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Vehicle Excise Duty is reserved to the UK Government with a proportion of the funds raised allocated to Scotland through the Barnett Formula as part of the block grant. Revenues raised from vehicle excise duty are not hypothecated and are therefore part of the overall Scottish Budget, rather than apportioned to any specific area of spending.

Policy relating to mobile telecommunications is currently reserved to the UK Government and is regulated by Ofcom.

However the Scottish Government recognises the vital importance of mobile connectivity for rural, remote and island communities and businesses. Through our Scottish 4G Infill Programme, we are investing £28.75M to deliver up to 55 4G masts in selected mobile ‘notspots’ around Scotland.

The Scottish Government continue work closely with the UK government and operators to ensure that resilience of the telecoms network in Scotland is a priority.

The Scottish Government is aware of the impact the necessary public health restrictions have had on businesses, including the outbound travel industry. Since the start of the pandemic, businesses have benefitted from more than £4.4bn in support from the Scottish Government. Eligible travel agents benefited from sectoral grants of up to £25,000 per premises in addition to other support including Strategic Framework Business Fund grants, Restart Grants, Non-Domestic Rates relief and furlough payments for staff.

We recently announced £3.5m for outbound travel agents as part of our support for businesses impacted by the measures introduced to control the spread of Omicron. Details of the eligibility, and how and when to apply will be published on the Scottish Government website and on the Find Business Support website as soon as they are available.

In Scotland, fishing vessel licences are issued by Marine Scotland, on behalf of Scottish Ministers. Scottish fishing vessel licences are issued for eligible vessels which are registered in Scotland by virtue of a Scottish address and port. Licenses are not issued by area, therefore no licenses have been issued, and no vessels are registered specific to the area covered by the Red Rocks and Longay MPA. There were 2093 Scottish licensed vessels in 2020.

Due to the changes in responsibilities, it is difficult to provide an exact like-for-like comparison of Scottish Government funding from the UK Government over the last five years. However, excluding Social Security and EU Replacement funding (neither of which featured in the Scottish Budget limit 5 years ago), the amount of funding has increased from £30.662 billion in 2017-18 to £39.257 billion in 2022-23. This is a real terms increase of 14.3 per cent over the period.

As the Scottish Government remains committed to passing on every penny of additional health funding from the UK Government much of this increase has been allocated to Health which has a direct impact on all other areas of the Scottish Budget, including local government.

If Health funding is excluded, the Scottish Budget real terms increase over the period is 8.5 per cent, and local government have therefore been treated very fairly with council’s revenue funding having increased by 9.9 per cent in real terms.

There are a total of 3,374 properties in the KA24 postcode area. As of 11 February 2022:

• 3,061 properties are already able to access superfast broadband speeds of 30 Megabits per second (Mbps) or above and, therefore, are not included within build plans for the Reaching 100% (R100) Central contract.
• 205 properties are within R100 Central contract build plans, with that build expected to be completed by the first half of 2023. They may be eligible for an interim voucher – worth up to £400 – through the R100 Scottish Broadband Voucher Scheme (R100 SBVS) and people can check their eligibility using our online checker at www.scotlandsuperfast.com . The interim voucher portion of the R100 SBVS was recently extended to 31 March 2022, giving people more time to secure a connection.
• 101 properties are not included within R100 Central contract build plans and, therefore, are eligible for a main voucher – worth up to £5,000 – through the R100 SBVS.

• The remaining 7 properties are expected to receive superfast connections as a result of commercial coverage – they may also be eligible for an interim voucher through the R100 SBVS.

The majority of funding local authorities receive for tackling homelessness is provided through the annual local government finance settlement. The distribution of the local government settlement for 2022-23 was discussed and agreed with COSLA and the City of Edinburgh Council will receive its fair formula share. The Scottish Government remains open to a review of the local government finance distribution formula but any suggested changes must, in the first instance, come from COSLA on behalf of its member councils.

Since March 2020, funding has been provided to NHS boards and integration authorities by the Scottish Government’s health and social care portfolio to support the additional costs of COVID-19. As agreed between COSLA and the Scottish Government, this is temporary financial support to all services delegated to the integration authorities.

The decision of whether or not to delegate responsibility for homelessness services is for the local authority and the health board. The City of Edinburgh Council has not delegated homelessness services to Edinburgh City integration authority and so funding provided to the integration authority cannot be used to tackle homelessness.

The Scottish Government is aware of the impact the necessary public health restrictions have had on businesses. We announced £375m of support for businesses impacted by measures introduced to control the spread of Omicron and this includes £19m for close contact businesses. This close contact fund is targeted at those who have been the most affected by the updated public health guidance introduced from 9 December 2021 to 24 January 2022, for example beauty services, hairdressers and wellness services. Driving instructors are not in scope at this stage.

We continue to see Common Housing Registers as a key way of simplifying and maximising access to social housing and support their development by directing local authorities, housing associations and co-operatives to the Scottish Government website, Common Housing Register (CHR) - building a register: a practitioner's guide - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

While the site continues to operate on the basis of the current operational functions there is no cause to look towards any environmental remediation. As outlined in the previous answer, any environmental remediation follows in a situation where operational licences are being handed back and are dealt with on a regulatory basis. The polluter pays principles are used to ensure that the land can be remediated to another purpose if this is required. When dealing with potentially contaminated land through either the development planning system, or if voluntary remediation is undertaken, it is for the developer or landowner to investigate and assess the extent of contamination and undertake any remediation that would be required. These remain hypothetical scenarios as the current site is operating and continuing to produce steel.