Seòmar agus comataidhean

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-29439 on 17 September 2024. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility, which can be found at: https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

The Business Register and Employment Survey (BRES), produced by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), is the preferred source for jobs estimates for industry sectors. The latest available BRES jobs estimates are for 2022 with consistent time series available back to 2015. Jobs estimates for the Accommodation and Food Service Activities sector for 2015 to 2022 are shown in the following table.

Table 1: Estimated jobs in the Accommodation and Food Service Activities sector, Scotland, 2015 to 2022

The Scottish Government funds the Scottish Book Trust (SBT) to deliver the SBT Reading Schools programme and therefore SBT is responsible for setting the criteria for core, silver and gold accreditation.

Reading Schools encourages a whole-school approach to establishing a healthy reading culture in schools across Scotland. The Reading Schools Accreditation framework details the key areas considered crucial to building and sustaining a whole-school reading culture and are mapped against How Good Is Our School? 4. In order to be accredited, a school must provide evidence of how they have achieved the standard described under each of the key areas. Schools retain their accreditation for three years, before being required to evidence further developments to sustain reading culture.

The SBT Reading Schools Framework can be accessed online here: https://www.readingschools.scot/framework

The Strategy Steering Group for Palliative Care (SSG), representing the wide range of partners involved in palliative care, chaired by a National Clinical Lead for Palliative Care, and supported by a Clinical and Professional Advisory Group (CPAG), has been crucial in the development of our new Palliative Care Strategy.

The Strategy Steering Group last met on 20 June 2024, to consider the latest version of the draft Palliative Care Strategy and provide further feedback. We anticipate that the draft Palliative Care Strategy and associated consultation will be published in the coming weeks.

As with any litigation, the details of any settlement are confidential to the parties involved in that litigation. The Scottish Ministers however can confirm that the total costs incurred by the Scottish Ministers in relation to the cases of McMaster & Others v the Scottish Ministers and MacKay & Another v the Scottish Ministers is £1,033,302.75.

Scottish Ministers are responsible for the safe operation and maintenance of the trunk road network. The requirements for surfacing materials used on the trunk road network are laid out in the Specification for Highway Works and the Design Manual for Roads and Bridges. These documents do allow some use of road planings in certain circumstances. They can be used in the lower foundation layers of all road types, depending on levels of traffic or as a base layer when mixed with a small amount of cement and foamed bitumen. Finally, small proportions of road planings can be recycled into hot and warm mix asphalt, which are generally used in the upper layers of a road.

The Roads (Scotland) Act 1984 places the statutory responsibility for local roads’ improvement, maintenance and repair with local road authorities. Local authorities have a duty to manage and maintain local roads in their area and duties under the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 to secure the expeditious, convenient and safe movement of traffic.

Where the maintenance liability for new roads being built within new residential developments is to be adopted by the Local Authority then the relevant local road authority will define the required specifications and standards and these govern what may be used.

Scottish Ministers honoured the commitment to treat sympathetically the compensation claims of the tenant farmers in the court actions of McMaster & Others v Scottish Ministers and Mackay & Another v the Scottish Ministers. Settlement terms are confidential to the parties involved in a litigation and should not be disclosed.

The Scottish Government continues to be committed to finding ways to make sustainable travel modes more attractive and supporting people to take fewer journeys by car. The forthcoming route map to 20% car kilometre reduction will aim to set out our approach to support this recommendation.

The Scottish Government is investing in rail services across Scotland, including the rolling programme of electrification. East Kilbride line electrification is now under way and I have recently announced that ScotRail is to procure replacement trains for the current InterCity High Speed Train fleet. The work continues to develop further procurements to replace and renew the ScotRail fleet as it ages

The Scottish Government funds the Scottish Book Trust (SBT) to deliver the Reading Schools programme which represents an inclusive, whole school approach to embedding a reading culture within schools.

SBT commissions independent evaluations of the programme to examine the impact on pupils, learning professionals and schools. All evaluations are published on the Reading Schools website at: https://readingschools.scot/evaluation

The Scottish Government understands that the most recent report on the 2023-24 programme by Research Scotland will be published in the next few weeks and will be publicly available through the Reading Schools website as referenced above.