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The Scottish Government is grateful for the latest advice from the Climate Change Committee. We have always been clear that meeting the legislated 2030 target – agreed by Parliament on a cross party basis - will be extremely challenging, and may not be feasible. Scotland is already half way to net zero and continues to decarbonise faster than the UK average.

On the 18th of April, Cabinet Secretary for Wellbeing Economy, Net Zero and Energy, outlined plans for a package to accelerate our actions to achieve net zero by 2045, which include a timeline for implementing demand management, to help us achieve our much needed target to reduce car usage.

We will carefully consider the report’s recommendations and provide a Scottish Government response in due course.

The information requested on how many cancer nurses have been employed in each year since 2011-12, broken down by NHS board area is not centrally available.

The Scottish Government has commissioned NHS National Services Scotland to work with a wide range of clinical and other stakeholders to consider how best to meet the needs of the population in terms of young people’s gender healthcare services for NHS Scotland. This work is ongoing, and aims to define the scope of a specialist service in Scotland.

The Scottish Government anticipates that an outline service specification based on this work will be presented to NHS Strategic Planning Board for Scotland for consideration later this year.

All restoration work funded through Peatland ACTION is subject to Sustainable Procurement Duty outlined in Procurement Reform (Scotland) Act 2014 . Procurement Reform (Scotland) Act 2014 (legislation.gov.uk)

Operational decisions on procuring contractors to carry out restoration work are made by respective Peatland ACTION delivery partners.

For further information on their selection criteria please contact NatureScot, Cairngorms National Park Authority, Forestry and Land Scotland, Loch Lomond & The Trossachs National Park Authority or Scottish Water.

The Scottish Government is grateful for the latest advice from the Climate Change Committee and remains fully committed to delivering net zero by 2045. As published alongside the statement to the Chamber on the Climate Change Bill, we will develop measures to accelerate the switch from ICE to zero emission vans and other vehicles in order to help reduce ICE van kms, with the intention of achieving early progress with the largest companies while ensuring appropriate support mechanisms for smaller businesses and independent traders.

We will carefully consider the report’s recommendations in relation to van traffic and provide a response in due course.

The Scottish Government recognises that childcare costs continue to be a challenge for many parents and carers. That is why the Programme for Government set out ambitious commitments to expand access to childcare as part of our mission to tackle child poverty.

However, I would note that Scotland already has the most generous offer in the UK. We are the only part of the UK to offer 1,140 hours a year of funded early learning and childcare to all 3- and 4-year-olds, and eligible 2-year-olds, regardless of their parents’ working status, putting children first. If families paid for this themselves, it would cost them more than £5,500 per eligible child per year.

The NHSScotland Special Leave policy provides the staff member and their partner initially up to one working week of paid compassionate leave. Additionally, managers hold the discretion to extend this leave by an additional week thereby providing a total of 10 days paid special leave to support healing and recovery.

Of the 2.5m jobs in Scotland, the research mapped nearly 40% of those as green jobs. Of those green jobs, 13% were classified as ‘new and emerging’ construction sector jobs, 12% were ‘enhanced skills and knowledge’ construction sector jobs, and 25% were ‘increased demand’ construction sector jobs. The research did not seek to define how many of these were as a result of policy initiatives nor does the Scottish Government hold that information.

The full report can be found here: https://www.skillsdevelopmentscotland.co.uk/media/q2lhg1v5/green-jobs-in-scotland-report_final-4.pdf

It remains the Scottish Government’s intention to update the School Premises (General Requirements and Standards) (Scotland) Regulations 1967.

Given the time elapsed between the consultation that took place in 2017-18, we must now consider the updated context that the regulations exist in.

We are now taking this work forward and will re-consult on the Regulations in due course.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W- 26745 on 18 April 2024. 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