Seòmar agus comataidhean

The new National Public Energy Agency – Heat and Energy Efficiency Scotland (HEES) –which is operating in virtual form in-house within the Directorate for Energy and Climate Change aims to work in partnership with a range of key stakeholders, including local government, to provide strategic leadership and co-ordination to accelerate both the pace and scale of heat and energy retrofit across domestic, non-domestic and public sector buildings in Scotland. To support this aim, one of the roles of the Agency will be to improve overall coordination including how it can most effectively work with local government.

COSLA are represented on the HEES independent Strategic Board which has been established to provide support to the design of the future Agency and also more widely on how the virtual Agency can accelerate the roll out of zero emissions heating and evolve our delivery approaches.

The virtual Agency continues to have ongoing engagement with COSLA and local authorities on specific delivery programmes. Since 2013 the Area Based Schemes funded by the Scottish Government and delivered by local councils have helped over 100,000 fuel poor households to benefit from warmer homes and lower energy bills. We have allocated £64 million for energy efficiency improvements through these schemes this year and continue to build upon our partnership approach to delivery.

As the Rural and Islands Housing Fund is part of the Affordable Housing Supply Programme, the Scottish Government will consider any additional costs associated with improved quality standards for homes delivered through the Rural and Islands Housing Fund and those additional costs will be accounted for in the affordable housing investment benchmarks which determine how a project is appraised.

Since wildcats are already present in the Cairngorms, any proposal to release wildcats in this area would be a translocation project to reinforce the existing population, rather than a reintroduction.

The ‘Saving Wildcats’ project submitted a licence application to NatureScot in September 2022 to permit the translocation of wildcats to sites in the Cairngorms Connect Project area from conservation breeding facilities.

In considering the licence application, NatureScot assessed the extent to which the application followed the best practice guidelines set out in the Scottish Code for Conservation Translocations. These guidelines involve a range of biological and socio-economic considerations. Also, as part of this process a full ‘Habitats Regulations Appraisal’ was undertaken to assess impacts of the project on European protected sites within the release area.

NatureScot has recently approved the licence application, and has published a licensing decision document at https://www.nature.scot/doc/decision-document-license-application-220947-licence-release-captive-breed-wildcats-felis-silvestris

Richard Lochhead, the former Minister for Just Transition, Fairwork & Employment engaged with a wide range of stakeholders in the offshore energy sector during this period. A comprehensive list of all Ministerial engagements for the year 2022 has been published and can be found online ( Ministerial engagements, travel and gifts - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)).

For the period of January 2023 until March 2023 The Minister had the following meetings:

• 9 February – The Minister met with Opportunity North East, Energy Transition Zone and the Net Zero Technology Centre, discussing Just Transition and the next phase of the Just Transition fund.
• 21 February 2023 – The Minister attended SBCC (Scottish Business Climate Collaboration) SME (Small/Medium Enterprise) Net Zero Hub launch event, with EY (Ernest & Young) and Scottish Power representatives in attendance.
• 2 March 2023 – Mr Lochhead visited South of Scotland Enterprise in Dumfries and chaired a roundtable discussion that included representatives from Carbon Capture Scotland, and visited Cochran Ltd on site.
• 16 March 2023 – The Minister chaired a CBI round table event, which included representatives from Centrica Energy, Equinor UK LTD, Scottish Power and SEC (Scottish Events Campus).
• 21 March 2023 - Mr Lochhead attended the Scottish Renewables Net-Zero Dinner and spoke to representatives from EDF Renewables, Scottish Renewables and EY (Ernest & Young).
• 22 March 2023 –The Minister delivered a speech to the Scottish Renewables Conference, and participated in a panel discussion with representatives from Scottish Renewables, EDF Renewables and Ripple Energy.

I also refer the member to the answer to question S6W-15805 on 24 March 2023.

All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers .

No meeting has taken place between my predecessor and the National Farmers Union and subsequently there is no information to publish. The request to meet with the National Farmer’s Union will carry over to me as the new Transport Minister to consider within my parliamentary business.

The Scottish Government remains committed to delivering work across Government, Parliament and beyond, to reduce drug-related deaths throughout Scotland, including Lanarkshire, and our National Mission will help achieve that. The National Mission has reviewed and learned from best practice at home and internationally and concluded that a public health approach to drugs is the most effective way forward.

A key part of that National Mission is the delivery of our Medication Assisted Treatment (MAT) standards and in Lanarkshire there is an Oversight and Implementation Group which has been established to oversee the implementation of these Standards. The group meet monthly and has Pan-Lanarkshire representation, including lived experience and family representatives.

They have submitted implementation plans to the Scottish Government, are reporting monthly on their progress, and are working with the Public Health Scotland led MIST (MAT Implementation Support Team) who are supporting areas to implement the standards.

NHS Lanarkshire is one of the highest performing Board areas in Scotland with regards to low waiting times. They continue to meet and exceed the waiting times target that 90% of people referred for help with problematic drug or alcohol use will wait no longer than three weeks for specialist treatment that supports their recovery.

There is a pan-Lanarkshire response to near-fatal overdoses in place via the Scottish Ambulance Service, and they have commissioned third sector outreach organisations to further support those with problem substance use and they have also implemented peer support initiatives. In addition to this work to support people still in active addiction, they also have a strong local recovery communities network.

The breakdown of CalMac scheduled sailings defined as (a) on time, (b) Level 1 Lateness and (c) Level 2 Lateness for each month since March 2022 are provided in the following table.

The Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 is reserved legislation so any changes made to the classification of substances (such as nitrous oxide) will affect the whole of the UK. We await the outcome of the UK Government’s consultation into the exemptions which will apply for the legitimate uses of nitrous oxide in medical, industry and food production sectors.

Upon the implementation of the classification of nitrous oxide as a Class C drug, Police Scotland will work with colleagues in UK policing to make sure the law is applied in the same way across the UK.

As the First Minister said on Tuesday, he has asked officials to go back to the drawing board on potential proposals to restrict alcohol advertising and promotion.

It is crucial that we prevent and reduce alcohol-related harms, particularly to young people, but that aim has to be balanced with careful consideration of the impact restrictions may have on business.

We will be reflecting on the feedback we received from stakeholders during the recent Ministerial roundtables and will analyse the public consultation responses to understand the views and perspectives of those that responded. Further consultation and engagement with public health stakeholders and businesses will take place as our work progresses.

Although the Scottish Government has not made an assessment of historical artefacts within Scottish educational institutions obtained as a result of colonialism, it has encouraged public collections to consider the method of acquisition of all objects in their care, the vast majority of which were obtained ethically and legally.

Any consideration to return historical artefacts would be a matter for the relevant institutions, including universities as autonomous bodies with responsibility for their own strategic and operational decisions. The Scottish Government expects institutions to follow best practice and ensure that decisions in respect of any requests for the return of objects of cultural significance from their collections conform to international standards.

Scottish Government officials continue to engage with the museums sector on these matters, including those museums hosted by universities.