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Prior to the Scottish Government taking control of the yard leading to Nationalisation, it was not possible to undertake a detailed analysis of the work required to complete the vessels. The detailed design and planning was the responsibility of the former owners of the yard.

It was only once the yard was in Scottish Government control that the full information was available and the full extent of issues with the design and approval of the ship become known. On 18 December 2019, the Turnaround Director submitted a report on the conditions of the two ferries, together with a revised programme and cost to complete the vessels. A copy of the report can be found on the Scottish Government website – Ferguson Marine: report on cost and programme for vessels 801 and 802 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) .

The CEO of Ferguson Marine is preparing an update, for the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee, on the delivery timetable and budget for vessels 801 and 802 which will be submitted before the end of March 2022.

The Northern Isles Ferry Services contract awarded in June 2020 was reviewed before contract initiation to ensure lifeline ferry services were supported throughout the Covid pandemic.

The Scottish Government is not a signatory to Openreach’s Fibre Community Partnership programme. The Fibre Community Partnership is a commercial offering, and has no direct link to the £384 million R100 North contract. As a registered supplier for the R100 Scottish Broadband Voucher Scheme, Openreach could choose to use the programme to deliver a solution for a community through aggregation of vouchers. However, I understand that they have currently paused registrations for the programme as a result of high demand.

Emissions for incineration with energy recovery are not separately reported in Scottish Greenhouse Gas Statistics: 1990 – 2019 . These emissions are included under “Power stations” in the Greenhouse Gas Dataset, which is published as part of the statistics.

Resilience of the Energy Sector is reserved and therefore the responsibility of the UK Government. Following the severe disruption caused by recent storms across Scotland the Scottish Government has fed in to independent reviews undertaken by BEIS and Ofgem.

Draft National Planning Framework 4 (NPF4) is clear that new, and alterations to existing buildings, infrastructure and spaces should be designed to be adaptable to future impacts of climate change. The draft acknowledges risks from climate change including those from extreme weather. Furthermore it supports in principle development proposals for enabling works for transmission and distribution infrastructure and energy storage including battery storage.

The draft NPF4 is currently subject to Scottish Parliamentary scrutiny, alongside a public consultation, prior to a finalised version being presented for Scottish Parliament approval. We are working towards laying a final version of NPF4 in the Parliament for approval this summer, following which it will be adopted by the Scottish Ministers.

Resilience of the Electricity Sector is reserved and therefore the responsibility of the UK Government.

Both BEIS and Ofgem have published their post-incident reviews/interim reports on Storm Arwen. The UK Government interim report on Storm Arwen review considers the issue of underground cables on p.10 and Ofgems Review into the networks’ response to Storm Arwen – Interim Report on page 16.

The Scottish Government contributed to both these reviews and will carefully consider the findings to understand where improvements could be made. We will continue to track progress against these recommendations.

We will also continue to press the UK Government, industry and the regulator for assurance that increased resilience of the electricity networks in Scotland is a priority.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the number of children on foster home waiting lists.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-06655 on 14 March 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 .

These assessments will be undertaken as part of work on the Scottish Government's Islands Connectivity Plan (ICP). Community needs assessments establish the level of transport connectivity required by each island and remote mainland community within scope of ICP and will update assessments undertaken for the Ferries Plan 2013-2022. Market assessments consider whether the required level of transport connectivity can be provided without government intervention.

The exact timescales for these assessments is still to be determined. We aim to make significant progress with these assessments during 2022 and conclude any outstanding work during 2023. Priority is currently being given to assessments required to support the business cases for live vessel and port investment projects.

Transport Scotland has not yet invited tenders for work on any of these assessments. It is expected that the work will be undertaken utilising both internal staff resource and external consultancy.