Seòmar agus comataidhean

The temporary modifications were introduced as part of the Cost of Living (Tenant Protection) (Scotland) Act 2022 to support a cost-of-living crisis. The Housing (Scotland) Bill will seek to introduce permanent rent control legislation.

From 1 April 2025, existing requirements under the Private Housing (Tenancies)(Scotland) Act 2016 will continue to provide protection from above market rent increases. We are taking steps through a further wave of our Renters Rights Campaign to ensure tenants are made aware of their rights to seek a independent review of a proposed rent increase.

Agricultural Officers do not all carry out the same duties and the type of work is not evenly distributed across Scotland. This means a single reply applicable to every Agricultural Officer is not possible.

Resource planning information shows that agricultural wages inspections currently take between 5% to 20% of time for those officers who carry out this duty. Rural payments take between 5% to 60% of an Agricultural Officers time for those officers who carry out this duty.

I can advise Parliament, that today, I’m launching the roll out of a new National Planning Skills Commitment Plan. This involves a co-ordinated skills and recruitment drive for the planning sector, being led by the Scottish Government and underpinned by a partnership approach across the built and natural environment. Over 100 people, across almost 60 organisations, will collectively contribute to the delivery of the Commitment Plan.

Delivery will take place through a range of actions to be progressed for, and by, people from a broad range of sectors and interests. In supporting skills development, industry representatives are contributing their time and knowledge to participate. The Commitment Plan also adopts a more direct approach to recruitment to attract the next generation of planning professionals. That will include steps to help modernise the image and reputation of the planning profession, as a positive force for delivery of investment in the high quality development that Scotland needs now and for years to come.

Taking forward the committed actions, each month will have a dedicated theme for both skills development and recruitment. For example, in March 2025, housing is the key focus topic for training through webinars and hands-on learning. Meanwhile, to boost future recruitment, the Scottish Government is currently taking forward a Future Planners scheme, for 18 Post Graduates, and is about to launch an expanded Bursary programme, trebling the number from 10, last year, to 30 this year.

I believe that all sectors have a vital role to play in addressing the skills and capacity challenges in planning. Professionals are moving forward with a shared ambition to strengthen resilience across Scotland’s planning system and public services.

Details of the National Planning Skills Commitment Plan

https://www.ourplace.scot/resource/training-and-recruitment-opportunities.

a) Scottish Government has not made any budget provision in this or future years to underwrite private investment in nature restoration.

b) No capital allocation has been made in the 2025-26 budget to pilot blended finance models in nature recovery. Any payments associated with it will not finalised until the pilot progresses. Resource to take forward the pilot will be from within existing staff time.

There may be contingent liability implications to the agreements entered into as a part piloting blended finance models for nature restoration and these will be managed in line with the Scottish Public Finance Manual.

The Scottish Government recognises the pressure on household budgets which is why the 2025-26 budget continues to allocate over £3bn a year to policies which tackle poverty and the cost of living, including providing free bus travel for all children and young people under 22.

In terms of general support, there is range of support available to anyone experiencing financial difficulties. We continue to support free welfare, debt and income maximisation advice services across all areas of the county with funding of over £12m allocated in 2024-2025 and have a dedicated Cost of Living website, signposting to helpful information across a range of subjects including energy and bills, debt and money and health and wellbeing.

Recognising the specific impact of the cost of living crisis on island communities, since December 2022 the Islands Cost Crisis Emergency Fund has distributed over £3.4 million to support islanders facing cost of living pressures.

The significant investments that we are making in Regional Growth Deals will have an important role to play in developing rural economies. The Scottish Government has committed over £379 million to Regional Growth Deal rural projects to accelerate inclusive economic growth, investment which will support a range of projects on themes like key sector innovation, skills, connectivity, housing and infrastructure improvement. As an example of how the Growth Deals are supporting young people in rural communities, the Affordable Housing project, delivered through the Inverness & Highland City Region Deal, is an ongoing project to complete over 500 affordable new homes. Of those completed, over 200 are now occupied by people younger than 30 years of age.

In addition, the Borderlands Growth Deal aims to develop the regional economy by addressing three main economic challenges: narrowing the productivity gap, increasing the working age population, and delivering inclusive growth. In Dumfries and Galloway SG is investing £4m in the Dairy Nexus project, which will deliver innovation to decarbonise the dairy sector and boost dairy sector businesses. Other planned investments include £16m to repurpose Stranraer and Loch Ryan as a vibrant marine leisure destination and £20m to stimulate the reinvigoration of towns and centres across the Borderlands area, with plans being developed in 5 Dumfries and Galloway towns.

The Scottish Government published a further update to the work on Scottish Government bonds alongside the 2025-26 Scottish Budget https://www.gov.scot/isbn/9781836910558.

This explains the outcome of the initial phase of due diligence and the work required in the next stage in the due diligence process. This phase will include timing considerations for an inaugural issuance given market conditions and related events.

The Scottish Government remains committed to ensuring Parliament is updated on this work as it progresses.

Local Authority borrowing decisions are a matter for the individual local authority and Scottish Ministers have no locus or powers to intervene.

Local authorities are required by statute to ensure effective and prudent management of their resources, to deliver best value to local residents and to have regard to the CIPFA Prudential and Treasury Management codes of practice which require a local authority to ensure that all borrowing is prudent, affordable and sustainable.

In having regard to the Prudential and Treasury Management codes of practice, local authorities are expected to develop and publish an annual integrated borrowing and treasury management strategy. The CIPFA Treasury Management Code of practice sets out the importance of a local authority having an effective strategy to manage and control risk and specifically advises on the requirement for a local authority to ensure that its treasury management strategy adequately addresses credit and counterparty risk, liquidity risk, interest rate risk, inflation risk, and refinancing risk.

With regards to the 2019 update, I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-23191 on 7 December 2023 by Lorna Slater MSP. This update to the old model will not be published to ensure clear communication of Scotland’s current material consumption. 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 revised Material Flow Accounts model is currently being developed and is expected to be released by June 2025. This will draw on the most recent dataset available from 2020.

The last report on the carbon footprint of Scotland’s waste [from all sources] was published by Zero Waste Scotland in 2021, reviewing 2018 data. Due to the SEPA cyber-attack, and limited waste data from all sources available for 2019 and 2020, producing carbon impact reports for these years in 2022 and 2023 was not feasible.

The final carbon metric report was published in 2023, on the 2021 carbon footprint of Scotland’s household waste.

In 2024 Zero Waste Scotland published the first Scottish Waste Environmental Footprint Tool (SWEFT) report. SWEFT is the successor to the Carbon Metric, and reports on the carbon impacts of waste alongside results of other environmental damage indicators such as biodiversity loss and air pollution. It is a vital tool in our work to address the climate and nature emergencies.

Currently SWEFT is only available for household waste, and Zero Waste Scotland intend to report on this on an annual basis. ZWS is currently reviewing the technical feasibility of SWEFT reporting on waste from all sources in the future.

The Scottish Communities Climate Action Network has received the following funding from the Scottish Government since 2021:

2021-22: £67,000

2022-23: £88,800

2023-24: £135,787

2024-25: £80,000

In addition to their core grant they received funding to support the design and set up of a number of climate action hubs. They employed regional co-ordinators to work with community groups to understand their needs and priorities and identify how this could be best delivered by a hub for their area.

To support this work they received the following:

2022-23: £441,000

2023-24: £393,921.