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Social isolation and loneliness can affect all ages, stages and groups in our society and we know significant events such as addiction can lead to a situation where isolation compounds the challenges of recovery. That is why the Scottish Government carried out wide stakeholder engagement, community events and consultation to hear people’s views when developing our 'A Connected Scotland' Strategy.

To support people with problematic alcohol and drug use into treatment and recovery, recognising the impact that loneliness and isolation can have, the Scottish Government funds third sector partners, including the Scottish Recovery Consortium, the Scottish Drugs Forum and Scottish Families Affected by Alcohol and Drugs to address loneliness and isolation through family support, peer support and recovery communities.

In the last few months the publication of new Medication-Assisted Treatment Standards, and significant additional investment or £250 million over 5 years in alcohol and drug support will further increase this work. And in the coming months we will publish a framework for Alcohol and Drug Partnerships, Children’s Services and other local partners, setting out a whole-family approach and family-inclusive practice, which recognises and supports family members to build their own resilience and recover themselves. This will reduce their social isolation and loneliness.

This specific work complements our broader work on social isolation and loneliness across society. We will shortly make an announcement on our planned next steps in relation to our commitment to £10 million funding for social isolation and loneliness work over the span of this Parliament.

We remain committed to improving health messaging on alcohol products in Scotland. Our Alcohol Framework is clear that we expect producers to include the UK Chief Medical Officers’ low-risk weekly guidelines of 14 units on product labels as well as nutritional information and health warnings. Information must be easily readable and on pack rather than provided elsewhere.

We, along with the Welsh Government and Northern Ireland Executive, are continuing discussions with the UK Government on their plans for calorie labelling on alcohol products in England, in order to explore options for approaching alcohol labelling requirements on a four-nations basis. We would consider taking action on a unilateral Scottish basis if an effective four nations approach cannot be agreed.

The Scottish Government takes the welfare of all animals very seriously; and provision is made for the keepers of all animals to provide for their welfare under the Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006.

The Scottish Government will monitor the progress of proposed EU legislation on animal production methods and will seek to remain aligned with any changes that are made.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-01146 on‎ 1 July 2010. 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 considering funding arrangements for student allied health professions as part of the ongoing Allied Health Professions Education review.

The Scottish Government holds monthly performance meetings with all NHS Boards, including NHS Grampian. Their last meeting was earlier this month.

Officials also hold weekly cancer performance meetings to monitor the Board’s progress with regards to cancer services.

Recovering the NHS is our immediate focus, and this is why we have committed to publishing an NHS Recovery Plan within the first 100 days.

As part of this, we are investing over £330 million in a network of National Treatment Centres, one of which will be located in NHS Grampian. This will provide additional capacity for elective care.

Information on the number of patients within NHS Grampian who have been waiting more than 12 weeks is published quarterly by Public Health Scotland and can be found at NHS waiting times - stage of treatment 25 May 2021 - Data & intelligence from PHS (isdscotland.org)

This data shows the number of (a) inpatient or day case admissions and (b) outpatient appointments who have been waiting over 12 weeks.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-00017 on 24 May 2021. 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 Rent (Scotland) Act 1984 made it an offence to charge or receive any premium or require the making of any loan in addition to rent and a refundable deposit of no more than two months’ rent as a condition of the grant, renewal or continuance of a tenancy. This was further amended in 2011 to place beyond any doubt that such fees were illegal premiums. This position is reiterated in the statutory Letting Agent Code of Practice which came into force on 31 January 2018.

Prospective tenants who think they have been charged an illegal premium can refuse to pay, where tenants think they have paid an illegal premium they can raise an action to recover any fee paid through the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland (Housing and Property Chamber), there is no charge for this, or report the matter to Police Scotland.

In addition, where the person charging a fee is a letting agent, tenants can make an application to the Tribunal in relation to a breach of the Code of Practice. Where an agent is found to have breached the Code of Practice the Tribunal can issue a Letting Agent Enforcement Order that could include provision for the return of any prohibited fee.

Letting agents are required to be registered and to comply with the Letting Agents Code of Practice, which sets out the standards on how they manage their business and provide their services. This includes complying with relevant legislation and to have in place a complaints procedure. Concerns about a letting agent can be raised with the Letting Agent Registration team at the Scottish Government.

Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic National Records of Scotland (NRS) has placed significant amounts of information on care home deaths into the public domain. NRS analyses provides valuable information on characteristics of the deceased as well as presentation at Health Board and Local Authority level.

Following receipt of a FOI request for data at individual care home level, NRS carefully considered the potential public benefit of providing care home level data against the potential distress the public release of these data may cause families of the deceased, care home staff, residents and families of residents. NRS recognises that this is a complex issue and therefore welcomed the Scottish Information Commissioner's conclusion on how the balance of public benefit and potential distress should be considered. Following the decision by the Scottish Information Commissioner, NRS has complied with the instruction and now made this data available in line with the original FOI request.