Chamber and committees

The Endometriosis Advisory Group (EAG) was established to support the action in the Women’s Health Plan to strengthen collaborative working between regional specialist endometriosis centres, territorial and special NHS boards and primary care providers, to drive improvement in patient pathways and achieve equitable access to care and treatment.

The EAG first met in April 2022 and have since been involved in communications on an ad hoc basis to assist in the understanding of the systems currently in place for endometriosis, from education to current practice and pathways.

As per previous years, in order to lessen the burden on NHS teams over the winter period from November 2022 to the end of February 2023 we commenced a light touch process to help monitor and prioritise communications. After this period of time we will reinstate communication and meetings with the EAG.

The EAG offer their expert advice and knowledge to help inform and guide policy processes and as such there is no formal findings or report which the EAG has produced.

Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS) is well placed to assist with the implementation of the Scottish Government policy to expand the range and size of the beaver population within Scotland over the next 10 years.

It is working closely with colleagues in Scottish Government land agencies, partners, and landowners/managers with an interest in actively expanding the beaver population into new areas within Scotland.

FLS is an active member of the newly formed Beaver Advisory Group, which has replaced the Scottish Beaver Forum.

The final report of the independent group chaired by Professor Elizabeth Aston, was published today https://www.gov.scot/ISBN/978-1-80525-352-5 .

The final report has been published alongside five associated reports that helped contribute to the Group’s work. The final report confirms that Scotland is in a strong position to seize the opportunity to become world leading in adopting a rights-based, ethical, evidence-based, consultative approach to innovation and adoption of emerging technologies in policing.

The Scottish Government’s response to the report has also been published today www.gov.scot/publications/emerging-technologies-in-policing-report-scottish-government-response

The Scottish Government stands ready to work with policing stakeholders on how they plan to follow up the recommendations made by the Group. This will enable the Scottish Government to continue to work with policing bodies to ensure that new technology will be used in ways which help in the detection and prosecution of crime, as well as protecting our communities first and foremost.

The consultation document will be published on Scottish Forestry’s website on 22 February at 10:00 am. The consultation will be open for 12 weeks. I would welcome all those interested in the future of forestry in Scotland to respond.

Skills Development Scotland deliver careers services to all 358 publicly funded secondary schools in Scotland.

The following details the number of people employed by the requested organisations in each period asked for:

Applications for warrants of entry are dealt with by the courts. The information requested is not held centrally. The Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service have established a working group to review the process for dealing with utility warrants, including the data recorded, with a view to improving the information currently available.

The statistical release on Ukraine Sponsorship Scheme expressions of interest data reconciliation exercise was published by the Scottish Government on 17 February 2023: https://www.gov.scot/publications/ukraine-sponsorship-scheme-in-scotland-expressions-of-interest-data-reconciliation-exercise-february-2023/ . This is a one-time ad-hoc release of management information and does not constitute an Official Statistics or National Statistics release.

The Cost of Living National Performance indicator is disaggregated by disability on the National Performance Framework Data Explorer. It was last updated on 3 Feb 2023 with the 2018-21 data, showing that disabled people spent 34% of their income on housing, fuel and food compared to 23% of income among non-disabled people. As this data precedes the cost of living crisis, Scottish Government published an analytical report on the available cost of living evidence on 2 November 2022. The report includes a summary of available evidence on disabled people’s costs. We know that disabled people often incur additional living costs and are disproportionally affected by the cost crisis, with evidence of higher prices for energy bills, food, and fuel costs. The Scottish Government provides a range of disability benefits to help disabled people and those with long-term conditions. Disability benefits are designed to provide financial support to disabled people to mitigate the additional costs of living with a disability or health condition. The Scottish Government is uprating disability assistance by 10.1% in April 2023, in line with the September CPI inflation rate. We are currently working with Disabled People’s Organisations and their members to develop a new Disability Equality Strategy in 2023. The cost crisis and disability poverty have been identified as key areas of focus in this strategy.

Analysis has been undertaken to estimate how many guests on MS Ambition will likely be matched into longer term accommodation based on the availability of hosted and Responsible Social Landlord properties in Glasgow and the surrounding areas. Analysis into the availability of accommodation for guests disembarking MS Ambition remains ongoing and is being revised as new data becomes available via the monitoring of the disembarkation process.