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The Scottish Government has provided funding to bus operators through a number of grants during the last five years. Information on the amount of funding provided to bus operators per year is provided for the following funds: Bus Service Operators’ Grant, Scottish Bus Emissions Abatement Retrofit Fund, Scottish Green Bus Fund, Smart Pay Grant Fund, Covid Support Grant, Covid Support Grant - Restart, Scottish Ultra-Low Emission Bus Scheme, Scottish Zero Emission Bus fund, Network Support Grant and Network Support Grant Plus.

Due to the number of entries, a spreadsheet containing the requested information has been placed in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. Number: 63569).

Transport Scotland actively publishes monthly details of all items of expenditure of a value of £25,000 or over. This information is available at Expenditure | Transport Scotland . Further information on the purpose of these funds is available on the Transport Scotland website: Bus Travel in Scotland (transport.gov.scot) .

Partial information is provided for 2022 but may be subject to change by the end of the financial year, for example where funding is provided subject to a financial reconciliation taking place later in the year to adjust final funding levels.

HOSFGN/002 was published in April 2017. The Home Owners Support Fund property threshold guidance is being considered as part of the current review and will be updated if required.

COVID-19 recovery funding is provided via the Network Support Grant Plus and paid as a pence per kilometre rate for each kilometre actually run. Funding is provided by advance payment on forecasts and then payment is adjusted after the scheme ends in October to ensure the final payment reflects actual services operated. This will include recovery of any funding paid to operators for services that did not operate. The scheme has not yet ended so no reconciliation or payment recovery from operators has yet taken place.

Scottish Water operates 1,857 wastewater treatment works (WWTW) across Scotland; this figure includes septic tanks.

Scottish Water works closely with the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) to develop the Chemical Investigation Programmes (CIP). Phase 1 of the CIP2 Scotland project involved sampling at 20 low dilution WWTWs monthly over a period of 2 years. Phase 2 of the CIP2 Scotland project involved sampling at a further 24 WWTWs monthly over a 6 month period for substances identified of further concern. 4 septic tanks were sampled as part of CIP2 Scotland. CIP3 Scotland is sampling at 5 WWTWs for substances of emerging concern monthly over a year starting in June 2022. CIP3 Scotland will be sampling at 5 coastal WWTWs monthly for 6 months.

WWTWs were chosen due to their low dilution as these WWTWs pose the greatest risk of not achieving the Environmental Quality Standard where the substance is controlled by existing legislation or the Predicted Non Effect Concentration (PNEC) where there are no controls in legislation. Dilution varies according to the population served by a WWTW and the volume of water in the receiving watercourse.

The following table gives a breakdown of the WWTWs sampled in each Local Authority Area in Scotland.

There have been no meetings between Scottish Government Ministers and Uber in the current parliamentary term. The former Minister for Transport and Islands, Mr Yousaf, met with Uber on two occasions on 20 April and 10 October 2017. Topics discussed included congestion, licensing, car-pooling, electric vehicles, and rural accessibility.

The Scottish Government continues to provide financial support for bus services to keep services more extensive, and fares more affordable than would otherwise be the case. On 1 April 2022, the Network Support Grant was introduced, with up to £93.5 million allocated for 2022-23 and an additional £25.7 million is being provided to extend the Network Support Grant Plus until October of this year. The Scottish Government continues to engage with bus operators and local government to keep support under review.

Scottish Government has engaged regularly with UK Government at official and ministerial level on the new subsidy control regime. Officials have participated in all engagement sessions, continuing to provide feedback and raising our concerns and those of our stakeholders.

Disappointingly many of these remain unaddressed. Nevertheless, Scottish Government will continue to engage with BEIS through the introduction of the new Subsidy Control regime as it affects Scotland. We remain particularly concerned that the Act brings further erosion of devolution through the sweeping powers granted to the Secretary of State. It undermines the long-established powers of the Scottish Parliament and Scottish Ministers to act in relation to matters within devolved competence such as economic development, the environment, agriculture and fisheries.

Under the Clyde and Hebrides Ferry Service contract, performance deductions can be applied by in certain circumstances.

The level of performance deductions by Contract Year incurred by CalMac Ferries Ltd is detailed below:

The following table shows how many staff have been allocated to the Home Owners Support Fund in recent years. Staff are fully trained and highly experienced and levels have been sufficient to meet demand for the Fund.

Pay and performance is a matter for CalMac Ferries Limited (CFL). Scottish Ministers have no role to play in any pay negotiations. The information on performance payments to senior staff is reported and available in the David MacBrayne Limited accounts.

Years where performance deductions have been made to the CHFS Contract were set out in my answer to question S6W-10178 on 7 September 2022. 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 .