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This is an operational matter for the Scottish Funding Council. I have asked the Chief Executive to respond.

As stated in ‘Global Scotland’, Scotland’s Trade and Investment Strategy 2016-21, published in March this year, the Scottish Government is committed to establishing a Ministerial-led Trade Board. We are currently discussing with public and private sector partners a delivery plan. Budget, remit and membership will be considered as part of these discussions.

The details for how this funding will be directed is currently being finalised. However, any projects will have to meet the following criteria:

Spend to save – a demonstration that investment in energy efficiency measures will generate reduced energy bills in future and thereby a saving to the public purse;

Carbon reduction – the potential to deliver a significant reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption;

Economic benefits – the project must have the ability to show a positive economic impact on Scotland and demonstrate that it is additional activity -not current planned investment; and

Work on the project must start in financial year 2016-17.

The Scottish Government launched the Transition Training Fund (TTF), on1 February, to support individuals and help the sector retain talent. The £12 million training fund, currently in its eight month will be available over a three year period.

A review of health and social care targets and indicators was announced in September 2016. This review will be chaired by the University of Strathclyde Professor of Global Public Health, Sir Harry Burns, and will ensure targets and performance indicators lead to the best outcomes for people being cared for, whether in hospital, primary care, community care or social care services. The current indicators on palliative and end of life care, as well as potential additional or alternative indicators, will be considered as part of this review.

Health and Social Care Integration Indicator 15 on the “Proportion of last 6 months of life spent at home or in a community setting” is now fully developed and will be reported on by all Health and Social Care Partnerships (HSCPs) as part of their Performance Reports. All HSCPs will publish their 2016-17 reports by the end of July 2017 and annually thereafter.

Work is on-going to ensure availability of robust data for indicator 23, “Expenditure on end of life care”. The recently announced review of health and social care targets and indicators will include further consideration of this indicator.

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-02458 on 21 September 2016. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

The current core suite of integration indicators was developed in consultation with a wide range of stakeholders across all sectors, including NHS Scotland, COSLA and a wide variety of third and independent organisations to ensure that they would be effective in driving forward improvement across the National Health and Wellbeing Outcomes.

The two indicators on palliative and end of life care were included in order to reflect Health and Care Partnerships’ key role in commissioning high quality palliative and end of life care services. The indicators will help ensure that there is a focus on more planned approach to palliative and end of life care which reflects best practice and, as far as is practicable, is in accordance with the needs and wishes of patients, carers and their families.

The Scottish Government is currently developing a draft Energy Strategy to be published in early 2017, alongside the Climate Change Plan. A public consultation on the draft Energy Strategy will take place thereafter, seeking the views and insight of industry, academia, public sector and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and embarking upon a public dialogue with Scottish communities and energy consumers on Scotland’s energy future. The results of the consultation will inform the production of the final Energy Strategy which will be published in the latter half of 2017.

The international evidence is clear - promoting competitiveness and addressing inequality are interdependent. Reducing inequality is not only important in itself, but is vital to creating the conditions to deliver sustainable economic growth over the long term.

Scotland’s Economic Strategy, published in March last year, contains relevant evidence on the relationship between inequality and growth (pages 22-23). For example, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) found that lower income inequality is correlated with faster and more sustainable growth. This is supported by work from Professor Joseph Stiglitz concluding that countries that are more unequal grow more slowly and are less stable. Finally, a recent working paper by Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) estimates that rising income inequality in the UK has decreased Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita growth by 9 percentage points between 1990 and 2010.

Further Information on Scotland’s Economic Strategy can be found at

http://www.gov.scot/Publications/2015/03/5984.