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Since 2011 the Scottish Government has provided interest free loans worth over £223 million to individuals and businesses across Scotland to support the transition to zero emission/ultra-low emission vehicles.

This financial year we are providing £15 million of loan funding to further accelerate the shift to zero emission transport. To support a just transition to net zero, funding has now been prioritised to focus solely on lower income households, as well as households in rural and Island locations, in addition to the taxi sector.

Recipients of the loan as well as individuals who reside in rural and Island locations can also access the domestic charge point fund which will provide up to £400 of funding to support the installation of a charge point for an electric vehicle.

Both of these funds are delivered by Energy Saving Trust on behalf of Scottish Ministers, additional information on the schemes supporting the transition to Net Zero and funded by the Scottish Government can be found here - Grants and loans to help you travel greener - Energy Saving Trust.

Our focus remains on mitigating any impact, to the best of our ability, that Petroineos’ decision to close the Grangemouth Refinery will have on the locality and wider economy. Petroineos’ consultation with their workforce is ongoing and, following its conclusion, we will be able to establish in more detail any potential impact that the closure of the Grangemouth Refinery will have.

The Scottish and UK Governments have announced a package of measures to support Grangemouth’s industrial future. This includes a skills intervention, jointly funded by Scottish Government and UK Government, to support those Petroineos workers affected by the recent closure announcement. This intervention will support workers at both the Grangemouth Refinery and Finnart Terminal, and will be provided by Forth Valley College.

Looking towards the long term future of the Refinery site, the Scottish and UK Government's are supporting the Project Willow cross site study which is examining the enablers and blockers to deploying low carbon technologies at Grangemouth. Such technologies will take time to be brought forward, but they offer a route to the creation of new, highly skilled jobs at Grangemouth and our focus is on accelerating the deployment of these projects and associated jobs.

Lastly, the Deputy First Minister and Secretary of State for Scotland have also signed an enhanced Falkirk and Grangemouth Growth Deal that will support wider economic development for those who live in the locality.

The Scottish Government has committed to the development of a just transition plan for Mossmorran following completion of the just transition plan for Grangemouth in 2025. As with the Grangemouth just transition plan, this work will be co-designed with key stakeholders including industry, the workforce and the community. The Scottish Government is actively engaging with relevant stakeholders as part of the scoping phase of this programme of work.

The Scottish Government is committed to reducing high deer numbers in order to help us to achieve our biodiversity and carbon objectives. In addition to the Cairngorms National Park Authority deer management incentives pilot, NatureScot launched two pilot schemes led by this autumn to incentivise deer managers to increase deer culls in specific parts of Scotland.

These pilot schemes have been implemented this year in different parts of Scotland to test different approaches to incentives and to better understand the barriers to deer management.

While these pilots do not constitute a single national scheme, we will use the findings from them to inform decisions on future incentive schemes.

The Scottish Government remains commitment to securing a long term, sustainable future for the Grangemouth industrial cluster, and highly skilled workforce located there. This is outlined in our draft Grangemouth Industrial Just Transition Plan which was published for consultation on 7 November.

This document is designed to set the strategic direction for Grangemouth’s transition to net zero, including a co-designed vision for the future of the cluster and a series of proposed actions to support this. The final plan will take cognisance of the outputs of Project Willow which is due to report in early 2025.

We have been engaging with the shareholders of the Grangemouth Refinery business over many years on future options for the site, demonstrated in a track record support for low carbon technologies at the site. Via Scottish Enterprise, since 2021 we have supported a range of studies which explored the feasibility a bio-refinery at Grangemouth, as well as the use of low carbon hydrogen for fuel switching purposes. These studies are predecessors to the Project Willow study, which the business approached the Scottish Government with in early 2024 and is considering the enablers and blockers to deploying a range of low carbon technologies at Grangemouth.

Social Security Scotland and Scottish Government work together closely to monitor the impact of the devolved benefits.

The impact of Best Start Foods is measured in three ways: the Social Security Scotland Client Survey; the Social Security Scotland Client Panels Survey; and Scottish Government policy evaluation.

The most recent Client Survey findings are published online at https://www.socialsecurity.gov.scot/reporting/publications/client-survey-2023-2024 and https://www.socialsecurity.gov.scot/reporting/publications/client-survey-five-family-payments-december-march-2024.

The most recent Client Panels Survey findings are published online at https://www.socialsecurity.gov.scot/reporting/publications/annual-client-panels-survey-2023.

In 2022 the initial evaluation of Best Start Foods was published online at https://www.gov.scot/publications/evaluation-best-start-foods/.

A further evaluation of the Five Family Payments is currently underway, which will provide quantitative evidence from a large scale survey of recipients on the impact of receiving Best Start Foods. The evaluation is expected to be published in Summer 2025.

The accreditation scheme is owned and managed by the Living Wage Foundation, with Poverty Alliance responsible for it's delivery in Scotland. Therefore Scottish Government is not the data owner or gatherer, below is the number of accredited employers since the 2015-16 financial year:

Scottish Government is working closely with ADPs to ensure further roll-out of Alcohol Harms Groups and Alcohol Death Reviews across Scotland.

The ADP Survey highlights that in addition to the 30% of ADPs with specific Alcohol Harms Groups in place a further third report having other structures in place for informing surveillance. These include multi-agency groups working on wider public health monitoring including drug and alcohol harms and sudden death groups whose remits include both death reviews and suicide reviews.

Several ADPs have indicated that alcohol harm and death review groups are currently in development.

Scottish Government is working in partnership with Alcohol Focus Scotland to ensure that all ADPs in Scotland have agreed processes to review alcohol deaths and build on the learning of the 27% of ADPs already delivering.

Scottish Government is working closely with ADPs to ensure further roll-out of Alcohol Harms Groups and Alcohol Death Reviews across Scotland.

We are working in partnership with Alcohol Focus Scotland is ensure that all ADPs in Scotland have structures in place to carry out alcohol death reviews and build on the learning of the 27% of ADPs already delivering these.