Seòmar agus comataidhean

This is a matter for the Scottish Social Services Council. The information requested is not held centrally.

The Scottish Government does not hold the full level of information requested.

We regularly monitor the support provided by our delivery partners, together with scheduled engagements across the year. We always seek to avoid excessive demands for data gathering in order to ensure the FIF can be distributed with a level of partner discretion to target direct support to those most in need at the time.

In 2021-22 - SFHA awarded funding to 35 projects, comprising single organisation, partnership and consortium bids. In total, 41 organisations were direct recipients, with a further 24 accessing vouchers for their tenants through one of the main grantees. Successful applications were received from housing associations from across Scotland, supporting rural, island and urban communities. While overall success rate reported by ADS for their applications from the fund in 2021 stood at 96%, with a total of 1,208 successful. ADS grant payments were administered to a total of 58 different energy suppliers in Scotland.

On receipt of FIF delivery partners 2022-23 evaluation reports, officials will consider appropriate publication of such details for access on the SG website.

Independent analysis carried out for Scottish Government showed that, with the right investment, the number of low carbon jobs in energy production is estimated to rise from 19,000 in 2019 to 77,000 by 2050. This would mean there are more jobs in energy production in 2050 than there are now. The draft Energy Strategy and Just Transition Plan, on page 89, shows estimates of direct and indirect low carbon production jobs by sector and the table below notes these projected job numbers. The “other” jobs listed in the table include: solar PV, wave and tidal, carbon transport and storage, bioenergy and waste and nuclear. The analysis did not provide an estimate of the average salary of low carbon jobs as a whole or by sector because currently available official statistics (Office of National Statistics Low Carbon and Renewable Energy Economy – LCREE data) do not include average salary estimates for low carbon energy sector jobs (e.g. hydrogen).

The Scottish Government has received correspondence from business representative organisations and individual businesses within the retail, hospitality or leisure sectors, or their elected representatives.

Prior to the publication of the Scottish Budget 2023-24, the number one ask of business organisations was to freeze the non-domestic rates poundage, which we have delivered, saving businesses £308 million compared to an inflationary increase, along with a package of reliefs worth £744m. We expect around half the properties in the retail, hospitality and leisure sectors to be eligible for 100% Small Business Bonus Scheme relief next year. Properties in these sectors may also be eligible for the transitional relief schemes set out in the Budget.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-13803 on 25 January 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/questions-and-answers

The value of payments made by our Fuel Insecurity Fund delivery partners varies substantially, from the cost of fuel vouchers to energy bill debt write-offs. Each payment is awarded on an individual case by case assessment, as to the most appropriate support and intervention that can be provided to help achieve a sustainable outcome.

We support veterans across our housing legislation. We published Social Housing Allocations in Scotland – A Practice Guide in 2019, to ensure that social landlords have an allocation policy that complies with all relevant legislation and statutory guidance. The guide provides clarity for social landlords about giving priority to Service leavers. The guidance also reinforces the need for social landlords to have clear information and housing options in place for all applicants, including veterans.

We amended legislation so that, from 1 July 2019, where the landlord is a charity providing accommodation to veterans, a private residential tenancy agreement will not apply. This will ensure that veterans specific accommodation in the private rented sector can continue to be used, ensuring that a veteran may be offered temporary accommodation for a period of rehabilitation and training, or permanent accommodation in line with the organisation’s charitable purpose and the needs of the veterans.

There is a statutory requirement on local authorities to produce a Local Housing Strategy that sets out its strategy, priorities and plans for the delivery of housing and related service. In September 2019 we published refreshed Local Housing Strategy guidance which encourages Local Authorities to fully consider the housing requirements of the Armed Forces community. The guidance has also been strengthened to encourage appropriate engagement with relevant organisations, such as Veterans Scotland, to better understand the needs of the Armed Forces community when developing Local Housing Strategies.

Scotland has some of the strongest homelessness legislation in the world and all local authorities have a legal duty to provide support to anyone at risk of homelessness, including veterans. We are also proposing new homelessness prevention duties, to be included in a forthcoming Housing Bill. These will include new duties on public bodies to ‘ask and act’ about housing situations and a change to existing legislation to allow local authorities to act at an earlier stage to prevent homelessness. Our approach is based around the principles of shared public responsibility, earlier intervention across systems and more choice and control for people over their housing options, which will include the veterans population

We are also taking action to make improvements across the rented sector that will progress the right to an adequate home and deliver our vision for Housing to 2040.

Regional transport strategies and developments, including their impact assessments, are led by the local authority and its Regional Transport Partnerships. We are aware that Glasgow City Council published its Glasgow Transport Strategy last year, with numerous policies addressing integration of transport.

The Scottish Government completes impact assessments and appraisals on its national policy and regulatory development, including for the smart and integrated ticketing measures in the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019, the second National Transport Strategy, and the second Strategic Transport Projects Review. The Scottish Government is also progressing the Fair Fares Review which will develop and assess options to create a fairer, more transparent system of fares across all modes that maintain and increase affordability for those who need it most.

For this response families have been interpreted as households with children.

There have been 447 households with children included in the homelessness application that have spent three years or more in temporary accommodation. This is based on available temporary accommodation placement data, where placements closed on or before 31 March 2022. Source: HL1 and HL3 data collections up to 31 March 2022, data as published on 18 August 2022.

Notes on data

The total duration of stay in temporary accommodation for households with children has been derived by linking records between the homelessness application (HL1) and temporary accommodation placement (HL3) data collections. The HL1 collects information on the composition of households making homelessness applications (available from 2002-03). The HL3 gathers information about temporary accommodation placements associated with homelessness applications (only available for all local authorities from 2017-18, however, it includes placements which commenced prior, and includes data prior to this for some local authorities).

The total duration is based on the sum of the durations of all temporary accommodation placements associated with the same household. It may be underestimated where households have placements that started and ended before the HL3 data collection began.

The figure includes households who may have turned down multiple offers of settled accommodation by the local authority but have chosen to wait for an offer that fully meets their needs.

It is important to note that households may sometimes make alternative arrangements for children when entering temporary accommodation and therefore children included in the HL1 return are not always present in associated placements. It can also be that children are present for only part of the stay in temporary accommodation, e.g. as part of shared custody arrangements.

In the first year of the Communities Mental Health and Wellbeing Fund for adults in 2021-22, the Scottish Government provided funding to the 32 Third Sector Interface (TSIs) who were responsible for distributing the funding to local grassroots community organisations. Local application processes are underway for Year 2, with information on the organisations receiving funding to be published in June 2023.

Further information about the funded projects can be found in the Communities Mental Health and Wellbeing Fund: Year 1 - Monitoring and Reporting Summary, which was published in June 2022.

A table providing details of the awards made to grassroots community projects by area, purpose and value of each award has been placed in SPICe bib number 63970.

This information was provided by Third Sector Interface organisations in April 2022 based on awards made.