Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government has a centrally-managed contract with Office Papers to supply newspapers on an ad-hoc rather than subscription basis. The contract allows for newspapers to be bought according to requirement and cancelled when not required, for example during Parliamentary recess.

On software subscriptions, the SG's IT Division, iTECS make use of tools such as our IT Service Management Tool and our Information Asset Tracker for monitoring software assets and purchases, which provides visibility into licence usage to manage compliance efficiently.

iTECS has an appointed licensing office whose role is to manage licencing, including taking regular audits of software and software usage to ensure compliance and value for money.

Software that is inadequately licenced, or out of vendor support, is removed from our network as its presence jeopardises our Cyber Essentials and other security accreditations we maintain.

Our central finance team also undertakes an annual exercise to track the continued usage of software assets to ensure that spend is current.

As explained in the answers to questions S6W-33501 and S6W-33502 on 28 January 2025, decisions on professional memberships, including assessing whether they deliver value for money, are made by senior staff in Directorates, Divisions and Departments. 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.

Whilst NHS Boards are encouraged to protect planned care, they must ensure that patients who require urgent care, including cancer treatment, are prioritised. In the case of Aberdeen Royal Infirmary patient cancellations have affected orthopaedic elective procedures. Where cancellations do take place, the large majority are routine procedures – although this should not underestimate the impact on the patient involved – and patients are rescheduled as quickly as possible.

To improve the availability of post-operative beds we are developing ‘Once for Scotland’ pathways, harnessing all opportunities to deliver patient care in the right place and closer to home, this includes maximising day case procedures to avoid any unnecessary stays in hospital.

This includes NHS Grampian’s bed base review to increase beds, which will reduce the need to board into planned care beds.

As part of our commitment for the decarbonisation of the Scottish Government vehicle fleet, our replacement policy since 2015 has been to consider the overall environmental impact of the fleet and actively reduce the emissions produced by replacing end of life petrol and diesel vehicles with zero or ultra-low emission alternatives where possible.

The total cost of gas and electric for Core Scottish Government buildings broken down by building type is:-

Number of hospital admissions of pedestrians injured is shown in the following table. The source is SMR01, Public Health Scotland, extract: January 2025.

The Scottish Government's use of official cars aligns with its environmental and sustainability targets through a focus on reducing emissions and promoting low-carbon transportation solutions. This includes key initiatives including the transition to low-emission and zero emission vehicles.

The Scottish Government is investing £60 million to renew play parks in Scotland, so children have access to free, high-quality outdoor play in their own communities.

Funding to support the Play Parks renewal programme has been allocated as follows:

2021-22 - £5 million

2022-23 - £5 million

2023-24 - £10 million

2024-25 - £15 million

The following table shows how much funding has been allocated to each local authority since 2021.

While no formal post-legislative review has yet to be undertaken, my officials have been informally monitoring the use of Experimental Traffic Regulation Orders (ETROs) by local authorities. Given the initial low uptake of ETROs following the legislative changes made it was felt that no formal review was required at that time.

Officials have advised that the scope of a review is currently being considered and that we plan to write to all local authorities to gather their views on the ETRO procedures within the next 4 months. It should be stressed that this review is often undertaken post-legislative change and would look at the numbers of ETROs brought in under the new legislation and any common issues local authorities are facing to help inform any further legislative change in the future. The review will not impact on the operation of existing ETROs or of TROs that are subsequently made under the current legislation.

Officials have also had a number of informal discussions with a number of local authorities who were in the initial stages of considering if an ETRO was suitable for various schemes. No specific record has been made of these conversations given that they are standard discussions between Transport Scotland and local authority officials

The Scottish Government agrees that research needs to be carried out in order to improve our collective understanding of all forms of childhood sexual abuse and exploitation. As such, we are continuously looking to improve local and national data and evidence around child protection, including child sexual exploitation. However, any data must be gathered in a manner that is appropriate, sensitive and minimises the risk of re-traumatisation of victims.

A National Child Protection Data Group has been established with members from the Scottish Government, Care Inspectorate and the Centre for Excellence for Children’s Care and Protection (CELCIS), which oversees this work and has developed a work plan for 2024-25.

In a joint effort, CELCIS, the Care Inspectorate and the Scottish Government has also developed a minimum data set for Child Protection Committees (CPCs), which is a ‘package’ of data collation, presentation, analysis, reporting and scrutiny supports to support child protection improvement, local planning and service development, and expanded analytical capacity.

In addition, a national dataset is published on an annual basis to support the publication of the Scottish Government’s annual children’s social work statistics. Data on prevalence of child sexual exploitation within child protection processes is included in this publication.

Childlight is also a global research centre of expertise on child sexual abuse based at the University of Edinburgh and has an aim of improving collection and use of data on child sexual abuse and exploitation (CSAE). Officials continue to engage the Centre on its work and Childlight is a member of the new National CSAE Strategic Group.

Additionally, progress continues to be made on data gathering and sharing by agencies in Scotland. Data on reported concerns about child abuse or neglect is collected by Police Scotland and reported nationally in a monthly dashboard, and this dataset is currently being extended to provide more in-depth analysis of characteristics and trends in abuse and exploitation. This will provide an improved understanding of prevalence of different forms of abuse, including child sexual abuse and exploitation.

However, we continue to consider opportunities to explore the scale and nature of child sexual abuse and exploitation.

As set out in answer S6W-32929 on 15 January 2025, the Scottish Government have confirmed that the replacement of the Eye Pavilion is a strategic priority and the 2025-26 Draft Budget has provided the necessary funding to allow the development of the business case to restart.

NHS Lothian’s Eye Pavilion replacement program had progressed to an Outline Business Case, the second of three approval stages, and therefore no Full Business Case or final estimate of costs has ever been produced.

We also do not yet have an updated cost estimate of a new eye hospital in Edinburgh, therefore it is not currently possible to answer this question. NHS Lothian are in the process of re-establishing the project team and will provide an updated forecast in due course.

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