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The Scottish Government recognise that social prescribing can be an effective method of improving an individual’s physical, mental and social health. There is growing interest in social prescribing approaches in Scotland and we are currently looking at how we can help develop these further.

At its core, social prescribing is a person-centred approach to supporting people to address the underlying causes of ill-health and an understanding of the importance of non-clinical community resources in helping with these challenges.

The Scottish Government already provides funding to third sector organisations to deliver a range of services, including social prescribing.

We arrived at our current target of restoring 20,000 hectares per year of peatland based on evidence from the Scottish Government’s second report on proposals and policies (RPP2) in 2013 which highlighted that it would be technically feasible for Scotland to restore 20,000 hectares of peatland a year.

Based on this the Scottish Government subsequently established firm annual peatland restoration targets in 2018 in its Climate Change Plan: third report on proposals and policies 2018-2032 (RPP3) .

We have adopted this as a target and in 2020 set out ambitious plans to invest more than £250 million over ten years to restore at least 250,000 hectares of degraded peatlands by 2030.

The application fee for Minimal Asset Process bankruptcy was removed from 6 February 2023.

Social Security Scotland directly employed 3,976 staff (headcount) as at December 2022. There were 3,566 directly employed staff who work in Social Security Scotland's central buildings in Dundee and Glasgow.

Social Security Scotland has adopted hybrid working in its central buildings. All colleagues based in Dundee and Glasgow are expected to spend part of their working week in an office.

The Scottish Government continues to prioritise investment in frontline services, providing an increase of over £730 million to NHS Boards in 2023-24 and taking funding for NHS Ayrshire and Arran to over £850 million – an increase of over 71% since 2006-07.

Despite this record investment there remain significant financial pressures across the system as a result of inflation, Covid and Brexit. The Scottish Government is working closely with all NHS Boards to address these pressures, ensuring patient care and safety remain the priority.

This includes providing additional support and scrutiny to NHS Ayrshire and Arran under the Performance Escalation Framework to support development and implementation of the Board’s financial recovery plan and delivery of sustainable services.

It is not possible to provide exact numbers on either current deer populations or future sustainable populations. For the purposes of protecting natural regeneration, tree-planting and peatland, in order restore and enhance natural systems that will deliver carbon and biodiversity benefits we need to focus on deer densities and impacts. We have already indicated in our response to the Deer Working Group report, that we support an overall density of no more than 10 deer per square kilometre. However we know that in many places we will need to achieve densities significantly lower than this in order to allow nature restoration projects to succeed.

We will aim to achieve the necessary reductions in deer populations through a combination of regulation and incentives. We are working to develop policies in this area, building on existing legislation and grant schemes.

At present our operational priority is to assess and identify priority areas where there is evidence of, or a high risk of deer damage, to ensure deer management efforts are focused and coordinated where there is the greatest need.

Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS) is funded primarily by revenue receipts from commercial trading activities such as the sale of timber, renewables, recreation, venison, estates, and other income raised. In addition, an Annual Subsidy Limit (ASL) is agreed with the Scottish Government. This is agreed by Scottish Ministers and forms part of the budget setting and review process and is set out in the annual Budget (Scotland) Act. It is this element of its funding that has reduced.

FLS is classified as a public corporation, for the purposes of its accounts, by the Office of National Statistics. This classification was awarded based on the nature of activity within the business and the high proportion of business trading. The classification enables the agency to build and sustain essential financial reserves across financial years to sustain and deliver outcomes. These are essential in managing the dynamic activity in the forestry sector.

As a result of the level of reserves held by FLS, the ASL allocated for FY 23/24 has been reduced. The FLS Business Plan sets out the main actions that the organisation will take over the period 01 April 2023 - 31 March 2024 to deliver the commitments and outcomes identified in their Corporate Plan. Ministers approved that plan in March 2023.

Business Plan - Forestry and Land Scotland

The plan highlights that FLS will use an element of its reserves to fund its ongoing activities.

Data from cull returns for the last three years is not yet complete, and in particular most of the data for the 2022-23 season is still outstanding. The following table is a snapshot of the latest position.

Not being a party to the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), the Scottish Land Commission did not provide comment or input into its wording. The MOU published in March incorrectly listed the Scottish Land Commission as having a decision making role on the project board, rather than correctly identifying its role as advisory. Both NatureScot and the Scottish Land Commission have since clarified the role of the SLC with the partnership.

As this partnership is at an early stage, NatureScot is currently not able to provide an estimate of the staff resource costs associated with this work. The Scottish Land Commission’s advisory role will be provided in line with its existing good practice programme.

Scottish Government are already supporting a range of interventions to help the wellbeing of our rural communities.

Between 2021-2023 £36 million was made available to grassroots community groups through the Communities Mental Health and Wellbeing fund to help tackle the impact of social isolation, loneliness and mental health inequalities.

Land Based rural workers have been supported by the Royal Agricultural Benevolent Institution (RSABI) who provide emotional, practical and financial assistance to people living and working in Scottish agriculture. In the 2022-23 financial year SG committed £50,000 to supporting RSABI taking the total Scottish Government support to £515,000 over the last five years.