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The Scottish Government and Scottish Funding Council meet regularly to discuss a range of matters, including equalities issues.

Universities, as autonomous institutions, are aware of the IHRA definition of antisemitism. Many are actively and presently consulting within their diverse communities and stakeholder interests on the definition, with three (University of Glasgow, University of Edinburgh and Abertay University) having adopted it to date. Universities UK is working with the Union of Jewish Students to raise awareness and understanding of antisemitism and to share best practice in tackling and eliminating it.

The Scottish Government continues to work with universities and the Scottish Funding Council to tackle racism and antisemitism.

The Scottish Government continues to follow the World Health Organization and European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control Covid-19 contact tracing guidance as well as recent evidence on the impact of vaccination in protecting the population from harm and latest evidence on infection and transmission in children and young people. Contact tracing continues to include all contacts in school with public health advice provided on the basis of whether a contact is ‘high-risk’ or ‘low-risk’ with low-risk contacts being identified by schools and receiving targeted ‘Information’ letters. People identified as asymptomatic high-risk exposure contacts, regardless of age, continue to be advised to isolate and to take a PCR test.

The changes made to contact tracing and isolation policy from 9 August continue to deliver an effective public health intervention whilst balancing the risk of health harms across the population with the harms caused by prolonged self-isolation of children and young people.

We will work collaboratively with partners, communities and other stakeholders to take forward the ten-year £500m Just Transition Fund for the North East and Moray. The delivery of the Fund will exemplify our co-design and co-delivery approach that will be supported by a programme of broad engagement in the area. This Fund is a new commitment which will require detailed policy design work and implementation planning. We will provide further information on the process in due course.

The Just Transition Fund will support and accelerate energy transition, create good, green jobs and maximise the region’s future economic potential. We are determined to tackle climate emergency and mitigate the impacts of the transition on communities across Scotland, and we will work at pace to deliver our sectoral plans for a just transition.

The Arts Alive programme delivered a digital programme from the period of April-June 2021 which consisted of 3 residencies. The remaining residencies and school sessions, delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, will be delivered in September-December 2021, as requested by schools.

The programme was delivered over 3 schools (see the following table)

The Scottish Government is clear that violence of any kind is totally unacceptable. Every person has the right to feel safe and protected from abuse and violence regardless of where they work and we encourage anyone who experiences violence or abuse to report it to the Police.

Scotland’s Justice system provides protection for all workers, with various criminal laws that protect everyone from threats or aggression including all those working in the charity sector. In addition, there are specific laws in place such as the recent Protection of Workers (Retail and Age-Restricted Goods and Services) (Scotland) Act 2021 which can offer separate protection for charity workers who specifically work selling goods.

Alongside the protections offered by the law, the Scottish Government would encourage charities to have policies and support in place to help maximise the protection afforded to all staff.

The Scottish Government continues to engage with the culture and heritage sectors to build fairer and more inclusive workplaces. Culture and Fair Work is an initial priority theme for the National Partnership for Culture (NPC), with the partnership currently reflecting on the material gathered at the Culture and Fair Work workshop, held on the 29th April. The NPC will use the outputs from the workshop to form recommendations to Ministers, by the end of 2021, on what priority actions should be taken to tackle the key issues faced by the culture sector in Scotland.

Through its flagship Fair Work First policy, the Scottish Government is extending Fair Work criteria to public sector grants, other funding streams and contracts wherever relevant and appropriate to do so. Creative Scotland are also drafting a statement of their commitment to Fair Work principles as an employer and a funder – this will be agreed by unions and published on their website.

Officials meet with the STUC and affiliate unions representatives of the cultural sector regularly to discuss key issues impacting workers in the culture sector, including issues around Fair Work.

The Scottish Government has also delivered on 100-day manifesto commitments to establish a Living Hours accreditation scheme and to expand Fair Work First criteria to support flexible working and oppose fire and rehire practice which will also benefit those working in the culture and heritage sector.

The National Partnership for Culture met on:

24 June 2020

23 July 2020

4 September 2020

4 November 2020

12 March 2021

29 April 2021

1 July 2021

10 September 2021.

The date of the next meeting has not yet been identified.

The projected cost of the overall campaign is £800,000 which is being funded by the Scottish Government‘s ‘Reducing Drug Deaths’ budget. We are working in partnership with Scottish Drugs Forum to deliver the campaign which will run until mid-November 2021.

In addition to widening awareness of naloxone, one of the main objectives of the campaign is to ensure that the general public know that overdose deaths are preventable and to address stigmatising attitudes regarding the lives of people who use drugs. Stigmatising attitudes impact on people’s sense of self-worth and therefore the likelihood that people engage with treatment which is an evidenced protective factor against overdose deaths.

The campaign is national and every area in Scotland will have an access to multiple elements of the campaign resource. However, it was crucial that lower socio-economic areas, areas with high rates of drug deaths, were identified and particular parts of the campaign, such as bill-board or bus-stop adverts, were closely located to community pharmacies where naloxone would be available.

Creative Scotland has commissioned a review of fair work, leadership, workforce and skills development across the arts, screen and creative industries in Scotland. The review will take place between August 2021 and February 2022.

The Scottish Government Chief Scientist Office (CSO) investment in NHS Research Scotland (NRS) clinical research infrastructure is supporting NHS Health Board participation in a number of COVID-19 vaccine trials to provide data for regulatory submissions for approval for use.

The CSO, NRS and health boards work closely with the UK Vaccines Taskforce to bring a range of vaccine trials to Scotland.

Regulatory approval and licensing conditions for the use of COVID-19 vaccines is a statutory responsibility of the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).

More information about the trials being supported by NHS Research Scotland is available at: COVID-19 vaccine studies | NHS Research Scotland | NHS Research Scotland .