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The campaign is not targeting children and young people through radio and outdoor advertising. These channels, along with online news sites, digital and social media are being used to reach and engage the parental audience across Scotland.

To reach children and young people, we have engaged with schools, parents and third sector organisations who work directly with children and young people, equipping them with resources, information and tips (via NHS Inform and Parent Club) to prompt awareness of, and have informed discussions with their children and young people, on the dangers and consequences of vaping.

To reach the parental audience in Scotland, we worked with a procured Scottish Government roster media agency to identify the most effective media channels. In this instance, within the parameters of the identified budget, outdoor advertising, radio, online news sites and social media were recommended. These channels have allowed for creation of engaging content that encourages parents to click through to NHS Inform and Parent Club for information, advice and tips on having open, honest, informed conversations with their children and young people.

Following the inclusion of squash in the Los Angeles 2028 Summer Olympics, squash will now be eligible for the UK Sport investment process. UK Sport strategically invests in the summer and winter Olympic and Paralympic Games and other major championship events to maximise the performance of UK athletes.

The Scottish Government is a strong supporter of Scottish Squash and recognises its contribution to raising Scotland’s profile on the international sporting stage, as well as promoting the wider benefits of sport and physical activity.

sport scotland, our national agency for sport, is investing up to £494,700 into Scottish Squash in 2023-24, an increase of 14.9% in investment from the previous year. sport scotland’s investment supports a wide range of activity that encourages and supports people to participate in squash at all levels, including school, club and coach development, and its performance programme. The additional investment in 2023-24 is specifically aligned to the continued development of a broader and more inclusive player pathway.

The effectiveness of the Brush Up campaign will be assessed using an on-line questionnaire of patients. Questions will focus on patients’ awareness of both the campaign itself and the accompanying dental reform.

The budget for the ‘Brush Up’ campaign to increase awareness of NHS dentistry reforms was £250,000.

In the recently published Mental Health and Wellbeing Workforce Action Plan, we committed to build on the work currently being undertaken as part of the Health and Social Care (HSC) Workforce Strategy to improve mental health and wellbeing workforce data, including on equalities.

Through our engagement on the Action Plan, we identified the need for improved comprehensive workforce data at national, regional, and service levels on the mental health and wellbeing workforce in order to enable planning of support and services. This includes addressing issues raised around access to workforce data, inconsistency, and accuracy of current workforce, as well as the need to better understand all roles within workforce.

We are continuing to support the timely reporting of workforce and trainee data for existing systems through our ongoing and constructive engagement with NHS Education for Scotland (NES), Health Improvement Scotland (HIS), Public Health Scotland (PHS), Health Boards and also with service leads directly on data improvement for existing systems.

This supports the future development and publication of Scotland’s first Mental Health and Wellbeing workforce technical document. As part of a phased approach, this will initially focus on the core workforce. We are now working with key partners to take this forward, with publication committed as a medium term timescale for delivery within the Workforce Action Plan.

Since being established in the winter of 2020 as part of the wider Winter Support Fund, the Scottish Government has awarded a total of £16.9 million to Advice Direct Scotland to administer the Home Heating Support Fund (HHSF).

Below is a year by year breakdown of the funding for the HHSF to date:

The Mental Health and Wellbeing Workforce Education and Training Strategic Advisory Group brings together senior leaders from key sectors and organisations to support a whole system approach to meet the ambitions of the Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy.

The group has held two meetings since it was established, which focused on initially on the development of the recently published Mental Health and Wellbeing Workforce Action Plan. The next meeting is due to take place on 11 January 2024 at which the group will consider the programme of work for implementing the education and training aspects of the Strategy’s Delivery Plan and Workforce Action Plan.

The Scottish Government budget for 2024 to 2025 will be publicly confirmed on 19 December 2023.

The 25-year contract for HMP Kilmarnock under the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) for a privately constructed and operationally managed prison expires on 16 March 2024. The decision to bring HMP Kilmarnock into public management and ownership and not to tender for a new private contract was taken in 2021. This is in line with Scottish Government policy that prisons should be owned and managed by the public sector, which has been in place since 2007.

The cost of private sector prison contracts depend on the market conditions at that particular point in time and in order to establish the cost of a new private sector contract for HMP Kilmarnock from 2024 this would have to be put out to tender. In line with Government’s long-running policy on private prisons the decision was made not to put it out to tender.

SPS is working to agree proposals for a transitional operating model, and a target operating model, which is to be adopted within the first year of the prison transferring to the public sector.

Sheriff Jack Brown is subject to ongoing Fitness for Judicial Office Tribunal proceedings. Under Section 23(6) of the Court Reform (Scotland) Act 2014, Scottish Ministers are obliged to pay such expenses as they consider are reasonably required to be incurred to enable a tribunal to carry out its functions. The Scottish Government will publish costs of the tribunal at the conclusion of the proceedings.