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When an area is granted a protectionorder it is on condition that wider public access is made available on terms andconditions that the Scottish ministers consider to be necessary. This access requiresto be maintained unless a different agreement is reached on conservation grounds.

There are currently no plansto revoke any protection order. However, the operation of protection orders is underconstant review, and any protection order may be revoked or varied where appropriate.

We recognise the issue of decliningyouth participation within angling and we are working with the sector to informyoung people about fish and to introduce them to angling.

Over the next three years wehave committed to make available £1.2 million towards management and developmentof freshwater fisheries.

Yes. On average households inScotland across all income deciles and council tax bands will be better off witha council tax freeze.

The ScottishGovernment recognises that in recent years there has been an undersupply ofhousing across Scotland, in many rural areas as well as pressuredurban settlements, and is committed to increasing housing supply significantly.Our consultation FirmFoundations: The Future of Housing in Scotland can be accessed online at: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2007/10/30153156/0or in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 43970). Itinvites comments on a proposed aim of increasing house building to 35,000 newhomes each year by the middle of the next decade across rural and urban areas.We are alsotaking action now to try to overcome the obstacles, such as land supply andplanning issues, which stand in the way of new development in rural areas,through the work of the Housing Supply Task Force. The task force hasidentified rural housing supply as an early priority and met to discuss ruralhousing supply on 27 November. Further information about the task force can befound online at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Housing/Housing/housing-supply-task-force.

The Scottish Governmenthas shown its on-going commitment to the work to tackle violence against women,including domestic abuse through the allocation of more than £40 million over thenext three years to this agenda. For example, both the Violence Against Women Fundand the Children’s Services Women’s Aid Fund will continue, as well as continuedfunding for Scottish Women’s Aid. We are also providing local government in Scotland with record levels of funding over the period covered by the spending review2008-11.

It is the responsibilityof each local authority to allocate the total financial resources available to iton the basis of local needs and priorities taking into account its statutory obligationsand the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities including the ScottishGovernment’s key strategic objectives and national outcomes.

As part of awide-ranging strategy to combat domestic abuse, the Scottish Government ispromoting effective handling of criminal cases, through the development ofoptions for a Domestic Abuse Court in Glasgow and the production of a toolkit to encourageinnovation across courts in Scotland. This is underpinned by a protocol on thehandling of domestic criminal incidents, agreed between the police and theCrown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.

However,sentencing of those found guilty is solely a matter for judges.

The Scottish Governmentis committed to tackling domestic abuse and ensuring that those affected by itare given the support they need and those perpetrating it are dealt witheffectively. It will continue to look at how it can improve what it does toaddress domestic abuse.

The increase in the number of domestic abuseincidents involving anex-spouse or ex-partner mirror the overall increase in reporting. This increase may be attributed to morepeople recognising that all forms of domestic abuse are wrong and reportingsuch incidents to the police.

The rise in the number of reported incidents may alsobe attributed to the highly successful publicity campaign, which runs annuallyfrom 26 December until the end of January, evaluation of which has shown thatover 78% of the population have seen or heard of the campaign. The campaignwill run again this year.

When an initialevaluation of the Protectionfrom Abuse (Scotland) Act 2001 wascarried out in 2003, it was found that the act hadbeen successful in increasing access to powers of arrest. In 2005 thethen Executive wrote to over 180 organisations to remind them of the variouslegal provisions in Scotland designed to protect against abuse. Inaddition to this, during the engagement with key stakeholders during thepassage of the Family Law (Scotland) Bill it was identified that solicitorswere familiar with the 2001 Act. The Law Society of Scotland said in itswritten evidence to the Justice 1 Committee that the 2001 Act “is the principalpiece of legislation containing powers of arrest and is most widely used”.

It is incorrectto say that funding for affordable housing is no longer ring-fenced. Table21.03 of the Scottish Budget document published on 14 November 2007 shows the affordable housing budget for the years2008-11. In addition, there is a further £119.1 million a year for affordablehousing which is ring-fenced in the local government budget.

In total, thespending plans for affordable housing over the period 2008-11 are 19% higherthan the spending plans for the period 2005-08. With the additional fundingprovided as a result of the Spending Review, we expect to approve over theperiod 2008-11 more new affordable houses than will be approved over the period2005-08. Precisely how many more will depend on how the social housing sectorresponds to the proposals in our discussion document, Firm Foundations: thefuture of housing in Scotland, for achieving better value from availablepublic expenditure.