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The Scottish Government has invested over £4 billion in the higher education sector over the last four years and, notwithstanding a very tough budget round, will continue to invest over £1 billion in our higher education institutions in 2016-17, ensuring that institutions receive financial support to enable them to deliver high quality teaching, world class research and knowledge exchange.

The Scottish Funding Council confirmed in their indicative funding allocations to universities for academic year 2016-17 (published 19 February 2016) that funding for core research, through the Research Excellence Grant and the Research Postgraduate Grant, would be maintained at the same level as in academic year 2015-16 (£231.8 million and £34.6 million respectively). In addition, the Scottish Funding Council is continuing to provide substantial strategic funding for research and knowledge exchange through its ambitious programme of Innovation Centres, investing up to £120 million over six years (2013-19).

Promoting Scotland’s research strengths in collaboration with the business base is key to maximising opportunities and ensuring impact. The Scottish Government’s continued investment in research and the development and application of higher education research and innovation enables our universities to continue to attract research funding from a range of other sources such as UK Research Councils, Innovate UK, businesses, charities and Europe. As announced in the Scottish budget on 16 December 2015, as part of our next major reform, we will work with all our partners, including the Scottish Funding Council and universities to further align our approach to innovation, to pool funding and to simplify the innovation landscape and access to support.

In 2012-13, the original maximum budget available to meet the Resource Accounting and Budget charge for providing student loans (excluding the Spring Budget Revision in readiness for the sale of the mortgage style student loan book) was £88.4 million.

The following table provides information on average gross revenue expenditure in Scotland per pre-school registration, primary pupil and secondary pupil along with information on teaching allocations per college and university place.

The following table provides the same information in 2014-15 prices:

For pre-school education, the estimates are derived by dividing the total expenditure on pre-school education reported by local authorities in the local finance return by the total number of early learning and childcare registrations reported in the Scottish Government early learning and childcare statistics. The data for the latter is collected by census based on registrations in a given week in January in 2008-2010 and September in 2010-13 (January 2010 data was used for 2009-10 and September 2010 data was used for 2010-11).

For primary and secondary education, average gross revenue expenditure per pupil is total gross revenue expenditure reported by local authorities on primary or secondary education, sourced from the local financial return, divided by the number of pupils in that school sector on pupil census date during the September of the relevant year.

For pre-school, primary and secondary education, data from 2007-08 and 2008-09 cannot be directly compared with data for 2009-10 onwards as there was an accounting methodology change.

Data from the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) on college teaching allocations per place is derived by taking funding provided to colleges for core teaching and fee waiver grant, divided by the weighted SUMs (relative costs to a college of delivering different subject) to derive expenditure by full time equivalent (FTE). Expenditure excludes tuition fees not paid by SFC (mainly the Student Awards Agency for Scotland) and student support funding along with funding from European Social Fund.

Data from SFC on University teaching allocations per place is derived by taking the total teaching grant provided by SFC for teaching places, divided by the total FTEs. The expenditure figures do not include funding for student support, SFC’s research and strategic funds or the tuition fees that SAAS pay. The total FTE figures are SFC and Scottish Government funded places and do not include fees only and international places. The rest of UK places were removed from 2012-13 on a phased basis (new students in 2012-13 and each new cohort thereafter over a five year period).

Real terms figures are in 2014-15 prices and are calculating using HM Treasury's GDP deflator series, December 2015.

I announced on 30 December 2015 the further work that would be undertaken following the responses to Zero Waste Scotland’s call for evidence. That includes the impacts on local authorities, small retailers and consumers, and other key issues.

The Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009 makes provision for ministers to introduce a deposit return scheme.

Scottish Government officials discussed the work undertaken thus far on deposit return and the Scottish Government’s plans for future work via teleconference with colleagues from the Welsh Government and the Northern Ireland Executive on 7 October 2015, with the Northern Ireland Executive on 1 February 2016 and with both administrations on 22 February 2016. The discussions covered updates on progress and issues that have been raised in relation to a deposit return system. There are no records associated with these meetings.

Rural Payments and Inspections Division have recruited 36 additional staff in order to help speed up processing and payments. The location of each of these staff members is shown on the following table:

It is not yet possible to confirm a date, although we expect to begin new procurement activity later in 2016. There are a number of steps that need to be taken prior to announcing our plans in detail. This includes finalising coverage to be delivered by the Digital Scotland Superfast Broadband programme, undertaking an Open Market Review to establish commercial plans and agreeing the appropriate state aid route. Currently we are working with the UK Government to develop a proposal to the European Commission for a new UK-wide state aid scheme for broadband. We expect this to be finalised in the coming months.

Scottish Government officials meet regularly with UK counterparts to discuss a range of issues, most frequently via teleconference. Following my letter to the Secretary of State in June 2015, for which I have not received a substantive response, there have been no meetings between officials specifically to discuss deposit return.

I wrote to the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on 31 January 2016 inviting him to discuss the further consideration of key issues on deposit return I announced on 30 December 2015. I am happy to share a copy of the letter with the member.