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The following table below shows the number of directly employed staff on Fixed-Term appointment contracts at 30 June 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020, broken down by Directorate. 30 June has been selected for consistency with PQ S6W-03819 on 8 November 2021 which contains 30 June 2021 data.

As part of our Future Skills Action Plan, we will provide more opportunities for the current workforce to upskill and retrain. To support this, we increased our investment in workforce development to £20m per annum from
‎ 2020-21.

The Flexible workforce Development Fund is now open to all employers, with up to £15,000 per year available for UK Government Apprenticeship Levy payers and £5,000 for SMEs to support workforce development supporting business growth.

In some sectors, such as Tourism and Hospitality, Cyber Security, green Construction, Aviation, Aerospace, and Digital, the National Transition Training Fund is supporting in-work skills development to enable economic recovery from Covid-19 and EU exit, as well as helping businesses gain the skills to for the transition to net zero.

In the current financial year, there is also support for businesses in Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire through the North East Economic Recovery and Skills Fund. This £14.3m fund recognises the dual impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the downturn in Oil and Gas/ Local partners are working with businesses in key sectors to provide skills support to aid economic recovery in the area.

The need to raise awareness amongst employers on the necessary behaviour changes that will support a just transition to net zero is also recognised as a priority area in the Climate Emergency Skills Action Plan (CESAP), which was published in December 2020.

The current activity taken as part of the CESAP includes training developed by Keep Scotland Beautiful that has helped organisations to better understand the climate emergency and respond to the risks and opportunities it presents and the development of multi-disciplinary training on natural capital approaches. In addition to the actions already being taken, over the next year there will be a ‘toolkit’ developed to help small/micro businesses develop the skills and knowledge they need to adapt to the demands of the transition to net zero.

Under Zero Waste Scotland’s Revolve certification scheme the number of stores reporting fluctuates year on year which leads to variations in data collated. Zero Waste Scotland do not receive data from all certified stores in a given year.

The data is self-reported by reuse stores, who can update monitoring processes for their unique circumstances over time.

While Zero Waste Scotland collect data on sales income, it does not hold data on the full "economic impact" of the reuse stores which would also include metrics such as other income, services provided, alongside social and employment impact.

Data collected by Zero Waste Scotland is set out in the following table.

The Scottish Government’s position is that VAT should not be applied to deposits charged under Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) and we have made official and ministerial representations on this issue. It is important that where we can we promote rather than hinder progress towards a circular economy.

As VAT is a reserved matter, the final decision will rest with the UK Government and will be for them to confirm.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-03808 on‎ 8 November 2021. 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.

The following table shows the number of directly employed staff on Fixed-Term appointment contracts at 30 June 2021, broken down by Directorate. These are our most recently published data.

For Bands A-C (junior to middle management grades) the Scottish Government does not use external recruitment agencies to fill temporary or permanent posts where the worker is employed by SG directly. At senor civil service level recruitment agencies are sometimes used to identify potential candidates for such roles.

The table provides this information for temporary and permanent employed roles in the senior civil service from 2018 onwards broken down by recruitment agency.

Under Section 2(3) of the National Parks (Scotland) Act 2000, a proposal for a new National Park must identify the area to be designated and the proposed functions of the new National Park Authority. We are aware that several areas may be interested in National Park status, so a fair and transparent bidding and evaluation process will be put in place to identify the area or areas which will be put forward to obtain National Park status and allow the statutory process to begin. We will shortly provide further information on this initial bidding and evaluation process, but given the complex and important nature of the work, we do not think it will be completed by Spring 2022.

The Scottish Environment Protection Agency is developing guidance for businesses to help them meet their obligations under The Deposit and Return Scheme for Scotland Regulations 2020. This will include an online toolkit and example scenarios to support producers and retailers to develop takeback services for online sales.

Stakeholder mapping carried out in June 2021 on behalf of the Scottish Environment Protection Agency identified approximately 4,400 retailers selling drinks on the Scottish market. Of these, 2.6% were identified as selling exclusively online. Analysis was not carried out to determine what proportion of retailers operate both online and bricks-and-mortar retail.