Chamber and committees

There will always be referrals to CAMHS that are not accepted as CAMHS only provide the right support for a small proportion of children and young people. Children who require neurodevelopmental support are not reported in these statistics unless they have co-morbid mental health issues, but may be included within total referral figures, leading to lower accepted referral rates in some Boards.

Public Health Scotland has started publishing data from the CAMHS and Psychological Therapies National Dataset (CAPTND), including referrals to CAMHS by sex, age and SIMD as well as reasons for referral not being accepted.

However, CAPTND is still under development, and any inferences or conclusions drawn from this data should be treated with caution. Work is ongoing between NHS Boards, Public Health Scotland, and the Scottish Government to improve the consistency and completeness of the information.

There will always be referrals to CAMHS that are not accepted as CAMHS only provide the right support for a small proportion of children and young people. Children who require neurodevelopmental support are not reported in these statistics unless they have co-morbid mental health issues, but may be included within total referral figures, leading to lower accepted referral rates in some Boards.

The National CAMHS specification includes a clear expectation that children and young people whose referral is not accepted for CAMHS are sensitively and appropriately signposted to a more suitable service, such as our community-based supports.

We have provided local authorities with over £65 million since 2020 to fund community-based mental health and wellbeing supports and services for children, young people and their families. This £15 million per annum funding will continue through the local government finance settlement from 2025-26.

We will continue to work with NHS Boards and partners to monitor the National Specification’s implementation, to improve services and support for children and young people and their families.

Due to the UK General Data Protection Regulation and the privacy policy agreed by applicants to the LEZ Support Fund, we are unable to disclose personal details of the funds recipients.

However, I can advise that in the Aberdeen area 197 households received grants with a total value of £464,688, 65 microbusinesses in the area received a further £140,000 for the disposal of a non-compliant vehicle and 2 microbusinesses received grants totalling £14,066 to retrofit vehicles to meet LEZ standards.

In the Dundee area 247 households received grants with a total value of £562,471 and 49 microbusinesses in the area received a total of £107,500 for the disposal of a non-compliant vehicle. No retrofit grants have been issued in the Dundee area.

In the Edinburgh area 794 households received grants with a total value of £1,879,604, 412 microbusinesses in the area received a total of £948,631 for the disposal of a non-compliant vehicle and 142 microbusinesses received grants totalling £1,118,852 to retrofit vehicles to meet LEZ standards.

In the Glasgow area 2048 households received grants with a total value of £4,777,931, 708 microbusinesses in the area received a further £1,597,350 for the disposal of a non-compliant vehicle and 411 microbusinesses received grants totalling £3,345,089 to retrofit vehicles to meet LEZ standards.

I refer the member to the answer to the question S6W-37322 on 19 May 2025. 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 Tobacco and Vapes Bill has now entered into committee stage in the House of Lords. Following the conclusion of the Bill’s passage through Westminster, we expect to consult on the extension of restrictions on smoke-free places.

The Scottish Government has not had any engagement with the Bank of England, regarding support to train and recruit more economics teachers in Scottish schools.

We are aware of the Bank of England’s new jointly funded initiative with the University of Manchester, which will see existing teachers offered training to deliver A Level economics alongside their core subject. We will note feedback as the pilot programme progresses and consider if there is applicable learning for the Scottish education sector.

Data on full-time equivalent (FTE) secondary teachers by main subject taught and Local Authority is available in the Teacher Census Supplementary Statistics, here:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/teacher-census-supplementary-statistics/

The information requested is set out in the following table:

It is not the policy of the Scottish Government to create a Scottish food agency. Following the manifesto commitment to set up a Scottish Food Agency, exploratory work was undertaken and the decision was taken not to proceed. Scotland Food & Drink and the Scotland Food & Drink Partnership bring together the key actors in food and drink in Scotland for collaboration, with excellent results.

The following table represents the total budget allocated to Food Standards Scotland (FSS) for each financial year from 2020-21.

Financial year FSS baseline Total Fiscal Resource budget £m

2020-21 15.6

2021-22 19.0

2022-23 22.6

2023-24 22.6

2024-25 22.6

2025-26 22.6

There was an uplift in the financial years 21-22 of £3.4 million and in year 22-23 of £3.6 million totalling £7 million. These uplifts were to fund additional responsibilities FSS were required to take on following the EU Exit.