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The Scottish Government intends the New Build Heat Standard to apply to all new buildings, applying for a building warrant, from 1 April 2024 onwards.

This is in direct response to the recommendation of the Committee on Climate Change on how to meet the net zero legal obligations legislated for by the Scottish Parliament.

The timescale reflects the need to act to reduce the emissions associated with heating our homes and businesses, and the introduction of the New Build Heat Standard will ensure that these buildings are future-proofed - avoiding any potentially disruptive retrofit works as we progress towards the decarbonisation of our remaining building stock in line with our Heat in Buildings Strategy.

The Scottish Government has engaged with a wide range of drinks businesses throughout the policy development and implementation stages for our Deposit Return Scheme (DRS), including through two stages of consultation (running from 25 June 2018 – 25 September 2018 and 10 September 2019 – 10 December 2019) which any business could participate in. We have not carried out any engagement relating to DRS specifically directed at retailers selling hampers, parcels, or gift sets, but many such retailers would have been captured by this wider engagement.

We are continuing to engage with industry in order to ensure a successful launch of Scotland's DRS in August next year.

The Scottish Government will consult on a draft Energy Strategy and Just Transition Plan (ESJTP) in the coming months.

The ESJTP will outline a co-ordinated vision for Scotland’s future energy system setting out a route map of steps required to deliver the vision and highlighting the energy sector’s role in achieving our emissions reduction targets.

The Scottish Government is clear that unlimited extraction of fossil fuels is not consistent with our climate obligations and is not the right solution to the real cost of living crisis families are facing. We support the fastest possible just transition for the sector and the oil and gas workforce, the communities in which they live and work, and the regional economies that have greatly benefited from oil and gas activities and have much to gain from the transition to net zero.

Official statistics on trends in the number of properties in the rented sectors over time can help to track the net effect of additions and removals of stock. These include survey based estimates of the number of households living in the private rented sector each year available from Scottish Household Survey publications . Although the latest published figures for 2020 are not directly comparable to results for previous years due to the change to a telephone survey based approach during the pandemic period. The Scottish Household Survey based estimates also feed into annual Scottish Government annual Dwelling Stock by Tenure figures , which provide annual estimates of the number of dwellings which are either privately rented or where the household is living rent-free. In addition, the Dwelling Stock by Tenure figures include the number of local authority and housing association dwellings each year to 2020, based on annual social landlord stock data. These figures include Local Authority stock data collected by Scottish Government and Housing Association stock data collected by the Scottish Housing Regulator. More recent figures for the year 2021 available as part of the latest Housing Statistics Annual Key Trends publication .

The Annual Key Trends publication also includes figures on demolitions and closures of housing stock, although there are data quality caveats associated with these figures, and in addition whilst the figures are presented with a local authority housing category separately identified there is no split available into private rented or for the total social sector component. In terms of new supply of social housing, quarterly affordable housing supply figures published as part of Quarterly Housing Statistics updates on the Housing Statistics webpages include information on the number of completions for social rent each quarter.

Alongside these sets of annual official statistics, the Scottish Government receives monthly aggregate information extracted from the Private Rented Sector Landlord Register system. This include figures on the total number of active registrations each month and the total number of properties that these relate to, although it does not contain a breakdown of the number of properties added to or removed from the system. Local authorities are responsible for the administration and enforcement of landlord registration, and are the data controllers of the information on the landlord registration IT system for landlords in their area. It should be noted that the Landlord Registration System is an administrative system used primarily to manage the registration of landlords and rental properties, and has not been designed to produce robust statistical figures on the sector. Figures from this system should therefore be considered in the context of data quality issues which include impacts from changes to IT systems over time, a risk of duplicated data and double counting of rental properties in certain instances for joint owners, as well as data issues stemming from any potential lags in the provision of information by landlords on changes to circumstances to existing registrations. The Scottish Government set out ways to improve data from the Private Rented Sector Landlord Registration system within the ‘New Deal for Tenants’ Consultation Paper.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-11821 on 11 November 2022, work is currently ongoing with local authorities and COSLA to determine how best to allocate funding in light of the emergency budget review. 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 .

The General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) is the independent regulatory body for teachers and, as such, Scottish Ministers have no locus to intervene in their procedures. The GTCS fitness to teach policy sets out key principles and acts as a mechanism for dealing with a teacher who presents a risk of harm. The fitness to teach process also aims to ensure that we have a teaching profession in Scotland that is and remains fit to teach so that public trust and confidence in teachers is maintained and the learning of our children and young people is protected.

