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The 433 additional properties to be connected in Dumfries and Galloway as a result of the £6.6 million extension to the R100 South contract are spread across the whole region. This extended build is also fully reflected on our online address checker where individuals can enter their address details to see what the R100 programme will deliver for their property.

The Financial Memorandum set out the range of possible costs for the NCS.

The NCS is being developed through a Co-Design approach. We are starting to work with the Lived Experience Experts Panel on larger scale co-design, and will continue to work with a range of organisations and individuals alongside the panel.

We will design and develop the NCS with the real experts, those who rely on social care, unpaid carers and the workforce.

The finances are being constantly monitored and reviewed as new information becomes available. Through the business case process we will continue to provide greater detail and clarity.

Parents and carers are encouraged to talk to their ELC setting about their child’s needs, and ELC practitioners will be able to discuss options for children who may benefit from an additional year of funded ELC. Local authorities are responsible for school enrolments in their area and this includes supporting parents and carers who cannot access online resources.

Local authorities are responsible for school enrolments in their area, including providing information for parents and carers who may wish to defer their child’s primary school start. We have written to local authorities to encourage them to update the communications they share with parents to reflect the change in legislation. The Scottish Government provides information about deferrals on the Parent Club website .

Zero Waste Scotland has calculated that 29 Scottish Local Authorities, including all Island Local Authorities, will incur a net financial benefit from the implementation of Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme (DRS).

There will be an Early Learning and Childcare (ELC) census in September 2023 which, as in previous years, will collect information on the number of deferrals but not on the age of the children. The new individual level child census, due to take place for the first time in May 2024, will collect data on children registered for funded ELC, including the date of birth of the child. At that point it will be possible to identify how many children registered for funded ELC were eligible under the change in legislation on deferrals. Some local authorities already provide funded ELC for deferred children regardless of the child’s birthday, so we will not be able to identify if these children would have been registered for funded ELC if the legislation was not changed.

The Island Communities Impact Assessment ( Deposit return scheme for Scotland: islands communities impact assessment - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) ) that we published in March 2020 confirms that the introduction of the Deposit Return Scheme will not increase the amount of waste that will arise in island communities. Since most waste is currently transported off the islands it is unlikely that there will be any significant increase in number of journeys made by waste hauliers. No further modelling has been undertaken.

Two Scottish cities are currently twinned with Ukraine. Our respective capital cities Edinburgh and Kyiv, have been twinned since 1989, and Newport-on-Tay entered into a twinning relationship with Zolotarevo in 2002. Twinning enables local communities to formalise friendships, create cultural and educational bonds as well as work on shared local issues.

COSLA is the twinning coordinator for local authorities in Scotland. The Scottish Government encourages any Local Authority, seeking to establish a twinning relationship with Ukraine to discuss this further with COSLA. I have previously met COSLA and the Lord Provost of Edinburgh, to discuss my support for their twinning relationship and to explore how further Scottish Local Authorities can support Ukraine.

The Scottish Government continues to engage with the culture and heritage sectors to build fairer and more inclusive workplaces.

As part of the refresh of our Fair Work Action Plan, the Scottish Government has extended Fair Work criteria to public sector grants and other funding streams and contracts wherever relevant and appropriate to do so. We will take forward work with Creative Scotland on implementing Fair Work First amongst the organisations that they fund; and we have included in the grant letters for the five National Performing Companies conditions regarding Fair Work First. We have worked with Historic Environment Scotland to revaluate their grant framework refresh, including Fair Work First principles, for 2021 onwards.

Creative Scotland commissioned Culture Radar to review Fair Work within the sector in Scotland, on behalf of Scottish Government. This review has now concluded and Scottish Government is currently considering the recommendations. We are also engaged with the Creative Industries Policy and Evidence centre on its ‘Good Work Review’, an independent review of working conditions in the creative sector, to ensure the Scottish creative industries context is reflected in its findings.

The Scottish Government is also engaging with public sector stakeholders on the implications of implementing the real Living Wage requirement in public sector grants.

The next Climate Change Plan must include proposals and policies for the following sectors:

• energy supply,
• transport (including international aviation and shipping),
• business and industrial process,
• residential and public (in relation to buildings in those sectors),
• waste management,
• land use, land use change and forestry, and
• agriculture.

We are considering other policies, proposals and actions that could be included in the Plan that are not included in the inventory, such as marine carbon.