procedural Handbook. The National Planning Framework 4 states that development proposals for the demolition of listed buildings will not be supported unless it has been demonstrated that there are exceptional circumstances and that all reasonable efforts have been made to retain, reuse and/or adapt the listed building.

A local authority will rely on evidence from a survey carried out by a structural engineer to advise on all options that minimise the extent of any demolition work. A local authority may engage an accredited conservation engineer on a case by case basis following advice from the structural engineer.

The Scottish Government has published its estimates of the direct costs to the Scottish public sector from the employers NI change, looking across our health and social care services, education providers, the third sector and others. We have shared those costs with the Treasury and have asked it for urgent clarification on the level of compensation that Scotland will receive.

If the chancellor does not fund that in full, it could be, that despite costs of more than £700 million across all sectors, at best £380 million would be forthcoming; leaving a shortfall of around £400 million. We continue to press for clarification.

The Scottish Government does not hold this information.

The Agri-Environment Climate Scheme (AECS) was launched in 2015 to promote land management practices which protect and enhance Scotland’s natural heritage, improve water quality, manage flood risk and mitigate and adapt to climate change.

To date over £317 million has been committed to 3,342 businesses to fund a range of activities that help to maintain and enhance our rich and varied natural environment.

An annual breakdown of the funding issued has been provided in the following table.

The Scottish Government highly values youth work in Scotland. Local Authorities are required to provide adequate and efficient Community Learning and Development (CLD), which includes youth work, as set out in the Requirements for Community Learning and Development (Scotland) Regulations 2013. In line with the Verity House Agreement, Local Authorities have the autonomy to allocate resources to meet the specific needs of young people in their areas.

These regulations require that a CLD plan is produced every three years by each education authority. Current CLD plans covering period 2024-2027 can be found on Local Authority websites. As the regulations set out the duties at a local level, the Scottish Government does not collate information on youth work organisations.