Chamber and committees

The information requested by Mr Kerr, MSP, is publicly available on the Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) website. Last month, the SSSC published official statistics in the ‘ Scottish Social Service Sector: Report on 2021 Workforce Data’ report. This Report contains official statistics dating back to 2012. As well as this report, the SSSC will publish more detailed tables in late 2022, providing a breakdown of the number of people working in all sub-sectors in individual local authority areas.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-10758 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

The Scottish Government is committed to building resilience to the locked-in impacts of climate change, as part of a just transition.

The approach to planning for adaptation in Scotland follows the statutory requirements of the Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009.

Alongside continuing to deliver the wide range of actions set out under the current statutory Scottish Climate Change Adaptation Programme (2019 – 2024), the Scottish Government is also now developing the next such Programme for publication in 2024. This Programme will respond to the full range of current and future climate risks for Scotland, as independently identified by the Climate Change Committee in its evidence base for the January 2022 update to the statutory UK Climate Change Risk Assessment.

As part of preparing the next Adaptation Programme, the Scottish Government is currently looking at options for early actions to enhance responses in the highest priority risk areas identified by the Climate Change Committee. These priority risk areas include both the impacts on food supply chains and distribution networks from climate-related disruption and those on human health, wellbeing and productivity from increased exposure to heat in homes and other buildings.

The Scottish Government is committed to building resilience to the locked-in impacts of climate change, as part of a just transition.

The approach to planning for climate change adaptation and resilience in Scotland follows the statutory requirements of the Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009.

Alongside continuing to deliver the wide range of actions set out under the current statutory Scottish Climate Change Adaptation Programme 2019 – 2024, the Scottish Government is also now developing the next such Programme for publication in 2024. This Programme will respond to the full range of current and future climate risks for Scotland, as independently identified by the Climate Change Committee in its evidence base for the January 2022 update to the statutory UK Climate Change Risk Assessment.

Over the remainder of 2022 and across 2023, the Scottish Government will be working with local authorities, public bodies, communities, the private sector and other stakeholders to develop enhanced approaches to building Scotland’s resilience to climate change. We also continue to fund the Adaptation Scotland Programme which works with local authorities and others to support adaptation capacity building, for example via the Adaptation Capability Framework, and support for place-based climate adaptation partnerships.

The First Minister met Tony Danker, CBI Director General and Tracy Black, CBI Scotland, Director, on 22 March 2022.During the meeting the following points were discussed:

• The Chancellor’s budget statement which was due the following day;

Many cities in Scotland have set ambitious net zero targets and are developing robust plans to deliver them. All 32 of Scotland’s Local Authorities signed Scotland’s Climate Change Declaration in 2007 and 28 Scottish Local Authorities have recognised or declared a climate emergency.

The Cities Commission For Climate Investment (3Ci) continues to work with selected local authorities to launch local place-based Net Zero pilots by providing technical assistance and support for project identification, design, investment structures and other key elements.

Glasgow and Edinburgh have bid to be a part of the European Union's 100 Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities mission and NetZeroCities project. The Scottish Government recognises that involvement in such a Mission presents a real opportunity to enable all of our seven cities to benefit from Scotland’s involvement in this hugely important Mission.

The Scottish Government welcomes the billion pound transformation of Glasgow’s Buchanan Street Quarter which will see Scottish Government officials working with Buchanan Galleries owner Landsec and Glasgow City Council to transform Glasgow’s famous shopping street with a multi-purpose shopping, residential and office quarter.

The Scottish Government is committed to continue working closely with cities across Scotland in tackling the global climate emergency.

A number of initiatives have been driven forward to support cities in Scotland in helping them work towards net zero ambitions. The Social Housing Net Zero Heat Fund is making £200 million of grant funding available over this parliamentary term to registered social landlords in Scotland, including Local Authorities for the retrofit of existing housing stock.

Earlier this year the Scottish Government published its draft Vision for Scotland’s public electric vehicle charging network and announced a new Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Fund that aims to double the size of the network through £60m of public and private investment.

Over £50 million per annum goes towards the Sustrans managed Places for Everyone programme that funds local authorities to create safer, more attractive, healthier places and increase the number of trips made by walking, cycling and wheeling for everyday journeys.

Although not targeted exclusively at cities, we are aiming to unlock £200m investment from local authorities in low carbon infrastructure through our Green Growth Accelerator and the long term nature of the £5 billion City Region and Growth Deals programme has allowed us to develop and apply international carbon management best practice that will result in significant net zero benefits across and beyond Scotland.

The First Minister and other Scottish Government Ministers engage regularly with the Federation of Small Business (FSB) Scotland to discuss all issues affecting small businesses.

The First Minister last met representatives of the FSB Scotland on 19 May 2022 at the FSB Celebrating Small Business Awards UK. A discussion with Martin McTague, FSB National Chair and Colin Borland, Director of Devolved Nations at FSB included the importance of small businesses to Scotland's economy, the significant support and work that FSB do in dialogue with Scottish Government and the success of Scottish businesses, including the Scottish 2022 winner at the UK-wide Federation of Small Business Awards.

More recently on 31 August 2022, I met with Stacey Dingwall, Head of Policy for Scotland and Andrew McRae, Scotland's Policy Chair FSB during a visit to Amity Fish Ltd, Peterhead. Issues discussed included business rates, energy costs and skills.

Information on committee processes in relation to individual planning applications which are called in by Scottish Ministers is not recorded centrally. The figures below are the collective total of applications called in by Scottish Ministers per year from 2012 to date. This includes cases called in at points before, during and after consideration by a council committee, and also those where the council’s consideration had been delegated to planning officials.

We are working closely with local authorities and with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA) and doing all we can to speed up the matching process and increase the numbers of displaced people moving into host accommodation.

On 22 September, the Scottish Government published its first summary of the latest Scotland-level data and information on people displaced by the war in Ukraine coming to Scotland through the Ukraine Sponsorship Scheme visa schemes, including data on the number of displaced people in welcome accommodation: Key points - Ukraine Sponsorship Scheme in Scotland: statistics - gov.scot.