Chamber and committees

This information is not held centrally.

The Roads (Scotland) Act 1984 places statutory responsibility for local roads, including structures, improvements, maintenance and repair with local roads authorities. As such it is the responsibility of the local authority to determine how best to meet its duties on local roads in their respective areas including the format of public reporting and no formal guidance is issued on this matter.

The recruitment and deployment of Police Officers is a matter for the Chief Constable, who along with the Scottish Police Authority, will continue to ensure the capability and capacity of Police Scotland to improve the safety and wellbeing of people, places and communities in Scotland.

We currently have 31 officers per 10,000 population in Scotland compared to around 24 in England and Wales and despite constraints on Scotland’s public services through a decade of UK austerity, policing services have been maintained and improved.

On 2 August the HMICS published its Assurance Review of Police Scotland’s Strategic Workforce Plan and I look forward to discussing the recommendations with both Police Scotland and the Scottish Police Authority.

Scottish Ministers cannot commission the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) to consider changes to the Shortage Occupation List (SOL).

The Scottish Government responded to recent reviews of the SOL with detailed evidence on labour market shortages and how the SOL could more suitably meet Scotland’s distinct needs. We also provided evidence calling for the permanent addition of social care roles to the SOL with key roles subsequently added to the List as per the MAC’s recommendation.

Scotland has distinct population challenges, the January NRS population projections reinforce the need for a migration policy tailored to our needs. We remain dependant on a UK Government immigration system that fails to address Scotland’s distinct demographic, labour market and economic challenges. We need a responsive system that allows us to decide how to accommodate our distinct labour market needs.

Given the changes to the UK immigration system, the role of the SOL must be reviewed so that there is clarity as to its purpose and benefits. The Scottish Government must also be given a formal role in determining occupational shortages in Scotland.

Transport Scotland are continuing to consult with local authorities and others to develop both the secondary legislation required to allow them to enforce the National pavement parking prohibition and the Parking Standards Guidance, which will underpin the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019.

Additionally we have been consulting with the public on some areas contained within secondary legislation where local authorities will need to undertake an assessment to consider whether they wish to exempt, subject to certain criteria, any areas of pavement from the prohibition. The analysis report of the responses to this consultation, which closed on 11 March, is available to view at https://consult.gov.scot/transport-scotland/scotlands-pavement-parking-prohibitions/ .
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As such, the majority of the secondary legislation is likely to be in place by late 2022, including those giving local authorities the powers to exempt sections of pavement. We have always stated that we will give local authorities 12 months to assess their streets and get the required signs and lines in place following the completion of those exemption regulations.

Some other aspects of the implementation process, such as the powers to issue Penalty Charge Notices and a drivers right to appeal such a notice, will not be in place until early in December 2023.

It is the statutory responsibility of local authorities to manage their school estate. Therefore, it is for them to determine what facilities are appropriate, while complying with the School Premises Regulations and in full consultation with the school community.

In August 2021, the Scottish Government published Supporting transgender young people in schools: guidance for Scottish schools. This guidance sets out the position on support for and provision of single-sex spaces within Scottish schools.

Our Learning Estate Strategy, which sets out the strategic approach for managing Scotland’s school estate, makes clear that good consultation about learning environments, direct engagement with learners and communities about their needs and experiences, and an involvement in decision making processes should lead to better outcomes for all.

The Scottish Government does not collect the information requested .

The Transport (Scotland) Act 2019 introduced a discretionary power for local authorities to implement workplace parking licencing (WPL) schemes. It will be for local authorities to decide whether they wish to implement WPL locally and to shape proposals to suit local circumstances.

The Workplace Parking Licensing (Scotland) Regulations 2022 require local authorities to notify Scottish Ministers when publishing notification of a scheme proposal. There is no requirement for local authorities to register their interest in introducing a WPL scheme with Scottish Ministers before they have formally published a scheme proposal (such as during initial scoping or exploration of a scheme).

While no notifications of scheme proposals have yet been received, I am aware that local authorities may be considering how best to use the new powers. For example, the City of Edinburgh Council has included plans to take forward a WPL scheme as part of its published City Mobility Plan 2021-2030 and have recently re-affirmed that they will continue exploration of such a scheme. I am also aware that WPL is under consideration in Glasgow as part of their Local Transport Strategy policy framework.

Recent modelling work predicts that the climate envelope of suitability for giant hogweed in north-west Europe will shift north in the next three decades (Anibaba et al., 2022). The model suggests that Scotland will remain climatically suitable for giant hogweed until at least 2050. Parts of the west coast may become less suitable due to milder winters by 2100.

In 2012, a team based at Biomathematics and Statistics Scotland (BIOSS) modelled the potential for further invasion by giant hogweed in Great Britain (Catterall et al. in 2012). The model predicts that between 2020 and 2030 giant hogweed will be found in a further twenty-seven 10km squares where it has not been recorded previously. The paper does not include predictions for 2040 but the results of the modelling suggests that giant hogweed will continue to colonise further areas beyond 2030.

However, a significant amount of work is being carried out across Scotland to control invasive non-native plants including giant hogweed. The Scottish Invasive Species Initiative is a 5-year partnership project tackling invasive non-native species including giant hogweed alongside rivers and water courses in an area of 29,500 square kilometres within northern Scotland - over a third of Scotland. The project is funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, NatureScot and through in-kind support from project partners and volunteers. The total project value is approximately £3.24M.

The Tweed Invasives project was set up by the Tweed Forum to tackle invasive plants, including giant hogweed, along 300 miles of the River Tweed and its tributaries. The project is funded jointly through the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development and the Scottish Government’s Biodiversity Challenge Fund. Between 2019 and 2021, the Biodiversity Challenge Fund has provided around £300,000 to support catchment-based control of invasive plants on the rivers Tweed and Endrick.

In September 2021, at CoP26, Scottish Ministers announced that the Nature Restoration Fund would provide £65 million for projects that benefit nature to be funded through this Parliamentary session. Habitat and species restoration, and eradication of invasive non-native species are among the types of projects that can apply for grants funding, including for projects lasting up to three years.

The Scottish Government is committed to reviewing non-domestic rates policies on a regular basis, in order to ensure that the rates system effectively supports our businesses and communities, and regularly attends the Scottish Rating Surveyor Forum and the Scottish Ratepayer Forum to discuss the operation of the non-domestic rates system with sectoral experts and their professional representatives.

In August 2017, the final report of the independent Barclay Review of non-domestic rates was published. This review made 30 recommendations to support economic growth, improve ratepayer experience and administration of the system, and to increase fairness and ensure a level playing field.

The Scottish Government accepted the majority of these recommendations in the Implementation Plan published in December 2017, and the final reforms are scheduled to come into force in 2023 alongside the revaluation. To ensure the recommendations were delivered effectively, the Scottish Government established an independent advisory group to provide advice to Ministers on the details of implementation.

The passage of the Non-Domestic Rates (Scotland) Act 2020 provided an opportunity for parliamentary scrutiny of the recommendations, and a number of the key recommendations of the Barclay Review have since been replicated by the UK Government following their Business Rates Review which was published in October 2021.

More recently, we commissioned an independent evaluation of the Small Business Bonus Scheme relief, and an independent review of small-scale hydro plant and machinery . The findings of these reviews, which have been published, provide an independent assessment of key elements of the non-domestic rates system.