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Scotland’s Redress Scheme provides freedom of choice for applicants throughout the process. The scheme is designed to ensure that applicants do not have to fund legal costs from any redress payment they may receive. While applications can be made without the need for a solicitor, applicants are strongly encouraged to take up the offer of funded legal advice, particularly before signing a waiver and accepting a redress payment.

Costs and expenses reasonably incurred in the making of an application are reimbursed and, recognising the importance of legal advice, the scheme ensures that where an applicant chooses to take legal representation there is a clear route for this to be funded directly from the Scottish Government to the solicitor. The maximum levels of legal fees which can be reasonably paid directly to a solicitor by the scheme are prescribed in legislation, though there is scope under the scheme to pay additional fees in exceptional circumstances. The prescribed sums are set at £450 + VAT for a fixed rate and next of kin payment and £2,000 + VAT for an individually assessed payment. However, as per the legislation, applicants are free to appoint their own solicitor and come to their own arrangements on the payment of fees if they choose to do so, and the terms of the engagement should be agreed at the outset.

Information is provided to applicants to ensure that they can make informed choices about the funding of legal advice. Practical, emotional, legal and general support is available to all applicants to Scotland’s Redress Scheme at all stages of their application.

As of 28th February 2023, £100,244 has been paid directly to solicitors. Redress payments of just over £17,500,000 have been paid directly to applicants.

An update on the progress of Scotland’s Redress Scheme was provided to the Education, Children and Young People Committee on 12 January 2023. The official report of the meeting can be found on the Scottish Parliament website .

This question relates to operational matters that are the responsibility of the Scottish Court and Tribunals Service (SCTS) corporate body. The question has been passed to the Chief Executive of the SCTS who will reply in writing within 20 days.

The Scottish Government has provided local government with an additional £147.1 million capital funding in 2023-24. The maintenance of buildings and assets is the responsibility of individual local authorities and it is up to councils to manage their own budgets and allocate the total financial resources available to them on the basis of local needs and priorities.

Local authorities also have a range of powers enabling them to take action on buildings that fall into disrepair, such as the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982 and Building (Scotland) Act 2003 (the Act). Section 28 of the Act gives local authorities powers to take action on defective buildings, this includes serving a notice to bring the building back into a reasonable state of repair having regard to its age, type and location.

Further support is made through the Place Based Investment Programme which aims to align place based investment, working collaboratively with local communities to deliver shared aspirations for their place. The programme includes investment of £140 million over the course of the parliament to local authorities. This investment is expected to support delivery of our policy ambitions for place, 20-minute neighbourhoods, town centre action, community led regeneration, community wealth building and contribute to net zero. The funding can be used for example for the repurposing of buildings, maintenance and repairs, reallocating external space and community led land acquisition.

The Scottish Government’s financial commitments to create green jobs include funding support provided through our Green Jobs Fund and the Just Transition Fund.

The Green Jobs Fund is a five-year, capital fund of up to £100m over 5 years which will support businesses and their supply chains to help them better transition to a low carbon economy and create new green jobs. In year one of the Green Jobs Fund, between the Enterprise Agencies and Scottish Ministers, 57 projects have been supported with grant funding of £16.8m. Figures provided by the recipients of these awards estimated this fund will support up to 3,886 jobs over the life of the individual projects. Figures for year 2 of the fund are not due to be published until Q2 2023 as contractual negotiations are continuing to be finalised.

The fund consists of £50 million provided by our Enterprise Agencies for businesses which provide sustainable or low carbon products and services to help them develop, grow and create jobs and up to a further £50 million to help ensure that businesses and supply chains across Scotland can capitalise on our investment in five priority sectors: energy transition; transport; manufacturing; construction; agriculture and land use. The Green Jobs Fund will make focused investments in, for example, machinery and equipment and research and development to ensure businesses are well placed to win public and private contracts.

Our Just Transition Fund is a ten year, £500m investment to support a fair transition to net zero and to diversify the regional economy, with the first £50m committed this year. Examples of the projects supported in the first year of the fund include a digital offshore energy skills passport which empowers offshore workers to utilise their existing certification; and an advanced manufacturing skills hub.

The Scottish Government also ring-fenced £1m of the Just Transition Fund this year for participatory budgeting, whereby local communities are able to influence and have a direct say on how money is spent in their local areas.

The Scottish Government is determined to maximise the economic opportunity for the Scottish supply chain from our offshore wind potential. That is why we asked Crown Estate Scotland to introduce the Supply Chain Development Statement as part of the ScotWind leasing round to demonstrate how serious the Scottish Government is about holding developers to account if they do not honour their supply chain commitments and create green jobs.

ScotWind developers have committed to invest an average of £1.4 billion per project, equating to more than £28 billion of potential investment in Scotland's supply chain. Government and its agencies continue to work closely with developers and those at the top of the supply chain to ensure that local suppliers in Scotland have a realistic opportunity to compete for key manufacturing contracts.

