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The Scottish Government cannot currently confirm the outcomes of the review. However, the Building (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2022 are expected to be laid in the Scottish Parliament soon after Easter recess with a proposed coming into force date of 1 June 2022. Supporting guidance is expected to be published in April 2022.

(a) & (b) The UK and Welsh Governments are both represented on the Building Standards (Fire Safety) Review Panel 2020-22 where the continued referencing of BS 8414 in guidance supporting building regulations in light of any new evidence was one of the main areas of discussion.

The Scottish Government is closely following the Grenfell Tower Inquiry proceedings and considering any evidence that may impact on building standards, including the role of BS 8414. Working groups for each phase of the Grenfell Inquiry have been set up by the Ministerial Working Group on Building and Fire Safety to address emerging evidence and key recommendations.

The Scottish Government will publish its response to the consultation after the Building (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2022 are laid in the Scottish Parliament soon after Easter recess with a proposed coming into force date of 1 June 2022. Supporting guidance is expected to be published in April 2022.

Since the late 1990s, an agreed definition of domestic abuse has been used to collate information on domestic abuse incidents within Scotland. This definition was progressed by the then Scottish Office and agreed through consultation with key justice agencies and stakeholders. It is as follows:

‘Domestic abuse is any form of physical, non-physical, or sexual abuse which takes place within the context of a close relationship, committed either in the home or elsewhere. This relationship will be between partners (married, co-habiting or otherwise) or ex-partners.’

The Scottish Government has considered the statutory definition of domestic abuse contained at Part 1 of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 which relates to England and Wales. The principal practical difference between the definition contained in that Act and the Scottish definition above is that domestic abuse does not extend in Scotland so as to include abuse between certain relatives who are not partners or ex-partners.

The Scottish Government recognises that abuse can be committed by people who are not a person's partner or ex-partner, including by other family members. However, in line with the views of the majority of stakeholders who responded to Scottish Government consultations that led to the development of recent legislation concerning domestic abuse, the Scottish Government considers that it is appropriate that this legislation applies specifically to partners and ex-partners. This is because abuse committed by a person's partner or ex-partner typically has a dynamic that differs from violence or abuse more generally, including where this abuse occurs within a family between, for example, siblings or parents and their adult children. There is a range of existing legislation that can be used to address familial abuse.

While the Scottish Government keeps the law under continual review to ensure that it is effective, there are no current plans to amend the definition of domestic abuse in Scotland to cover abuse perpetrated by family members who are not partners or ex-partners.

Information on the number of pupil support assistants employed in 2021 was published on 15 March 2022 and is available here School support staff statistics - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) .

Information on previous years is available in the answer to parliamentary question S6W-01069: 'To ask the Scottish Government how many classroom assistants have been employed in each local authority area in each year since 1999.'

The function of Scottish Water is to treat and supply high quality drinking water as well as to collect, treat and safely dispose of wastewater for those customers who are connected to the public water and/or wastewater network. To this end, Scottish Water has delivered significant levels of investment since its creation in 2002 and local authorities would not be funding and undertaking work which falls under the specific functions of Scottish Water. Local authorities have separate responsibilities in relation to private water supplies, any private water and waste water pipes which fall under their responsibility, some roads drainage and also for flood risk management. In areas where there are inter-linking responsibilities, some partnerships have been established between Scottish Water and local authorities, such as the Metropolitan Glasgow Strategic Drainage Partnership and the Edinburgh and Lothians Drainage Partnership. In addition to this, Scottish Water has partnerships with local authorities, where appropriate, where there is an opportunity to develop and deliver innovative solutions, such as the Stirling district heating scheme and work being delivered through Clyde Gateway, among others.

Scottish Water would be happy to further discuss its partnership work with Local Authorities if the member would find that helpful.

The Scottish Government does not collect or hold this information. You may wish to contact the Scottish Housing Regulator who collect a range of information from all social landlords as part of their Annual Return on the Scottish Social Housing Charter or individual Local Authorities.

Veterans who have left the armed forces within the past two years are a priority access group for the Low Cost Initiative for First-Time Buyers (LIFT) shared equity schemes, which includes the Open Market Shared Equity and New Supply Shared Equity schemes.

As the tax authority with responsibility for the collection and management of Scotland’s devolved taxes, Revenue Scotland publishes monthly and annual data on its website regarding the number of property conveyances and non-residential leases subject to Land and Buildings Transaction Tax (LBTT) and the associated tax liabilities. These are available at https://revenue.scot/news-publications/publications/statistics .

Local authority level data is published on an annual basis, as part of Revenue Scotland’s Annual Summary of Trends in the Devolved Taxes. The report for 2020-21, which provides data for the period from 1 April 2015 to 31 March 2021, is available at: Annual Summary of Trends in the Devolved Taxes 2020-2021 | Revenue Scotland .

In particular, the ‘Data for Figure 17’ tab in the figures and tables file of this publication includes an estimate of LBTT excluding ADS declared due for residential conveyances by local authority and year. The ‘Data for Figure 23’ tab in the same file gives an estimate of LBTT declared due by Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS) 2 area and year for non-residential conveyances. Local authority level estimates of non-residential conveyances are not provided to minimise the risk of disclosing protected taxpayer information.