The public consultation referred to in the debate on 8 January 2026 will be published in the coming weeks. It will be open for responses up to, including and after the pre-election period with the exact closing date yet to be set. It will be for the administration in place after the May 2026 election to consider any next steps arising from the consultation as part of the administration's assessment of priorities.

For the years 2010-11 to 2024-25 the Scottish Government’s school estates data collection makes a distinction between schools built and those refurbished, while for the years 2007-08 to 2009-10 no such distinction was made in the data collection.

Table 1 provides statistics on the number of schools built/refurbished by sector in each local authority between 2007-08 and 2009-10.

Statistics on the number of schools built by sector and local authority since 2010-11 are provided in Table 2, while Table 3 provides the corresponding statistics for refurbished schools.

Across all years, only schools where the total cost of the works (build or refurbishment) was £500,000 or more for primary schools or £1 million or more for secondary and special schools are included.

The Scottish Government welcomes Audit Scotland’s report and has asked the Collaborative Response and Assurance Group, which is co-c-haired by the Scottish Government and COSLA, to come together to consider the recommendations as a whole and to develop a partnership approach to addressing them. The Scottish Government has begun this work and is engaging with key partners to discuss the delivery of Powers of Attorney and Guardianship processes.

This work is still at an early stage. As such, the form that the Group’s work will ultimately take, and the timescales for its completion, have not yet been determined. The Scottish Government will provide further updates as this work progresses.

Regulation of veterinary medicines is a reserved matter for the UK Government. The Veterinary Medicines Directorate is responsible for enforcing Veterinary Medicines Regulations and undertaking appropriate monitoring in fulfilment of their regulatory duties. Therefore, the Scottish Government does not have plans to implement a dedicated single public dataset covering site-level use of veterinary-medicines across all production phases.

Information required by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) on monthly medicinal treatment usage by site is already made publicly available on Scotland’s Aquaculture Website on a quarterly basis. Sea lice medicine, Hydrogen Peroxide and antibiotic use are available datasets.

Regulation of veterinary medicines is a reserved matter for the UK Government. The Veterinary Medicines Directorate is responsible for enforcing Veterinary Medicines Regulations and undertaking appropriate monitoring in fulfilment of their regulatory duties.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-43099 on 23 January 2026. 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 regulation of veterinary medicines as a reserved matter for the UK Government and the Veterinary Medicines Directorate (VMD) is responsible for market authorisation of antibiotics, including publication of antibiotic sales and sectorial usage statistics, and surveillance of antimicrobial resistance.

The VMD publish antibiotic sales and usage figures annually in the Veterinary Antimicrobial Resistance Sales and Surveillance (VARSS) Report. Figures for antibiotics sales figures, including aquaculture, are provided by the veterinary pharmaceutical companies marketing these products to the VMD, and this is a statutory requirement. The VARSS report also includes data on usage in different animal sectors, including fish, and the VMD works in partnership with various animal sectors to develop, facilitate and coordinate antibiotic usage data collection systems. These data are reported on a voluntary basis.

For the purpose of environmental protection, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) places licence conditions on marine fish farm operators to record and report antibiotic treatments to SEPA, including the product and volume used. The requirement for enforcement action associated with non-compliance in returns is assessed in line with SEPA’s enforcement approach.

While Adult Disability Payment and Personal Independence Payment are both benefits which provide money to help disabled people, they are underpinned by different principles and approaches. Direct comparisons should be treated with caution.

The 2026-27 budget has not yet been passed by Parliament and is at draft stage. Spending plans are still being developed by policy leads but provisionally the budget will deliver £245.1 million for the Primary Care Fund which pays for various programmes and initiatives supporting general practice delivery e.g. the board employed multidisciplinary teams and GP walk-in service pilots among other measures.

The Scottish Government unequivocally condemns the abuse experienced by children and young people at the Ladyfield psychiatric unit for children. We offer our full and unreserved apology and recognise the courage of survivors in coming forward to share their experiences. Ladyfield was examined during Phase 9 of the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry’s public hearings, and the Inquiry’s findings are awaited. The Scottish Government continues to fully participate in the Inquiry process.

The following table provides a breakdown of the local authority areas that Just Transition Fund projects are located in – including projects from Financial Years 2022-23 to 2025-26. Some of the projects further distribute the funding to project partners, and where this is the case, this is indicated in the table: