Chamber and committees

The current Health and Social Care Standards were implemented on 1 April 2018 and are published on the Scottish Government website.

The Care Inspectorate is the independent scrutiny body and regulator for care services in Scotland. Since April 2018, the Health and Social Care standards have underpinned inspections and quality assurance functions carried out by the Care Inspectorate, Healthcare Improvement Scotland and other scrutiny bodies.

Two new standards were published in March 2022 and have a strong emphasis on helping care home residents and their families stay connected. We have provided additional support and resource to the Care Inspectorate (£276,000 over the next two years) to enhance their role in supporting visiting rights through the ‘Anne's Law and Connection for People in Care Homes project’. This additional resource will enable the Care Inspectorate to proactively champion the implementation of the new standards and rigorously monitor its progress.

The Scottish Government has worked closely with the Care Inspectorate and other public bodies as they have raised awareness and understanding of the Standards. “Real stories” videos and animations raising the profile of the standards are available through the Care Inspectorate’s YouTube channel. A one-day Holyrood event took place to help organisations understand how they can be used in delivering quality care and the Standards were promoted at a number of conferences and events, including targeted events for NHS staff. A dedicated website and a Scottish Government Twitter page were created and used to promote the launch of the Standards, and a bespoke booklet for unpaid carers was launched in partnership with the Carers Trust.

Skills Development Scotland (SDS) provide funding for Modern Apprenticeships (MAs) each financial year. There were 3,231 MA starts within the Construction & Related occupational grouping up to the end of quarter 2 in 2022-23, with MA year-end statistics for 2022-23 expected to be published in May 2023.

SDS recently undertook a reallocation process for MA starts as part of their usual contract management processes and several hundred starts have now been allocated to providers who requested additional starts and met the eligibility criteria, a proportion of which have gone to construction.

It is standard practice for SDS to review changing demand for apprenticeship starts in-year and adjust the number of starts allocated to respond as appropriate within budgets available. SDS will continue to follow this process and keep under review whether any additional starts can be allocated to providers within this financial year.

While we can be confident that the Scottish Greenhouse Gas Statistics publication for 2021 will be published by early June 2023, we can not provide a precise date at this time. The reason being that the publication date is agreed by officials in the four Nations of the UK following initial quality assurance of the draft greenhouse gas inventory dataset.

The publication date will be pre-announced on the Scottish Government website during the month before publication.

Listed public bodies subject to climate change duties under the Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009 are required to submit annual reports, including information on corporate carbon emissions and organisational emissions targets. The most recent analysis report was released in May 2022, based on data from reporting year 2020-21.

Emissions from heating, transport and electricity reduced by 5.8% in 2020-21 compared to the previous year, noting that at least part of this annual change will be attributable to the impact of pandemic response measures. Such emissions have decreased by 32.6% since mandatory reporting began for 2015-16.

Public bodies submitted reports for year 2021-22 in November 2022. Work to analyse these reports is underway and the annual summary analysis report is expected by the end of March 2022.

Skills Development Scotland (SDS) provides funding each financial year rather than academic year for Modern Apprenticeships (MAs) on behalf of the Scottish Government. Official statistics published by SDS on 8 November 2022 report there were 12,593 MA starts up to the end of Quarter 2 2022-23 with year-end statistics expected to be published in May 2023. SDS were asked in their Letter of Guidance to deliver at least 25,000 new apprenticeship starts this financial year as part of our commitment to build back up to 30,000 starts.

The Scottish Government funds the Scottish Flood Forum (SFF) to provide help to businesses and families in the event of flooding. They can offer advice, information and support to help those flooded – from advice on managing insurance claims, drying out, finding a builder, to protecting property from flooding.

The Scottish Welfare Fund helps families and people in Scotland who are on low incomes through Crisis Grants and Community Care Grants. Crisis Grants are available to those hit by crisis such as a flood. Applications can be made through local authorities.

Scottish Water does not maintain information by parliamentary region, however it is able to provide information for the closest equivalent area. For this large geographical area ( Argyll Islands, Argyll Mainland, Caithness, Fort William, Orkney, Ness, Shetland, Skye, West Coast & Western Isles ), it is estimated that total leakage levels were 47.2 Mega litres per day for December 2022.

Scottish Water does not maintain information by parliamentary region, however it is able to provide information for the closest equivalent area. There were 151 reports in December 2022 in this large geographical region ( Argyll Islands, Argyll Mainland, Caithness, Fort William, Orkney, Ness, Shetland, Skye, West Coast & Western Isles ), compared to 185 reports in December 2021. This would include both leaks reported by customers as well as those identified separately by Scottish Water as part of its active leakage management.

It is the responsibility of local authorities to develop and deliver flood protection schemes in Scotland. Since 2008, the Scottish Government has provided £42million/ yr through the general capital grant to support the delivery of flood risk management actions. The 2020 PfG also committed an additional £150 million over the course of this parliament.

Flood Risk Management Plans have been developed to reduce the devastating and costly impact of flooding in Scotland. The plans coordinate the efforts of all organisations that tackle flooding and concentrate the work to where the risk of flooding and benefits of investment are greatest. The 2015-2021 Plans included a number of flood protection schemes in the South Scotland region including in Hawick and Whitesands.

Flood Risk Management Plans for the period 2022-2028 were approved by Scottish Ministers in December 2021 and published by SEPA in January 2022. A COSLA/ Scottish Government Funding Working Group has been set up to discuss funding arrangements for flood risk management actions including those set out in the
‎ 2022-2028 plans. This group will put recommendations to the joint Scottish Government/COSLA officers’ Settlement Distribution Group. Ministers and Council Leaders’ will subsequently be provided with advice in 2023.

The Scottish Government and COSLA published ‘ Creating Hope Together , Scotland’s ten year suicide prevention strategy’ in September 2022 alongside an initial three year action plan. The development of the strategy and action plan involved engagement with key stakeholders, including those working across the further and higher education sector, as well as people with lived experience of suicide. The action plan includes a focus on developing tailored approaches to suicide prevention to meet the needs of different groups, and students are identified as one such group.

The Government is also currently developing a Student Mental Health Plan, due to publish in Spring 2023, which will complement ‘ Creating Hope Together’ and the Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy, which is due to publish in Spring 2023. The Student Mental Health Plan will provide a framework for action by universities and colleges.

The Student Mental Health Plan will be informed by key research, such as the Mental Health Foundation’s Thriving Learners Surveys and Universities UK’s ‘Suicide-safer universities’ resource. The development of the Plan is being driven forward by the Student Mental Health and Well Being Working Group, which I chair. Membership includes NUS Scotland, Think Positive, Universities Scotland and Colleges Scotland.