In October 2021 I launched the Communities Mental Health and Wellbeing Fund for adults, providing an initial £15 million to support small scale, community mental health and wellbeing activities. In light of the very positive response to the Fund, and the number of high quality bids received, in February I provided an additional £6 million for this work in financial year 2021-22.

Since the launch of the Fund, the Scottish Government has worked with the 32 Third Sector Interface organisations across Scotland to support hundreds of grass roots, community groups to deliver programmes for adults which tackle priority issues such as suicide prevention, social isolation and loneliness.

Projects are being funded across the whole of Scotland, supporting activities involving sport, nature, the arts and community cafes. There is a clear focus on people who are more vulnerable and in need, including those facing social isolation, refugees, the LGBTQ+ community, and carers.

Officials are currently collating learning from year one of the Fund, which will be used to inform a further £15 million investment in the coming year.

On April the 1st, ScotRail passenger services were successfully brought into public ownership. This move now offers us the opportunity to take the right actions to make rail travel more sustainable, affordable and accessible for the people of Scotland.

Affordable rail travel, including a consideration of peak rail fares, will be considered by the Fair Fares review. This review will seek to consider the affordability of public transport across the network, whilst also considering how journeys can be better connected through integrated ticketing, for example. In the context of the cost of living crisis it is absolutely essential that all Governments consider how to support an affordable public transport network.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-07557 on 19 April 2022. 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 Scottish Government has not commissioned Strathesk Resolutions to undertake a mediation process between employers and trade unions.

The organisation has undertaken a Lessons Learned exercise to identify factors that have led to dispute in the college sector in recent years, and has provided recommendations on the future operations of national bargaining in Scotland.

The report, alongside the Scottish Government's response, will be published in due course.

It is an existing criminal offence to knowingly make a false statutory declaration and the Bill creates a new offence of knowingly making a false application for legal gender recognition. The maximum penalty for these offences is imprisonment for up to 2 years or an unlimited fine, or both.

There is provision in the Bill for a person with an interest in a Gender Recognition Certificate, such as the Registrar General to make an application to the Sheriff for revocation of a GRC on the grounds that it was fraudulently obtained. For example, the Registrar General may receive information that would have led to the refusal of the application or a person may make it known they have submitted a false application.

As with any criminal offence, it would be a matter for the police, the procurator fiscal and the courts to demonstrate and determine where an offence has been committed.

The Scottish Government welcomes the publication of the IEA’s 10-Point Plan to Cut Oil Use as a useful contribution to ongoing global policy development on net zero and energy sector volatility. It contains a range of actions which can be taken by consumers, businesses and public sector actors. The IEA report asserts that if adopted in full by all advanced economies, it would reduce consumption by 2.7 million barrels a day within the next four months, relative to current levels. The publication underlines the importance of reducing the need for private car travel, which the Scottish Government is addressing through our target to reduce car kilometres by 20% by 2030 – a truly world-leading commitment. Our route map to achieving this commitment was published in January and provides a framework for people to choose alternatives to car journeys, including sustainable online options; choosing local destinations; switching to walking, wheeling, cycling or public transport where possible; and to combine a trip or share a journey.

The Scottish Government’s position is clear that unlimited extraction of fossil fuels is not consistent with our climate obligations and we have consistently called on the UK Government, to urgently re-assess all approved oil licenses where drilling has not yet commenced against, our climate commitments. By refusing to recognise this, whilst demonstrating a failure of leadership to support an acceleration of low carbon heating and home energy efficiency measures, the UK Government’s new Energy Security Strategy has completely failed to take into account the agreements made at COP26, particularly in view of the UK’s continuing role as COP president in the run up to COP27, advice from its own statutory advisors, and the most recent alarming report from the UN’s IPCC. In Scotland, we will continue to focus on reducing reliance on fossil fuels and our overall energy demand while accelerating the deployment of renewable energy, creating a true just transition for our existing workforce and a greener, fairer future for everyone.

The Scottish Government collects information on the use of temporary accommodation (associated with homelessness applications). The HL2 data collection provides aggregate snapshot data on the number of households in temporary accommodation at the end of each quarter.

However, the Scottish Government does not collect data on the availability of temporary accommodation or stock in each local authority over and above what is in use. It is for local authorities to have an understanding of their stock, and that of their partners, which enables them to determine what could potentially be used as temporary accommodation when required.

The HL2 data is available for all local authorities from 2002 to 2021. Table 26 of the main tables associated with the most recent Homelessness in Scotland annual publication provides data for the number of households in temporary accommodation as at 31 March, by local authority, which will be a very close proxy for households in temporary accommodation on 29 March.

The bi-annual publication Homelessness in Scotland: update to 30 September 2021 provides additional quarterly figures from 31 st March 2019 to 30 September 2021 – Table 14 of the associated tables. This is the latest data available.

Data up to 31 March 2022 will be published on the homelessness statistics webpage in Summer 2022, although the publication date is not yet known.

The audit trail here is a matter of public record. Advice was put to the then Cabinet Secretary Keith Brown on 20 August 2015, setting out CMAL’s identification of FMEL as the preferred bidder. Advice was also put to the then Minister for Transport and Islands on 7 October 2015, setting out risk associated with contract award in the absence of a guarantee, and mitigation that would be put in place.

The memos to Ministers mentioned have been in the public domain since 2019 and can be found at the following link: Ferguson Marine: key documents - 2015 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

There was no Ministerial direction in relation to the contract award and Ministers did not direct CMAL to enter into the contract. The contract was awarded by CMAL in its capacity as procuring authority following a robust procurement process.

While CMAL did express concerns about the absence of a refund guarantee, mitigations were agreed that were sufficient to assuage those concerns.