Registers of Scotland is accountable to the Scottish Parliament and its performance is regularly scrutinised by the Economy and Fair Work Committee. The Scottish Government also receives regular reports on the progress RoS is making in delivery of its Corporate Plan 2022-2027 strategic objectives, which includes updates on the achievement against RoS’s Key Performance Indicators for its service performance (timeliness, quality and customer satisfaction).

I wrote to the UK Minister for Energy Consumers on 17 October 2024. Scottish Ministers proposed changes to the ECO4 scheme to enable ECO financed work to benefit from stronger management and quality control as part of local and national fuel poverty schemes in Scotland. Scottish Ministers emphasised the need to re-build public trust in the reliability of `government backed’ schemes, citing the inappropriate use of spray foam insulation in lofts as an example.

The UK Minister for Energy Consumers replied on 19 December to say that the UK Government was reviewing the current consumer protections in place for retrofit work and how they could be strengthened. They advised that any changes in their approach to consumer protection will form part of the UK Government’s Warm Homes Plan.

We will continue to press the UK Government to allow a better managed approach to ECO4 delivery in Scotland and request further details about any proposed changes to consumer protections.

The alcohol marketing review is being carried out as part of the remit of work Public Health Scotland (PHS) is already commissioned and funded to do. PHS is a national Special Health Board, funded by the Scottish Government to work collaboratively, focusing on increasing healthy life expectancy and reducing premature mortality.

The Scottish Government is aware that, since April 2024, there has been ongoing supply issues with the availability of naloxegol (Moventig®) tablets. On 25 April 2024, the Scottish Government issued a Medicines Supply Alert Notice to NHS Scotland on the availability of naloxegol (Moventig®) tablets. Medicines Supply Alert Notices are circulated to Medical Directors and Directors of Pharmacy across all Health Boards including national Health Boards (such as NHS National Services Scotland) for onward dissemination to healthcare professionals. Community Pharmacy Scotland also receive a copy of the Medicines Supply Alert Notices for onward dissemination across their network.

The Scottish Government meets with the Scottish Ambulance Service regularly to discuss demand, capacity, and pressures. Since escalating to REAP level four the Service has been submitting twice daily situational reports on pressures and we have been meeting with their operations Director on a frequent basis.

The First Minister has also Chaired several meetings to discuss NHS pressures more widely which were attended by SAS and other key partners.

The Scottish Ambulance Service has implemented a number of actions to mitigate the effects of pressures throughout the healthcare system over the past few weeks and continues to maintain its focus on improving response times to patients.

The Resuscitation Research Group’s PADmap web portal is expected to go live by Spring 2025. PADmap will provide organisations and communities with more evidence on the optimal location to place their defibrillators in order to increase their potential impact.

The Women’s Health Plan set out actions which aim to address women’s health inequalities by raising awareness around women’s health, improving access to health care for women across their lives, and reducing inequalities in health outcomes for women and girls.

We have taken specific action through the Plan to support practitioners providing care to women accessing their service including commissioning NHS Education for Scotland to create bespoke training packages on menstrual health and menopause for general practice and others working in Primary Care.

In addition, our ‘Women's experiences of discrimination and the impact on health’ report was published on 27 June 2023. The report examines the current evidence base on women's health inequalities and reports on a two-phase research project. The findings in this project contribute to the evidence base on women's health inequalities, discrimination and young women through in-depth exploration of women in Scotland's intersectional experiences. The findings from this report will inform the next phase of the Women’s Health Plan.

Our ambition is that ‘women and girls enjoy the best possible health, throughout their lives’. This remains the ambition of the Scottish Government, and will continue to be our guiding principle as we consider the next phase of the Women’s Health Plan.

Our Women’s Health Plan 2021 - 2024 Final Report on progress provides further details of our work to date.

The Scottish Government works closely with the Scottish Library and Information Council (SLIC), which provides leadership and advice to Scottish Ministers, local authorities, and the wider libraries sector.

In 2024-2025 we have provided the Scottish Library and Information Council (SLIC) with £665K from the Culture Budget, as recognition of the importance of our public libraries, and to support the excellent services they provide. In the 2025-26 budget the Scottish Library and Information Council (SLIC) have been allocated £935K from the culture budget.

Public library policy is devolved to local authorities, they have a statutory duty to ensure there is adequate provision of library services for their residents.

The Scottish Government provided block grant funding of over £14 billion to Local Authorities in 2024-25, a real terms increase of 2.5 per cent. The 2025-26 Scottish Budget, published on 4 December 2024 provides local government in Scotland with record funding of over £15 billion, an increase of over £1 billion or a real terms increase of 4.7% compared to 2024-25.

Any decision around public libraries and other local services must be considered extremely carefully. We strongly encourage local authorities to work in partnership with communities to explore ways of delivering services, based on need.

National Planning Framework 4 (NPF4) places climate and nature at the centre of our planning system and makes clear our support for all forms of renewable, low-carbon and zero emission technologies. Potential impacts on communities and individual dwellings are important considerations in the decision-making process and all applications are subject to site-specific assessments. Local Development Plans should seek to realise their area’s full potential for electricity and heat from renewable, low carbon and zero emission sources by identifying a range of opportunities for energy development.

All planning applications must be determined in accordance with the statutory development plan unless material considerations indicate otherwise. For any given area of Scotland this consists of the National Planning Framework and the relevant Local Development Plan(s). If there is a conflict between the policies in NPF4 and Local Development Plans in making any planning decision, the most recently adopted prevails.

When determining applications made under the Electricity Act 1989, representations from community councils and members of the public are taken into account.

We are building on our legally binding commitment to just transition principles by developing Just Transition Plans for specific sectors. Our latest Programme for Government sets out our intention to publish Just Transition Plans for energy, transport, built environment and construction, and land use and agriculture. We are staggering the publication of these sectoral plans, to ensure that sufficient time and focus is dedicated to each. We are proposing to publish Just Transition Plans for transport, and land use and agriculture in early 2025, and will develop plans for the remaining sectors subsequently.