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No primary care projects previously committed to by the Scottish Government have been cancelled or delayed in 2023-24.

The Scottish Government does not hold information centrally on the percentage of anticipated community benefit payments made to communities from renewable energy projects, broken down by local authority area.

The Scottish Government’s Register of Community Benefit, administered by Local Energy Scotland, shows commitments from operational renewable energy projects and can be accessed here: https://localenergy.scot/community-benefits-register/

The Register relies on developers and communities voluntarily submitting data. It is not exhaustive and does not provide a full picture of community benefit payments across Scotland. The Register should therefore be seen as a guide to community benefit provisions across Scotland.

The Register of Community Benefit, administered by Local Energy Scotland on behalf of the Scottish Government, indicates that, since 2010, over £198 million in community benefit from onshore renewable projects has been committed to communities, including over £25 million in the 12 months. The register can be accessed here: https://localenergy.scot/community-benefits-register/ .

The Register relies on developers and communities voluntarily submitting data. It is not exhaustive and does not provide a full picture of community benefit payments across Scotland. The Register should therefore be seen as a guide to community benefit provisions across Scotland.

I can confirm that officials from the Building Standards Division met with the Institution of Structural Engineers (IStructE) regarding Reinforced Autoclaved Aerated Concrete in public buildings on 5 September 2023, and again on 12 September 2023. IStructE presented information at the RAAC cross-sector working group meeting of 27 September. Prior to those meetings, engagement with IStructE was on structural matters in general, including the certification scheme operated through our building standards system.

While the Scottish Government is not required to publish minutes of informal meetings with stakeholders, on this occasion a copy of the notes of these meetings have been placed in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe) under BIB number 64548. The minutes of RAAC cross-sector working groups will be published at Building and Fire Safety: Ministerial Working Group - gov.scot (www.gov.scot).

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-15474 on 10 March 2023 .

Transport Scotland has recently met with MPs and MSPs, and the Langholm Alliance to discuss signing to Langholm on the Scottish and English trunk road networks. Following these discussions, Transport Scotland has been reviewing potential changes on routes within Scotland leading to the A7. It has been documented that for the A7 trunk road itself, Langholm currently features on all appropriate route confirmatory signs northbound and southbound within Scotland.

In relation to the A7 and other Scottish destinations being adequately signposted from the M6, Transport Scotland continues to engage with MPs and officials at the Department for Transport, National Highways and Cumberland Council to discuss the continuity of signing to Langholm on both sides of the border.

In September 2022, there were 83 GPs per 100,000 population in Scotland compared to (a) 63 per 100,000 in England and (b) 64 per 100,000 in Wales, excluding GP trainees and locums.

The latest Public Health Scotland GP headcount statistics and comparative figures in England and Wales relate to September 2022.

Officials are involved in the UK Government’s Cross-Government Working Group on RAAC. Recent meetings have confirmed that the Institution of Structural Engineers' guidance on RAAC remains a valid approach to the assessment of RAAC. This has also been confirmed in discussions with the Health & Safety Executive, the UK-wide regulator for health and safety.

Officials also regularly attend meetings of UK education departments convened by the UK Department for Education to consider RAAC.

The Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills spoke to Baroness Barran, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Education on 31 August regarding RAAC in schools and there has been subsequent correspondence between the Cabinet Secretary and Gillian Keegan, Secretary of State for Education.

On 16 August, the Deputy First Minister wrote to UK Treasury seeking clarity on new capital funding to deal with RAAC. On the same day, the Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice wrote to the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities recommending a collaborative approach between administrations. Dialogue continues on both these issues.

The IUCN Red List classifies species at risk of global extinction into nine categories: Not Evaluated, Data Deficient, Least Concern, Near Threatened, Vulnerable, Endangered, Critically Endangered, Extinct in the Wild and Extinct. NatureScot, working with stakeholders, have identified approximately 12,000 species in Scotland which fall into one of these categories, of which around 75% (8,381) are considered to be of Least Concern and not, therefore, considered to be at imminent risk of extinction.

1,748 species have been assessed as at some risk of extinction, with 148 assessed to be Critically Endangered, 295 Endangered, 673 Vulnerable and 632 Near Threatened.

Historically, monitoring of species has been influenced by various factors including the taxa, visibility and popularity, which has resulted in some data deficiencies, including in respect of some critically endangered species. NatureScot is working with stakeholders to address this, including through projects such as Species at Risk, which aims to bring all taxa onto a level playing field and focus more attention toward the lesser-known species. With new datasets and analytical tools becoming available, we are able to present trends in status for more species than ever before.

Our Scottish Biodiversity Strategy to 2045 recognises the importance of good quality biodiversity data to achieving our goals, and together with NatureScot we are providing £580,000 over two years to support the Better Biodiversity Data Project, led by the National Biodiversity Network Trust. The project will establish a Scottish Data Hub which will bring together biodiversity data from a range of sources and make it more accessible for analysis. More information on this is available at: https://nbn.org.uk/news/better-biodiversity-data-project/ .

Further details can also be found in the latest State of Nature Scotland Report for 2023, a collaborative work between government agencies and eNGOs, published on 28 September 2023. The report is available at: https://stateofnature.org.uk/countries/scotland/ .

I have asked Teresa Medhurst, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS), to respond. Her response is as follows:

Scottish Prison Service (SPS) staff are dealing with some of the most vulnerable people in our society. Every death, whether in prison custody or in our communities, is a tragedy for families, friends, and for those who have support the individual on a daily basis.

SPS are fully committed to engaging with key partners to gain a better understanding to prevent deaths occurring and to ensure wider supports are in place for those in our care.

Whilst SPS have taken into account the University of Glasgow report ‘ Still nothing to see here?’, the new SPS Mental Health Strategy will explicitly reference the Scottish Governments ‘Creating Hope Together Scotland’s Suicide Prevention Strategy’ and their emerging Self Harm Strategy. The new strategy goes even further to reference ‘Time, Space & Compassion’ which not only provides recommendations for improvements in suicidal crisis response, but is an overarching, whole person, whole system approach.