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Scottish Government grant making to the third sector, including credit unions, is allocated across portfolios to improve a wide range of outcomes. Some Scottish Government funding will also be issued through independent grant makers or intermediary organisations. This information is not centrally collated.

Examples of credit union focussed funding is provided in the following table.

Streetlighting is the responsibility of local councils. We are not aware of any particular supply chain issues but we would be happy to consider this if the member can provide more information.

Learning and evaluation continue to be a key aspect of our approach to employability services in Scotland.

The Implementation evaluation of the development and early delivery of No One Left Behind and the Young Person’s Guarantee was commissioned by the Scottish Government and published on 10 August 2023.

We will consider the recommendations from the evaluation alongside the outputs from our recent national stakeholder discussion events and actions will be reviewed to identify how we can improve.

The decision on whether to appoint a local women’s champion or advocate sits with local authority areas. As such, the government does not hold a list of champions or advocates. The government is, however, fully committed to working with local authority areas to ensure that we take, when appropriate, a gendered response to substance use. That is why we have committed more than £5.5 million to establish two houses, run by Aberlour, which are designed to support women and their children through recovery. In addition, we are providing more than £6 million to establish a training and social enterprise based residential rehabilitation programme at River Garden Auchincruive which will have a separate unit to support women through recovery.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on specific litter or flytipping incidents, which are reported to local authorities or SEPA.

The most recent data from the Scottish Health Survey on sports participation by children aged between 11 and 15 in each of the last five years is detailed in the following table.

The Scottish Government works in partnership with Local Government and Local Employability Partners to offer key worker led, person-centred holistic support. At a local level they work in communities and with partners to deliver employability services to those who are experiencing or are at risk of becoming long term unemployed and this includes people with disabilities or long-term health conditions.

Supported employment including Individual Placement and Support can offer assistance to those requiring intensive and specific help especially those with severe and enduring mental ill health.

These evidence-based models of delivery help people find or re-enter sustainable employment that fits their needs and interests. It offers intensive, individual support, rapid job search followed by placement in paid employment in the open labour market, and time-unlimited in-work support for both the employee and the employer.

We are working with a range of partners, to inform options on development of the Supported Employment offer which is currently delivered through Fair Start Scotland. From 2024 this type of support will be made available through our No One Left Behind approach with the Local Employability Partnerships.

The Scottish Government remains committed to implementing the provisions of the Vulnerable Witnesses (Criminal Evidence) (Scotland) Act 2019 to ensure that the presumption in favour of pre-recorded evidence extends to children and adult deemed vulnerable witnesses.

While the presumption does not currently apply beyond children giving evidence in specified cases in the High Court, the Court does have the power to, upon application of either the prosecution or the defence, direct that the evidence of other children and vulnerable adult witnesses should be pre-recorded. This is provided for in the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995 and in 2017 the High Court issued a practice note to give guidance around the use of evidence by commissioner hearings. Evidence by commissioner hearings are therefore regularly being conducted to pre-record the evidence of a wider cohort of witnesses that are not yet covered by the statutory presumption.

In partnership with Scottish Renewables, we commissioned Climate Exchange to conduct a research project with the aim of assessing the ‘clean heat’ and energy efficiency workforce and the potential required workforce that would be needed to meet the targets set out within our Heat in Buildings Strategy. The report was published in July 2022 and can be found here - https://www.climatexchange.org.uk/research/projects/clean-heat-and-energy-efficiency-workforce-assessment/

The report was used to inform the development of our Heat in Buildings Supply Chains Delivery Plan which was published in November 2022.

The Scottish Government continues to explore options regarding the funding for employability services on a multi-year basis. However, we are required to deliver a balanced budget each year, and employability funding, like all other funded programmes and services throughout government require to be assessed against policy prospectus outcomes which are reviewed on a year-by-year basis.