Chamber and committees

Transport Scotland collects and uses a range of data on transport from a variety of sources. These incorporate collection methods that remained relatively unaffected by the COVID-19 pandemic, such as automated traffic counters, recorded ticket purchases, and other operational data.

Throughout the pandemic period, Transport Scotland published a range of data regarding travel, providing an ongoing insight into the impact of the pandemic ( https://www.transport.gov.scot/coronavirus-covid-19/analysis/ ).

The key survey source for transport data is the Scottish Household Survey (SHS). The SHS collects a range of data on people’s transport and travel habits in Scotland, including a record of all the journeys they made the day before the survey interview.

Due to COVID-19 restrictions, the survey was adapted in 2020 and 2021, including a change from face-to-face interviewing to telephone. However, since 2022, the SHS has returned to being a face-to-face interview, primarily administered in people’s homes. The survey is operated using an established methodology and collects data from a representative sample of around 10,000 Scottish Households.

It is not possible to provide information on staffing costs for this work because in line with usual practice, details of individual tasks carried out by civil servants, including the number of hours spent on them, are not routinely recorded as there is no business need to do that.

We have previously answered two FOIs on website visits to the Building a New Scotland Papers:

• Unique online visitor statistics: FOI release - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)
• Building a New Scotland webpage visitors: FOI release - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

Paper title: Citizenship in an independent Scotland

Main paper URL: https://www.gov.scot/publications/building-new-scotland-citizenship-independent-scotland/

Main paper publish date: 27-7-2023

Main paper views in first month (all pages): 32,144

Easy read URL: https://www.gov.scot/publications/building-new-scotland-citizenship-independent-scotland-easy-read/

Easy read publish date: 27-7-2023

Easy read views or download link clicks in first month: 1,186

Audio URL: https://soundcloud.com/scotgov/building-a-new-scotland-citizenship-in-an-independent-scotland-summary-audio-version

Audio publish date: 27-7-2023

Audio link clicks in first month: 31

Community language landing page URL: https://www.gov.scot/publications/building-new-scotland-citizenship-independent-scotland/documents/

Translation publish date: 27-7-2023

Translation downloads in first month:

Arabic: 42

Bengalii: 8

Bulgarian: 9

Cantonese: 42

French: 30

Gaelic: 27

Hindi: 13

Italian: 18

Mandarin: 69

Polish: 9

Punjabi: 9

Romanian: 6

Russian: 10

Spanish: 22

Ukrainian: 13

Urdu: 43

BSL YouTube Link : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5WndkF6tnw

Date BSL Version Published: 27-7-2023

Views in first 30 days : 28

The funding provided in the Autumn Statement fell far short of what we need. Instead, the Autumn Statement delivered a real terms reduction in the total block grant.

The Tourism budget sits within the Wellbeing Economy, Fair Work and Energy portfolio which saw reductions of £98m (7.2%), requiring difficult decisions on prioritisations.

In recognition of their role in supporting economic recovery and growth in the visitor economy, we have prioritised funding for VisitScotland to the extent possible given the extremely challenging settlement.

As the national tourism organisation VisitScotland remain committed to driving the visitor economy and growing its value to Scotland. In delivering this, they recognise that consumer behaviour and the needs of businesses in both the tourism and events sectors have changed, particularly since Covid and in an increasingly digital world.

To adapt to this new landscape, VisitScotland anticipate making some changes to the way they deliver some of their activities to be even more efficient and effective. In light of the budget announcement, the pace of these changes will likely need to be accelerated.

VisitScotland will continue to focus their efforts on driving the visitor economy through their work on marketing, events, destination development and business advice and support.

The external costs associated with the production and publication of the paper ‘ Renewing democracy through independence’ were published in the answer to question S6W-11002 on 23 September 2022. Additionally, there were launch costs for travel, for staff and external attendees, a BSL interpreter and audio visual equipment which totalled £1718.60. 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 .

Our analytics tool logs only record 13 months of data for PDF downloads, so we do not have the data for the translations of this paper as they were published out with this period.

We have previously answered two FOIs on website visits to the Building a New Scotland Papers:

• Unique online visitor statistics: FOI release - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)
• Building a New Scotland webpage visitors: FOI release - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

Paper title: A stronger economy with independence

Main paper URL: https://www.gov.scot/publications/building-new-scotland-stronger-economy-independence/

Main paper publish date: 17-10-2022

Main paper views in first month (all pages): 77,787

Easy read URL : https://www.gov.scot/publications/building-new-scotland-stronger-economy-independence-easy-read-version/

Easy read publish date: 27-7-2023

Easy read views or download link clicks in first month: 254

Audio URL: https://soundcloud.com/scotgov/a-stronger-economy-with-independence-summary-audio-version

Audio publish date : 17-10-2022

Audio link clicks in first month: 409

Community language landing page URL : https://www.gov.scot/publications/building-new-scotland-stronger-economy-independence-summary/documents/

Translation publish date: 17-10-2022

Translation downloads in first month: Historic data not available for this period for downloads

BSL YouTube Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_TGJzVEXD0

Date BSL Version Published: 17-10-2022

Views in first 30 days: 102

The external costs associated with the production and publication of the paper ‘Independence in the Modern World. Wealthier, Happier, Fairer: Why not Scotland?’ were published in the answer to question S6W-11001 on 23 September 2022. Additionally, there were launch costs for travel, for staff and external attendees, a BSL interpreter and audio visual equipment which totalled £1647.80. 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 external costs associated with the production and publication of the paper ‘ Migration to Scotland after independence’ were published in the answer to question S6W-22829 on 21 November 2023. Additionally, there were launch costs for travel, for staff and external attendees, catering and venue hire, which totalled £1,443.47. 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 Highland Council worked closely with CalMac, the contractor RJ MacLeod and CMAL during and after the vessel berthing trial on the 14 December 2023 when the issue with the new restraint bollards arose. An additional bollard to aid vessel operations was installed. Following a successful vessel berthing trial ferry services on the route resumed on Friday 22 December 2023.

We do not hold data on how many places were available in STEM subjects at College in each of the last 10 years.

Funded places are not allocated to specific subjects, it is within the remit of colleges to distribute places to the set of subjects they each offer.

The Scottish Funding Council (SFC) collect and publish data each year on College enrolments. This included providing college enrolment data for 2014-15 to 2020-21 for the ‘STEM education and training strategy - refresh: annual report’. This is available in the background data at the following link:

STEM education and training strategy - refresh: annual report - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)