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Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS) has supported the Scottish Government in the development of the Scottish Biodiversity Strategy (SBS) and Delivery Plan, through participation in official working groups ran by the Environment and Forestry Directorate.

FLS provided written evidence to Scottish Forestry officials on forest policy related actions which subsequently fed into the SBS.

FLS are now discussing internally how to support delivery of the Biodiversity Actions which will be summarised in their next corporate plan.

As Scotland’s largest manager of wild deer FLS provided practitioner input to the development of the SBS reflecting the critical dependency for SBS outcomes to be enabled by proactive deer management by all land managers.

The following table shows the number of cases closed during the past 5 financial years which were time barred on receipt of report by COPFS. Each case may comprise multiple accused and a variety of charges. To ascertain case type would require a manual check of each report. This information is not readily available.

Criminal cases reported to COPFS

Count is cases closed using the marking - 'No Action: Timebarred On Receipt'

Grouped by financial year case closed

count is by case

Financial year closed

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the retirement ages of GPs.

The Scottish Government does not collect or hold information on how many individuals may seek regulated independent healthcare provided transgender chest surgery.

Regular updates will be provided by Transport Scotland to Ministers to ensure appropriate action is taken to address concerns at the Shawhead Flyover. The current position is that Transport Scotland has asked its maintenance contractor (Scottish Roads Partnership) to assess several options for works at the junction to improve driver confidence. This work is underway. In addition, Transport Scotland has also asked Police Scotland for the junction to be assessed by their Police Camera Safety Team in the next site selection exercise, which is due to begin in April.

The safety of the rail network is a reserved matter under Schedule 5 of the Scotland Act 1998. The rail infrastructure in Scotland is owned and managed by Network Rail. The Scottish Government has fully funded Network Rail to meet its obligations as specified by the independent Office of Rail and Road (ORR) and Scottish Ministers expect Network Rail to manage the rail infrastructure in a manner which provides a safe and reliable railway for the people of Scotland.

Senior Officials from the ORR and the Managing Director of Network Rail Scotland have confirmed to senior officials at Transport Scotland that this matter is being addressed within Scotland, a point also reflected in the Chief Inspector’s recent letter to Network Rail on this matter:

“…..Scotland can substantiate a recovery of examinations and structural assessments within [2024-29]” Control Period 7, CP7.

The letter itself can be found here: Non-compliance with structure examinations - Letter to Network Rail dated 11 February 2025

This information is not collected centrally by the Scottish Government and is an operational matter for NHS National Services Scotland, National Services Division (NSD).

Gender reassignment surgeries, as a treatment option for assessed gender dysphoria, are highly specialised and are carried out within the framework of a four-nations contract managed by NHS England. This contract is managed on NHS Scotland’s behalf by NSD.

The Transport (Scotland) Act 2019 places a duty upon all local authorities to enforce the new parking prohibitions. It is for each local authority to determine how best to enforce these prohibitions in their area. Transport Scotland annually collates figures on income and expenditure and Penalty Charge Notices issued, which now includes pavement parking. The most recent report was published in December 2024 and can be found at the following link: Decriminalised Parking Enforcement (DPE) Report 2023-2024 | Transport Scotland

This is an operational matter for Caledonian Sleeper Ltd (CSL).

CSL advises that it is taking a number of actions to promote its iconic services, which are fully booked for a growing proportion of the year. The Member may wish to contact CSL directly for more details.

The Scottish Government has provided over £65 million to support the development of public EV charging across Scotland. As a direct result of this funding, and increasing private sector investment, Scotland met its target for 6,000 public charge points in October last year, two years ahead of schedule and Scotland now has almost 6,200 public EV charge points.

In June 2023 the Scottish Government published the Vision for Scotland’s Public Electric Vehicle Charging Network, highlighting the need for a transition towards a public charging network that is largely financed and delivered by the private sector. In December 2024 we published our draft Vision Implementation Plan that identifies proposed actions for delivering this Vision, as well as a route map for delivering approximately 24,000 additional public electric vehicle charge points by 2030, largely funded and delivered by the private sector.

The Scottish Government does not install EV charging, but it continues to support EV charging expansion through its £30 million EV Infrastructure Fund which supports Scotland’s local authorities to partner with the private sector to continue to expand public EV charging and, following approval of the Scottish Government’s budget for 2025-26 by this parliament, a further £5 million will be made available to support the provision of public EV charging in rural and island communities. Further details of this funding and the charging infrastructure it will support will be announced in due course.