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At the end of 2022 the Scottish Government reached agreement with social landlords that average rent rises across the social sector in Scotland for 2023-24 would be around 6%, recognising the balance to be struck between acute cost pressures faced by tenants and the need for social landlords to cover the costs of services and invest in new and improved homes. Whilst most social sector landlords expected to raise rents below this level it was recognised that there may be individual circumstances where a higher increase would be made.

In practice, social landlords have kept rent increases below the agreed level with an increase of around 5% on average and well below inflation. Individual landlords will have rents above or below that average, depending on their own service and investment plans and their own consultation with tenants.

The Scottish Government recognises the pressure on household budgets which is why last year and this, we have allocated almost £3 billion to support policies which tackle poverty and protect people as far as possible during the ongoing cost of living crisis. This includes £68.1m to fully mitigate the bedroom tax, helping over 91,000 households in Scotland to sustain their tenancies. We would encourage anyone struggling with rent or other costs to visit our website for information about the help available Cost of Living Support Scotland and to contact their landlord who can provide them with specific support and advice.

Information relating to the number of patients residing in NHS Highland, NHS Orkney, NHS Shetland, and NHS Western Isles that are currently waiting over six months (26 weeks) and 12 months (52 weeks) for a new outpatient appointment or treatment as an inpatient or day case in other NHS Boards can be found at Bib number 64130.

Please note that PHS are unable to provide data at procedure level, and so data are provided at specialty level only.

I refer the member to answer to question S6W-10759 on 20 September 2022. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at - https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

We continue to work with local authorities on plans to ensure every school-aged child has access to a device and connectivity by the end of this parliamentary term in 2026.

We provided £25 million of funding in 2020-21 to local authorities across Scotland to tackle digital exclusion.

We recognise that accurate local data on long COVID prevalence, distribution across the population and symptoms are needed to forecast and plan for the need for NHS services and specific specialties arising from long COVID.

a. Diagnosis of cases. We do not anticipate that the pausing of the ONS COVID-19 Infection Survey will have any impact on the ability of clinicians to diagnose individuals with long COVID (which includes the case definitions of ‘Ongoing symptomatic COVID-19’ and ‘Post-COVID-19 syndrome’). The identification, assessment and management of patients with long-term effects of COVID-19 in Scotland is guided by the UK-wide clinical guideline developed by the Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN), the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP). Further information can be accessed at Overview | COVID-19 rapid guideline: managing the long-term effects of COVID-19 | Guidance | NICE .

b. Monitoring of cases. The ONS survey data has provided a valuable means of estimating the prevalence of self-reported long COVID over time in Scotland. While a pause in the COVID-19 Infection Survey (CIS) will create a gap in the tracking of time-series data on long COVID, long-term trends in prevalence estimates are unlikely to change markedly within a short timeframe. Further, to improve local data collection, we are already supporting activity with NHS National Services Scotland’s long COVID Strategic Network. The Network is taking forward a dedicated workstream to agree outcomes, indicators, monitoring and evaluation to accelerate progress on capturing data to inform the planning of health service provision for people with long COVID.

The Coronavirus (Recovery and Reform) (Scotland) Act 2022 introduced a range of changes to specific legislative areas, many of which originated in temporary Scottish and UK Covid legislation.

These reforms include permanent public health protection powers, similar to those which already exist in England and Wales, increased protection for private rented tenants facing evictions, and a temporary extension of some changes in the justice system to help manage the backlog of court cases arising from the pandemic.

The Act is now permanent legislation including those provisions relating to the private rented sector which means extension to these powers are no longer required.

The provisions in the Act relating to the private rented sector, saw pre eviction protocols relating to rent arrears made permanent, ensuring that tenants who reside in the sector have all the information they need about their rights and also ensuring that Tribunals are able to continue taking circumstances of both parties into account when deciding whether to grant an eviction order or not.

The Scottish Government is not aware of any evidence of distance decay in relation to health outcomes in Scotland.

Responsibility for service delivery rests locally with Health Boards and Health and Social Care Partnerships (HSCPs). For NHS Boards that cover remote and rural settings, local planning is expected to take account of the particular needs of these communities. Officials engage with Health Boards and HSCPs on a regular basis to review health outcomes.

We will consider the proposed Right to Addiction Recovery Bill when it is introduced by Mr Ross to Parliament.

Meanwhile, we have committed £250 million pounds now, through the National Mission, to tackle the drug deaths crisis.

We are also looking to the National Collaborative – which includes people affected by substance use and their families – to bring forward a Charter of Rights.

This will aim to set out how rights in the forthcoming Human Rights Bill can be implemented to improve the lives of people affected by substance use.

Our National Strategy for Economic Transformation sets out how we will establish Scotland as a world-class entrepreneurial nation, recognised as one of the best countries to start and grow a business.

Since the Strategy’s publication we have announced the appointment of Mark Logan as Chief Entrepreneur, launched our Techscaler network to support the creation of more tech start-ups and published the Pathways Report: A New Approach for Woman in Entrepreneurship to address the barriers woman face in entrepreneurship and business start-up.

Vice-President of the European Parliament Katarina Barley MEP and I held a positive meeting in August last year, in which we spoke about Scottish Government's draft hydrogen action plan.

The subject of Scottish independence was not an agenda item in discussions, however Scottish ministers will always be polite enough during international meetings to answer any questions put to them about the Scottish Government's stated policies, including a legal, constitutionally sound referendum, as set out in our Programme for Government.