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We welcome DEFRA's strategic assessment report on Nature security and the attention it brings to the critical importance of biodiversity both domestically and globally. We will take these findings into consideration as we work to deliver our biodiversity ambitions through the Scottish Biodiversity Strategy and its first five year delivery plan.

The Scottish Government is absolutely committed to supporting a just transition to net zero for workers, communities and businesses. Through initiatives such as the Just Transition Fund and the Energy Transition Fund, we have invested £120m in the North East and helped leverage in tens of millions in extra investment, create green jobs, support innovation, and secure the highly skilled workforce of the future.

Budget positions reflect the challenging overall fiscal context. Despite this, the Scottish Government has maintained support for key Energy Transitions initiatives such as the Grangemouth Just Transition Fund, the Oil and Gas Transition Training Fund and Carbon Capture Utilisation and Storage. The Just Transition Fund for the North East and Moray is crucial in realising our just transition ambitions and is just one part of a wider package of support for the region. The Just Transition Fund’s multi-year settlement, set out in the Spending Review, underlines the Scottish Government’s commitment to the Fund.

NHS guidelines advise an average minimum frequency for routine dental appointments however Health Boards are not statutorily obligated to provide General Dental Services to patients directly.

NHS Western Isles is actively working towards accessible dental care to patients across their region. A locum dentist is expected to begin providing service mid-March 2026.

Additionally, the Public Dental Service (PDS) continues to provide urgent and emergency care to unregistered patients unable to access general dental services. These provisions remain in place within NHS Boards, to ensure unregistered patients with a dental emergency are seen as a matter of urgency.

Planning for Community and Renewable Energy Scheme (CARES) funding for 2026-27 is currently ongoing.

We are committed to working with partners to continue to grow the community energy sector, including by investing in CARES. We want to ensure that the delivery of renewable energy comes with benefits for people in Scotland, as well as supporting progress towards net zero.

Following the extended relief announced at Stage One of the Budget Bill, the Budget ensures the estimated revenues raised from non-domestic rates in 2026-27 will be 7% lower in real terms measured by the Consumer Price Index than pre-COVID despite the number of properties on the valuation roll increasing in that time. It sets out a decrease in the three non-domestic property rates, including a 3.5% decrease in the Higher Property Rate, from 56.8p to 54.8p.

Ministers and COSLA Leaders have agreed that £42m from the General Capital Grant will be distributed for flood resilience in 2026-27. The Draft Budget also includes £20m of capital funding for the Climate Emergency, and £15.5 for Inter Island Connectivity.

The Scottish Government’s policy on spending is to allow local authorities the financial freedom to operate independently. It is then the responsibility of local authorities to manage budgets and to allocate their financial resources, including on flood protection, on the basis of local needs and priorities, having first fulfilled their statutory obligations and the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities.

The Scottish Government’s Community and Renewable Energy Scheme (CARES), continues to play a central role in supporting communities to engage with, participate in, and benefit from Scotland’s transition to net zero emissions.

In 2024-25, CARES Recovery funding delivered or supported 154 projects across all of its funding calls.

In 2025-26 to date, CARES Recovery funding has so far delivered or supported an estimated 264 projects through its funding calls. The Community Energy Generation Growth Fund and the Community Solar Fund were both supported by a combination of Scottish Government and Great British Energy funding. As this financial year is ongoing, the final number of projects delivered is subject to change.

Following our commitment in 2024 to invest up to £500m over five years in offshore wind infrastructure and supply chain, the Scottish Budget has allocated up to £93m for investment in 2026-27. We are working closely with industry and public sector delivery partners to identify and deliver projects at pace, with a continued focus on leveraging significant wider investment. Over the past two years, we have made £200 million of capital funding available and allocated £100 million, leveraging up to £370 million of private investment, with the potential to support over 2,000 jobs.

And overall to date, our investment of almost £150 million is crowding in a further £70m from UK public finance institutions and leveraging up to £670 million in private investment into projects with the potential to support up to 5,000 jobs.

The impact of global offshore wind market conditions, and delays to progress on key UK-level policy and system enablers – including Contracts for Difference, transmission charging, electricity grid connections, and the Strategic Spatial Energy Plan – have affected short-term investor confidence. It is now more important than ever that the UK Government takes decisive action to ensure the Scottish project pipeline can be deployed quickly in order to deliver the thousands of offshore wind sector jobs that can support a just transition.

The Scottish Government and our NHS partners are committed to ensuring everyone in Scotland has equal access to the healthcare they need. This is reflected in The Health and Social Care Service Renewal Framework 2025-26, which sets out our vision to improve population health, including mental health; preventative healthcare and early intervention; and reducing inequalities.

The Scottish Equity in Screening Strategy 2023 - 2026 also outlines our commitment to improving access to screening for all, including those with mental health conditions. The screening programmes are working with all NHS Boards, screening programmes and a wide number of stakeholders to identify and address challenges patients may face.

To support this work, the Scottish Government have provided £1 million annually for national and local initiatives that reduce inequalities and improve access to screening. This funding has recently enabled NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde to employ a specialist nurse to deliver cervical screening in mental health inpatient settings. Screening Oversight and Assurance Scotland is also developing new guidance to improve screening access for all inpatients, including those in mental health care.

Across the NHS more generally, all patients and screening participants are encouraged to discuss any concerns or additional requirements with a relevant healthcare professional before attending appointments or receiving treatment. These must be taken account of and recorded where they have been communicated by the patient, the patient’s carer, or a medical practitioner, to ensure support can be provided throughout the entire patient pathway. This is underpinned by the Waiting Times Guidance, published November 2023, which notes that Health Boards have a duty to ensure that patients are provided with information they can easily understand, and that appropriate support is put in place as required.

Finally, Everyone should be invited every five years between the ages of 40 and 74 for a NHS health check, while people engaged with their GP’s learning disability register are entitled to a mandatory annual health check.

Regulated roles are defined under schedule 2 and schedule 3 of the Protection of Vulnerable Groups (Scotland) Act 2007 and there is guidance to assist at PVG scheme - Regulated roles guidance - mygov.scot.

It is the responsibility of the organisation providing the individual with the role to assess whether, as a necessary part of that individual’s role, the type of activity they are doing with children would meet the definition of a regulated role with children set out in schedule 2 of the Protection of Vulnerable Groups (Scotland) Act 2007.

Where an individual is doing a regulated role, the organisation supplying them is responsible for confirming PVG scheme membership.

For school-based volunteering managed by the school or local authority, the school or local authority must apply its own recruitment procedures, including appropriate use of the PVG scheme.

When activities arranged by a school are provided by another organisation, for example, a charity providing mental health support to pupils then suitability for the role is the responsibility of the charity. The charity must ensure that the individual is a PVG scheme member and has received a Level 2 PVG scheme disclosure before undertaking the regulated role.

A more definitive answer to this question cannot be provided as it is unclear whether the role would take place within a school or on the charity's own premises. This distinction is significant because the setting can determine whether a role is regulated, particularly where there is potential for unsupervised contact with children.

In relation to activities involving contact with children, a charity representative delivering a talk about their organisation is unlikely to be carrying out a regulated role. However, if the charity is delivering workshops designed to train or teach children a specific skill or activity or is providing recreational or physical activities, then the individual would be carrying out an activity set out in schedule 2 of the Protection of Vulnerable Groups (Scotland) Act 2007.