We are already seeing the employment benefits from the development of Scotland’s offshore wind sector. Scotland is the best performing UK region in the Green Jobs Barometer, a tool to track job creation, wider employment benefits, job loss, carbon intensity of employment, and worker perceptions with relevance to the green transition.

Table 1 provides information on average gross revenue expenditure in Scotland per pre-school registration, and primary and secondary pupil along with information on allocations (accounting for teaching and tuition fees funding) per college and university place.

The Scottish Government publishes yearly evaluation studies and annual reports of Fair Start Scotland. These contain data on the impact and experience of disabled people, as part of the overall reporting on the service. These evaluations have not specifically or separately considered the experiences and outcomes for people with learning disabilities. All evaluation reports relating to Fair Start Scotland are available on the Scottish Government website and are listed below. The first evaluation of No One Left Behind is currently underway and a report will be published in early Summer 2023. This will not specifically consider the experiences of people with learning disabilities.

Tables which accompany the quarterly publication Scotland’s Devolved Employment Services: statistical summary provide equalities information for participants on Fair Start Scotland, which includes data for disabled people and people with learning disabilities. The data reporting template for people receiving support through No One Left Behind has recently been expanded to capture where people have a learning disability, learning difficulty, autism spectrum disorder and other developmental disorders (such as ADHD). This data will be published as part of the quarterly statistical reporting in due course.

We have also undertaken a review of Individual Placement and Support (IPS) and of Supported Employment to identify areas of improvement and make recommendations on future delivery of these two forms of specialist employability support in Scotland. These reviews, along with Scottish Government responses, were also published on our website and are listed below.

Evaluation reports for Fair Start Scotland

Implementation Review:

Fair Start Scotland evaluation report 1: implementation and early delivery review

Evaluation Report 2

Overview Report:

Fair Start Scotland evaluation report 2: overview of year one - November 2019

Participant Phone Survey:

Fair Start Scotland evaluation report 2: participant phone survey - November 2019

Local Area Case Studies:

Fair Start Scotland evaluation report 2: local area case studies - November 2019

Evaluation Report 3

Overview Report:

Fair Start Scotland - evaluation report 3: year two - overview

Participant Phone Survey:

Fair Start Scotland - evaluation report 3: participant phone survey - year 2

Local Area Case Studies:

Fair Start Scotland - evaluation report 3: local area case studies - year 2

Annual Evaluation Report 4

Overview Report:

Fair Start Scotland: evaluation report 4 - year 3 overview

Participant Phone Survey:

Fair Start Scotland: evaluation report 4 - participant phone survey - year 3

Local Area Case Studies:

Fair Start Scotland: evaluation report 4 - local area case studies - year 3

Economic Evaluation:

Fair Start Scotland: economic evaluation

Individual Placement and Support Review

Fair Start Scotland - individual placement and support review: findings

Support Employment Review

Supported employment: review report and Scottish Government response

The Scottish Government recognises the importance of robust data and caveated evidence to build understanding of the inequalities experienced by people with learning disabilities.

Therefore, we have been collaborating with our partners through the Keys to Life, the Scottish Strategy for Autism and the Towards Transformation Plan to take forward research to better understand the daily lives of people with learning disabilities and autistic people and the inequalities/barriers they face.

The Scottish Government has also commissioned the Scottish Learning Disabilities Observatory (SLDO) to understand the health equalities and barriers faced by people with learning disabilities. SLDO reports and their methods can be found on their website.

Similarly, the Scottish Commission for Learning Disability (SCLD) also produced a variety of evidence-based reports to inform the development of policy around experience of people with learning disabilities including employment, hate crime, health, social care, parenting and human rights. Through the pandemic SCLD also produced the How's Life Survey and provides a snapshot of the lives of people with learning disabilities through the pandemic. They also work alongside Public Health Scotland to produce routine Learning Disability Statistics Scotland using census data.

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring people with learning disabilities have access to data that is important to them, including evidence about employment and employability in Scotland.

To achieve this Scottish Government are working with our partners to refocus data collection efforts to encompass the whole life journey through a Learning Disability and Autism Data Action Plan.

We expect Zero Waste Scotland to submit the review report in May, and we will then consider its findings.

The Scottish Government has not conducted this type of analysis as regular grant funding to these organisations from Creative Scotland remains in place.

The role of a school culture coordinator is a discretionary role that supports the delivery of the Youth Music Initiative (YMI) programme, administered on behalf of Scottish Government by Creative Scotland with local authorities.

A school culture coordinator is a role that I understand only exists currently in two local authorities: Falkirk Council and Argyle & Bute Council. The various roles within all other local authorities who manage YMI programmes include Instrumental Music Service Managers, Music Instructors, Creative Learning Officers. As a result, there is no funding programme for which Creative Scotland supports the role of culture coordinator across the entire local authority network.

Creative Scotland monitors the organisational reserves of regularly funded organisations via the submissions provided as part of the annual contracting process. Ad hoc monitoring by Creative Scotland may also occur depending on the organisation’s financial position, including a recent RFO survey on rising costs. Organisational reserves are also publicly disclosed at Companies House.