Seòmar agus comataidhean

The Kinlochleven hydro-electric power station was built specifically to power the Kinlochleven Aluminium Smelter. Since the smelter closed in 2000 all the electrical power produced at Kinlochleven has been exported to the national grid and no power is dispatched to the Fort William smelter directly. The Kinlochleven power station has no connection to the Scottish Government’s Lochaber guarantee and the Kinlochleven power generation assets are not included within the Government’s Lochaber security package.

The Scottish Government’s Suicide Prevention Action Plan was published in 2018. Many of the key actions in the Plan have been delivered, including the launch of Scotland’s social movement: ‘United to Prevent Suicide’; production of learning resources to support suicide prevention; and guidance to encourage, inform, and support local suicide prevention approaches. Pilot services to support those bereaved by suicide will go live this summer and work continues to develop processes for reviews of all deaths by suicide.

Our Mental Health Transition and Recovery Plan sets out our commitment to work with COSLA and stakeholders to produce a new long-term suicide prevention strategy for Scotland. The new strategy will be outcomes-focussed, and its development will be directed by the voices of lived experience. It will be informed by data and evidence, and adopt a cross-government approach to ensure the Government continues to take all actions it can to reduce the number of people who die by suicide. The new strategy will be published in September 2022, supported by a full delivery plan.

In the meantime, continued focus, pace and evaluation on suicide prevention will be achieved by extending activities under the current Action Plan for a further year, up to the point the successor strategy is published. This approach has full backing from partners, including COSLA and the National Suicide Prevention Leadership Group. This approach will be backed by additional spending on suicide prevention in 2021-22, through our £120 million Mental Health Recovery and Renewal Fund.

As announced in March, the recommendations from the Review will be taken forward by an Implementation Group which I am pleased to announce will be Co-Chaired by Dennis Robertson and a clinical lead that will be confirmed shortly.

I am also pleased to announce today that we are providing £5 million of funding to respond to the recommendations from the Review in this financial year. The majority of this funding will be provided to NHS Boards to support them respond to the increase in eating disorder presentations due to the Covid-19 pandemic, which is Recommendation 1 from the Review. This funding is being provided from the £120 million Mental Health Recovery and Renewal Fund.

In addition, in response to Recommendation 6 (Self-help Resources) and Recommendation 13 (Families and Carers) from the Review, we are also providing funding to Beat, the UK’s Eating Disorder Charity, to provide a wide range of support options such as support to families and carers of those with an eating disorder, support for children, young people and adults who are currently waiting to be seen by services and peer support services. We will shortly announce further details of this package of support.

In the period October to December 2020:

• There were 3,502 eligible referrals for the 62-day standard, an increase of 14.9%.
• There were 5,697 eligible referrals within the 31-day standard, an increase of 14.7% from the previous quarter.

The below tables outline Eligible Referrals broken down by central region.

Eligible referrals for the 31-day standard (rate per 100,000 of population):

Neither the Cabinet Secretary for Health & Social Care, nor Scottish Government officials have engaged with ServiceNow. NHS National Services Scotland are responsible for the development and operational performance of the Service Now platform which is used as part of the overall digital solution for Covid Vaccinations, and it is for NHS National Services Scotland to manage the performance of their suppliers.

To manage the volume of vaccination appointments based on available supply we intentionally limited the initial functionality of the Citizen Portal system. The portal can currently be used to reschedule appointments. Unpaid carers and 18-29 year olds can also register online to receive their appointment.

We are exploring ways to allow people to book their own appointments.

We are committed to ensuring that all children and young people get the additional support that they need to reach their full learning potential.

We published our joint response to the independently chaired review of implementation of additional support for learning in October 2020. Angela Morgan’s report sets a clear direction in how we can continue to build on progress in this area. The joint action plan sets out the measures we will take to implement her recommendations. The action plan and governance arrangements for this work are available from Additional support for learning: action plan - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) .

As the Association of Directors of Education in Scotland has said, it is normal to look at historical school data as part of the quality assurance process in awarding national qualifications. This is designed to help support the best outcomes for our young people.

I am clear that if a learner has demonstrated they deserve a particular grade, and this grade is robust against the national standard, that is the grade they will receive.

To provide additional assurances on this, Education Scotland has liaised with all 32 local authorities who have all confirmed that historical data has not been used to unilaterally change any assessment judgements by teachers or schools.

Once the provisional grades have been submitted to the Scottish Qualifications Authority they will not be changed because of any school’s past performance.

The following data is based on an HGV being defined as a vehicle over 3.5 tonnes:

For A77 trunk road (from south of M77 Junction 8 to junction with A75 at Stranraer)

Work on a planned public energy company was halted during the pandemic. As set out in the SNP manifesto, Ministers will now focus government efforts on a new dedicated national public energy agency. This will coordinate and accelerate delivery of heat and energy efficiency work, inform and educate the public on the changes required, provide expert advice to national and local government, and work with public, private and third sector partners to deliver this transformative national project. Further details will be set out to Parliament in due course.