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Scottish Government officials have engaged with analytical specialists and key stakeholders, such as Historic Environment Scotland, to ensure that any proposals for retrofitting traditional buildings or listed buildings in rural and island areas are flexible and protect the characteristics of our buildings, as well as considering the health and wellbeing of Scotland’s people.

We have recently published a final report of the Short Life Tenement Short Life Working Group on energy efficiency and zero emissions heating as well as The suitability of clean heating options for challenging dwelling types, which are available on the Scottish Government website. Officials have also attended Hopetoun House and Holyrood Lodge to hear about the challenges of retrofit and what Historic Environment Scotland had done to improve these buildings.

We will continue to engage with stakeholders alongside the Private Renter Sector (PRS) Minimum Energy Efficiency Standard (MEES) consultation workshops on the proposals. This engagement will be vital in helping us develop and shape cost-effective and feasible solutions to improve the energy efficiency of privately rented traditional and listed buildings in rural and island areas.

The Scottish Government is committed to improving energy efficiency and decarbonising heating systems in Scotland’s buildings to support improvements in fuel poverty and to help meet our climate target to reach net zero by 2045.

We have committed to investing over £300m in our Heat in Buildings programme in 2025-26. The support is aimed at reducing emissions from heating and improving energy efficiency in homes and other buildings across Scotland, as well as developing heat networks.

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that everyone who needs it can access seamless, timely and high quality palliative care.

That is why later this summer we will publish our new palliative care strategy, Palliative Care Matters for All. The strategy will set out a series of aims and outcomes designed to help to improve palliative care services across Scotland.

The strategy will be accompanied by a delivery plan which will set out how the actions will be delivered through collaboration with a variety of service providers such as Integration Joint Boards, Health Boards, third sector organisations (including independent hospices) and other independent service providers such as care homes.

Data on full-time equivalent (FTE) secondary teachers by main and other subject taught is available in the Teacher Census Supplementary Statistics, here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/teacher-census-supplementary-statistics/

Information is not held on the subjects offered by individual schools as schools may be able to offer a subject even if they do not have a teacher for that subject in the staff census, for example through school-school or school-college partnerships.

Improving safety for the babies, families and staff is our utmost priority, which is why we are taking this step and why we have taken phased approach to transition, allowing time to build the right levels of capacity in all areas, with NHS Boards working towards full implementation by 2026.

We are working with Regional Planning Chief Executives to plan and deliver this service change, informed by the testing that has been underway since 2018 in Ayrshire and Fife, and supported by Scottish Government funding of over £6m since 2019.

Information on the number of classroom assistants for the years 2003-2020 was provided in answer to question S6W-01069 on 14 July 2021 which is available on the Scottish Parliament website at: https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/questions-and-answers

Data on classroom assistants by sector and local authority is available from 2019 to 2023, here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/school-support-staff-management-information/

The decision to move to three Neonatal Intensive Care Units has been firmly based on clinical evidence that the most premature and sickest babies do best when they are cared for in larger specialist neonatal units with higher numbers of these babies, and with specialist staff and services (for example neonatal surgery) available on site to give them the very best care.

Local neonatal units across Scotland, including Wishaw, will continue to offer care to babies who need it, including a level of neonatal intensive care.

We have considered the data and evidence in relation to the proposals and have taken advice from clinical advisors, and are assured about the validity of the evidence base, the process and the conclusions reached.

We have consulted families on the changes to inform implementation of the new model. We have shared the outputs of that consultation with Regional Chief Executives and are taking forward Scotland-level actions required.

Regional Chief Executives have worked with NHS Board teams and strategic planning leads to undertake modelling and capacity work to develop local implementation plans, including plans for staffing levels. It’s important that the whole multidisciplinary team are involved in developing local plans, including obstetric and maternity staff. We expect that staffing resources in the neonatal units will be reflective of the workforce required to deliver care under the new model.

The Scottish Government values the teaching profession and the important work that teachers do is one of the key strengths of our education system.

We will continue to work with COSLA and the teaching unions to address concerns around teacher workload.

We are clear that reducing teachers’ class contact time by 90 minutes per week will help address critical concerns around teacher workload, including the retention of teachers.

We will continue to work with COSLA and the teaching unions to make meaningful progress on this important commitment.

The Scottish Government welcomes the finding that eligible patients are increasingly accessing CAR-T therapies.

NHS Board Chief Executives have endorsed a three-centre regional service model for delivering CAR-T therapies across Scotland, in NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, NHS Grampian and NHS Lothian, to expand capacity and provide easier access for people requiring this treatment. This service delivery model fully commenced on 1 April 2025.