Chamber and committees

I can advise Parliament, that today, I’m launching the roll out of a new National Planning Skills Commitment Plan. This involves a co-ordinated skills and recruitment drive for the planning sector, being led by the Scottish Government and underpinned by a partnership approach across the built and natural environment. Over 100 people, across almost 60 organisations, will collectively contribute to the delivery of the Commitment Plan.

Delivery will take place through a range of actions to be progressed for, and by, people from a broad range of sectors and interests. In supporting skills development, industry representatives are contributing their time and knowledge to participate. The Commitment Plan also adopts a more direct approach to recruitment to attract the next generation of planning professionals. That will include steps to help modernise the image and reputation of the planning profession, as a positive force for delivery of investment in the high quality development that Scotland needs now and for years to come.

Taking forward the committed actions, each month will have a dedicated theme for both skills development and recruitment. For example, in March 2025, housing is the key focus topic for training through webinars and hands-on learning. Meanwhile, to boost future recruitment, the Scottish Government is currently taking forward a Future Planners scheme, for 18 Post Graduates, and is about to launch an expanded Bursary programme, trebling the number from 10, last year, to 30 this year.

I believe that all sectors have a vital role to play in addressing the skills and capacity challenges in planning. Professionals are moving forward with a shared ambition to strengthen resilience across Scotland’s planning system and public services.

Details of the National Planning Skills Commitment Plan

https://www.ourplace.scot/resource/training-and-recruitment-opportunities.

Performance management procedures in place for Senior Civil Servants and for Civil Servants at delegated grades, are regularly reviewed and include procedure in relation to management of poor performance and dismissal.

While workforce and terms and conditions of employment for Scottish Government civil servants are delegated to Scottish Ministers, the terms and conditions of Senior Civil Servants (SCS) are reserved to the UK Government and any changes made by UK Ministers and their application will be considered by Scottish Ministers in due course.

The Scottish Government does not hold this information because the statutory responsibility for managing and maintaining the school estate rests with local authorities.

However, through the £2bn Learning Estate Investment Programme, the Scottish Government will provide local authorities with substantial funding support to modernise their school estate, and also includes replacements for schools which were significantly damaged by deliberate fires. For example, we will provide funding support of £25.8m for a replacement Peebles High School in the Scottish Borders, and £40.2m for the new Greenfield Academy in Dundee which will replace Braeview Academy and Craigie High School.

It is important that we work closely with leaders in the Psychiatry profession to address the challenges they are currently facing and the Psychiatry Recruitment and Retention Working Group are currently working towards producing a series of recommendations which will be presented to Ministers in Spring 2025.

Whilst the working group has been ongoing, the Scottish Government has worked in partnership with the profession on a range of measures to support recruitment and retention in psychiatry. This has included funding and supporting recruitment stands at the Royal College of Psychiatrists (RCPsych) international congress events (2023 and 2024); working with NHS Education for Scotland (NES) colleagues on improvements to psychiatry webpages to increase engagement and on the promotion of vacancies; ensuring that the specific challenges facing psychiatry were considered by the Medical Locums Task and Finish Group and; supporting the Centre for Workforce Supply (CWS) in their direct work with NHS Health Boards to address challenges in filling vacancies and on the promotion of careers in Scotland.

We also continue to work with NES and the RCPsych to encourage medical students to consider a long-term career as a psychiatrist. This work includes the Choose Psychiatry campaign, undergraduate taster sessions and improved psychiatric placements at Foundation level. Recruitment into Core Psychiatry has improved drastically in recent years, with the exception of one unfilled post in 2020, 100% of entry level posts have now been filled for the fourth consecutive year (up from 63% in 2018).

The regulation of manmade materials and chemicals that are present or can be used in the production of construction materials is complex and largely reserved to UK Government. The Construction Products Regulation lays down rules to ensure products perform to a designated standard and is being revised by UK Government. This will introduce a requirement for construction products to be safe, create a safety critical list of products, and strengthen existing market surveillance and enforcement powers.

Scottish Government provides funding to Construction innovation centre BE-ST1. A 2023 report2 commissioned by Zero Waste Scotland and BE-ST that looked at the availability, performance, manufacturing supply chains and market analysis of Natural Fibre and Circular Insulation options also considered adverse effects for people from available manmade insultation materials.

1https://www.be-st.build/

2 https://www.be-st.build/media/d4gdyucy/sustainable-insulation-products-in-the-scottish-construction-industry.pdf

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that all people living with gastrointestinal conditions and symptoms in Scotland are able to access the best possible care and support, and benefit from healthcare services that are safe, effective and put people at the centre of their care.

Information and guidance on gastrointestinal conditions and symptoms such as Inflammatory Bowel Disease including crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis is already widely available to the public via the NHS Inform website: Scottish health information you can trust | NHS inform and we have no plans to commit to a campaign at this time.

Following our declaration of a national housing emergency in May last year, we set out a response plan to focus in the short term on housing supply. This includes delivering more high quality, permanent homes - growing the economy and supporting affordable housing as a vital public service through increased private and public sector investment across all housing tenures.

The 2025-26 budget allocation of £768m represents an increase of over £200m when compared to the original 2024-25 published budget of £556m. This investment will help tackle the housing emergency while contributing towards our target of 110,000 affordable homes by 2032.

Alongside our Housing Emergency response work, the Housing Investment Taskforce will identify actions that will unlock both existing and new commitments to investment in housing – across all tenures – by bringing together key interests of investors and investees.

There are strong legislative protections that protect tenants living in the private rented sector, including the right to seek an independent adjudication of a rent increase.

It is critical that tenants are aware of their rights. We have therefore launched another wave of our Renters Rights Campaign to support private tenants understand their housing rights and exercise them.

NatureScot is not planning to remove the practical element from the muirburn training. Practical training is an important part of muirburn training and the Scottish Government encourage all practitioners to undertake this as soon as they are able. However, we also recognise that it is possible that everyone who needs to undertake the practical training may not be able to do so before the end of the current muirburn season. This is because of limited training capacity, possible adverse weather and numbers of individuals requiring training.

NatureScot therefore propose to introduce a transitional period during 2025-26 and allow the granting of a licence on the completion of the knowledge-based training, with a requirement for the practitioner to complete the practical element within a specified period. In future years NatureScot will require completion of the practical element before a licence is granted.

The Scottish Government welcomes the Competition and Markets Authority’s market study on infant formula and follow-on formula. Parents need to be able to make fully informed infant feeding choices. Where a family chooses to formula feed, the cost of essential food for babies should not be out of reach.

Scottish Government will work with UK partners to consider the Competition and Markets Authority’s recommendations, including how they relate to Scotland.

To date, there have been 27 referrals to secondary services including housing, addiction recovery and mental health services. In addition to these referrals, the facility continues to support individuals in accessing appropriate recovery pathways and re-engaging with services they had previously accessed but had since disengaged from.