The Scottish Government Child Protection Unit engages with GTCS on a regular basis on child and public protection and safeguarding issues, and to clarify the role of the bodies that are responsible for dealing with teachers who present a risk of harm to children.

The Scottish Government has also recently established an internal forum on the implementation of the child protection guidance in schools, and will continue to facilitate discussions on reporting and investigation processes of child protection issues within schools.

The Super Sponsor Scheme continues and displaced Ukrainians are still arriving and benefiting from welcome accommodation, advice and support. The scheme is paused to new applications, and reopening to new applications must be predicated on ensuring we are able to honour our commitment to displaced people already in Scotland and those yet to travel and meets the seven criteria as set out in our paper published on 1 November - Super Sponsor Scheme review paper .

This criteria includes ensuring displaced people already here are in safe and suitable accommodation with access to advice and services; mitigating pressures on local Councils; ensuring accommodation is available for people who are yet to travel; assessing the current situation in Ukraine, including unforeseen developments leading to mass migration; and understanding costs related to re-opening the scheme with confirmation funding is in place. The Scottish Government will continue to monitor the situation closely and only re-open the scheme when it is safe and deliverable to do so.

Social Security Scotland has 16 working days to complete a re-determination for Low Income Benefits. In the case of Adult Disability Payment and Child Disability Payment, the timescale for completion of a re-determination is 56 calendar days. Work on a particular case may fluctuate during these time periods depending on progress to reach a conclusion. The number of hours invested by colleagues will depend on the complexity of the case.

Therefore Social Security Scotland is unable to provide an estimated cost of a re-determination request. How long it takes can vary depending upon the benefit involved and the complexity of the case - with a key factor in this being time taken to gather any further evidence. We do not monitor hours spent on processing a re-determination, we monitor the total turnaround time for providing a response to clients to ensure we do this in a timely manner and within the statutory periods. As our staff become more experienced, we would expect to see further efficiencies in this service.

Re-determination is an important part of our decision-making process and gives people the opportunity to ask us to look again and reconsider their application. At the re-determination stage, people often provide additional information that can be used to determine eligibility.

If on re-determination someone is found to be eligible, they will be paid from the date they first applied. Providing the option for re-determination minimises the need to go through the Tribunal Service with an appeal.

The Programme for Government 2021-22 stated that we will work alongside Police Scotland to develop an online reporting system that will enable anyone to upload camera footage of dangerous road use. The National Dashcam Safety Portal (NDSP) initiative, which deal with all matters of careless road use including riding, cycling or walking, is being led by Police Scotland with financial support from the Scottish Government through Scotland’s Road Safety Framework Fund.

The project to introduce a pilot Dash-Cam Safety Portal into Police Scotland is in the initial business case stage with Police Scotland currently looking at the internal processing, handling and storage of digital images and how that best fits with current and projected processes.

(a) Warmer Homes Scotland Customers save £230 on average on their annual fuel bills. In the period from April – September 2022, Warmer Homes Scotland Customers saw an average SAP increase of 6.7, with 5402 heating and energy efficiency measures installed in 2503 households.

(b) Warmer Homes Scotland is a national scheme which primarily targets support at owner occupied households. A range of proxies which indicate that a household are in or likely to be in fuel poverty are used as eligibility criteria to target support at those who need it the most. The eligibility criteria has recently been widened to allow a further 100,000 more households to become eligible.

(c) The current contract for Warmer Homes Scotland ends on 30th June 2023, and the procurement process is currently underway for a successor scheme which is due to begin on 3rd July 2023. The successor scheme will run for a minimum of 5 years, the contract includes the option to extend a further 2 years which would see the programme run until July 2030.

(a) (i) The consumer benefits for Phase One of the Home Upgrade Grant have not yet been published. However in the period from March – August 2022, 155 heating and energy efficiency measures were installed in 121 households. This data can be found here . (ii) The consumer benefits for Phase Two of HUG have not yet been released.

(b) (i)/(ii) The Home Upgrade Grant is delivered by Local Authorities who will set out their own individual eligibility criteria within parameters.

(c) (i) The Home Upgrade Grant Phase One has ended, (ii) Phase Two is due to end in March 2025.