Chamber and committees

Scottish Government officials met with Police Scotland and Environmental Health Officers on 12 January 2023 regarding concerns related to the potential involvement of organised crime groups in the beauty/cosmetics sector.

The implications of the use of counterfeit and unlicensed beauty products is one of a number of issues under consideration as we consider further regulation of non-surgical cosmetic procedures.

The Scottish Government and its partners on the Serious Organised Crime Taskforce are committed to working together to disrupt any serious organised crime and the harm it causes to individuals and communities.

The Scottish Government is not responsible for taking action against any land occupiers who have received multiple Section 59 notices. It would be for SEPA or the local authority responsible for issuing the notices to determine whether or not any further action or investigation would be appropriate in relation to any ongoing activity on the land.

The Scottish Landfill Communities Fund has provided an important source of funding for community and environmental projects across Scotland.

The Scottish Government recognises that the forecast decline in Scottish Landfill Tax revenues, which reflect the policy intent to reduce the volume of waste sent to landfill, will reduce the contributions that landfill operators make to the Fund. We are therefore, in partnership with Revenue Scotland and the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency, carefully considering future arrangements for the Fund.

More broadly, the Scottish Government is committed to supporting local environmental projects through, for example, the growth of our national network of regional Community Climate Action Hubs. These hubs, which are supported by up to £5.5 million of funding in 2024-25, enable local communities to develop place-based approaches to reduce emissions and become more climate resilient.

There are no plans to review the monetary penalties at this time.

It should be noted however that SEPA continues develop relationships with relevant parties with the aim of taking a prevention-based approach, where penalties are viewed as a last resort.

Whilst fixed monetary penalties remain as one available enforcement measure, they are intended for lower-level offending. For more significant offending, SEPA also has the option of variable monetary penalties (with the current limit set at £40k) or it can recommend prosecution in serious cases to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.

SEPA collected around £ 4.8m in financial penalties in the financial year 2023-24.

The Scottish Government grant to the University of Glasgow for this purpose funds one PhD studentship and a number of small projects. The projects are currently at different stages, outputs from some of the projects are expected before the end of the year and all are expected to be completed by Spring 2025.

The successful candidate for the PhD studentship took up their post in January 2024 and the projects and PhD studentship are both wholly managed by the University of Glasgow.

As is standard with high quality research, it is anticipated that the findings will be published in relevant peer reviewed journals.

Scottish Government officials are currently undertaking scoping work with a variety of stakeholders including healthcare professionals (representatives from British College of Aesthetic Medicine and British Association of Cosmetic Nurses), hair and beauty industry representatives, Environmental Health Officers, Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS), and other UK Governments in order to bring forward proposals regarding the potential regulation of non-surgical cosmetic procedures.

The scoping work includes consideration of the levels of insurance, training, qualifications and supervision required to safely perform various types of non-surgical cosmetic procedures that pierce and penetrate the skin. This is to ensure that we get any potential future legislation right and that it is robust, flexible and future-proof to maintain pace with any new procedures in this fast changing sector.

We hope to be in a position to update Parliament on this shortly.

Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS) is represented on, and contributes to the discussions at the Scottish Cosmetic Interventions Expert Group, which meets regularly to discuss and advise the Scottish Government on options for the potential regulation of non-surgical cosmetic procedures in Scotland.

However, as a regulator, HIS only regulates independent clinics where services are provided by a medical practitioner, dental practitioner, registered nurse, registered midwife, dental care professional, pharmacist or pharmacy technician.

Scottish Government funding of over £2.5m has been committed to support the mental health and wellbeing of health and care staff in 2024-25. These resources include a 24/7 compassionate listening service, confidential mental health treatment through the Workforce Specialist Service and access to psychological therapies and interventions.

Prioritising these treatment and therapeutic programmes reflects our commitment to offer care and support to those staff suffering from stress, anxiety and other conditions. In addition, the National Wellbeing Hub offers a range of self-care wellbeing resources and signposting to relevant mental health and support services.

Information on how many (a) paediatric and (b) neonatal nurses have been employed by each NHS board, in each of the last five years, can be found on the TURAS NHS Education for Scotland workforce statistics site at:

NHS Scotland workforce (phase one) | Turas Data Intelligence (Employment over time tab)

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that we are able to manage more of our own waste within Scotland both for environmental and economic aims. As part of this, Scottish Government officials and Defra continue to engage regularly on matters regarding international waste exports, a reserved policy area. We are currently seeking confirmation from the new UK Government on its priorities for waste exports policy and continue to encourage Defra to build on work already undertaken to ban the export of plastic waste to non-OECD-countries, and will work closely with them on the development of this.

Through our Circular Economy and Waste Route Map consultation, we are actively progressing actions that we can take under devolved powers to boost Scotland's ability domestically to manage its waste and provide greater incentives for domestic reprocessing. This includes new co-designed recycling standards and consulting on a statutory duty on local authorities and others to report on the final destinations of collected material to increase transparency and strengthen public confidence in recycling services. We have also committed to publish a report on Scotland’s existing and planned domestic reprocessing infrastructure. This builds upon existing measures like extended producer responsibility schemes, and the £63 million-worth of investments made via the Recycling Improvement Fund to improve the quality and quantity of recycling collected.