Seòmar agus comataidhean

Skills Development Scotland (SDS) holds operational responsibility for the delivery of apprenticeships across Scotland, including the assessment of sectoral demand. Within the roofing sector, there are currently three distinct apprenticeship pathways, all of which are embedded within the Construction Modern Apprenticeship (MA) frameworks.

The Scottish Government continues to prioritise funding for Modern Apprenticeships in construction, recognising the sector as one of the largest contributors to MA starts and in-training figures for 2024-25.

Modern Apprenticeship allocations are informed by consultation with employers and industry stakeholders. This includes demand statements from Sector Skills Organisations and representative bodies, input from Industry Leadership Groups, and insights drawn from Skills Investment Plans and Regional Skills Assessments.

In 2025-26, we are investing £300 million in heat in buildings programmes to increase energy efficiency and provide financial support. At the same time, we are prioritising skills development for Scotland’s current and future workforce—working closely with the sector to ensure training provision aligns locally with business needs and future demands, supporting our transition to net zero.

Through our Just Transition Fund for the North East and Moray, we have allocated £75 million since 2022 to create jobs, support innovation and secure the highly skilled workforce of the future.

The Scottish Government has not made an assessment of any long-term economic benefits of replacing methadone with Buvidal for eligible patients

The Scottish Government’s supplementary Financial Memorandum, to reflect the scaled-back care reform proposals for the Care Reform (Scotland) Bill, was published on the Health, Social Care & Sport Committee’s website on 25 March 2025.

The Scottish Government published the Core Standards for Mental Health to help improve the quality of mental health services. The standards highlight that people, including those in crisis, should have timely access to mental health services, with clear communication about available services and any alternative support if needed.

Health Boards are expected to place significant emphasis on the quality and safety of all clinical environments, particularly those where individuals need to be assessed and may be admitted where a place of safety orders is in force. Responsibility for designating a healthcare facility a Place of Safety should be agreed by local partners and outlined in their Psychiatric Emergency Plan.

The site of the former hotel at Carrick Castle, Lochgoilhead, is not owned by Scottish Government as per the Vacant and Derelict Land Register. This has been uploaded in error and steps are being taken to update the Register. The site is privately owned.

An open and transparent criminal justice system is important to allow for justice to be delivered and seen to be delivered so communities can have confidence in how offending behaviour is being dealt with. However, there can be areas of the operation of the criminal justice system where it is considered appropriate to allow certain individuals to remain anonymous to protect their dignity and privacy while still ensuring justice is able to be delivered.

The issue of anonymity in respect of domestic abuse criminal cases has been raised in the past with the Scottish Government. In considering whether victims of domestic abuse should receive anonymity, a key consideration has been that if anonymity is afforded to victims then, given the nature of domestic abuse, it may be that anonymity would be required for the accused too. This is because identification of the accused may reveal the identity of the victim. This inherently creates a challenging scenario within which to develop anonymity protections.

While the Scottish Government has no current plans in this area, we keep all policy relating to anonymity within the justice system under review.

The citation of witnesses is a matter for the independent Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. The Scottish Government is, however, supporting justice partners to drive reforms to improve our criminal justice system to make it more efficient and ensure that it works better for everyone.

That will include reducing the number of police witnesses who are required to attend court and reducing the length of time that cases take. It will also mean enabling more cases to be concluded earlier, and fewer victims and civil witnesses needing to come to court.

Two key programmes being rolled out across Scotland are the judicially led summary case management programme, which provides a new approach to summary criminal cases, and the digital evidence sharing capability programme, which allows digital evidence to be shared at the earliest opportunity including the evidence from Body Worn Video technology which is being rolled out by Police Scotland this year. It is anticipated that combined these will deliver benefits for both civil and professional witnesses.

It is not possible to assess how many new green jobs have been created by region and sector, however the PwC Green Jobs Barometer shows that 5.6% of all job adverts in Scotland in 2024 were for jobs that have a positive impact on the environment, up from 4.0% in 2023. This helped Scotland once again retain first place among 12 nations and regions of the UK in the overall Green Jobs Barometer, once again showing that Scotland is leading the way in delivering a green jobs revolution and unlocking the tremendous potential that our energy transition and wider net zero journey holds.

An open and transparent criminal justice system is important to allow for justice to be delivered and seen to be delivered so communities can have confidence in how offending behaviour is being dealt with. However, there can be areas of the operation of the criminal justice system where it is considered appropriate to allow certain individuals to remain anonymous to protect their dignity and privacy while still ensuring justice is able to be delivered.

Provisions to introduce new statutory anonymity protections for sexual offence victims as well as victims of certain other offences are contained in the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill which is currently before Parliament. If approved, the legislation will introduce these new protections to help protect the dignity of victims of these offences.

We held a public consultation on media reporting on child homicide victims between 9 July 2024 and 1 October 2024. We asked for views on a range of possible approaches to reducing the trauma that media reporting can have on bereaved families, and on the wider impacts those approaches might have. This included inviting views on legislating to provide automatic or ‘on application’ anonymity for child victims. The analysis of consultation responses was published on 24 February 2025.

The consultation made clear that there would be serious complexities with legislating to anonymise the victims of child homicide in a way that avoided unintended consequences (like criminalising bereaved family members); that struck a robust balance between privacy rights and freedom of expression; and that could be enforced in practice. However, many of the experiences highlighted in consultation responses vividly illustrate the need for more sensitive reporting on these cases. We are therefore working with stakeholders to explore a range of non-legislative measures including support materials for bereaved families, media guidance and training. Further detail is available on the Scottish Government website.

The Children (Care and Justice) (Scotland) Bill – which underwent Parliamentary consideration from 2022 to 2024 – contained provisions, on introduction, extending the anonymity for child suspects, accused, victims or witnesses both prior to and subsequent to any criminal court proceedings. This followed public consultation, with the analysis published on 8 September 2022. The provisions were further amended at Stage 2 to extend that, in relation to child victims and witnesses, anonymity could continue after a person turns 18 just as was the case for child suspects/accused. These provisions were amended out at Stage 3. Scottish Ministers gave a full account of the reasoning to the Parliamentary chamber. This is contained in the Official Report of 24 April 2024.

The Scottish Government, along with the other UK nations, relies on advice about screening programmes from the UK National Screening Committee (UK NSC), an independent expert advisory group.

We welcome research on the further improvements that can be made to our screening programmes. The UK National Screening Committee is reviewing this evidence as it becomes available. Should a recommendation be made to introduce changes to the screening programme, the organisations that oversee screening will advise Scottish Ministers on how to take that recommendation forward.