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The list of practices accepting new patients in NHS Lanarkshire can be found at: Dental Practices accepting new NHS patients | NHS Lanarkshire (scot.nhs.uk), and as with all Boards, is subject to change at short notice.

Scottish Government officials are continuing to work with the design advisory group to establish the Anti-Racism Observatory for Scotland (AROS). The design advisory group is providing expert support ahead of a procurement process that will select a host for AROS.

This is an important step forward in our journey to a fairer Scotland for all, and will build upon the Anti-Racism Interim Governance Group’s participatory research work with over 500 individuals from racially minoritised communities across Scotland.

We are committed to completing an equality impact assessment before AROS is established. We will engage with stakeholders to examine the evidence available and understand the impacts that may be felt by communities.

The establishment of the Anti-Racism Observatory is one part of our wider strategic approach to tackling racism. We continue to work with all our partners and stakeholders to achieve our ambition of eradicating racism in Scotland.

Legislation and regulations relating to electricity networks are reserved to the UK Government, with National Grid Electricity System Operator (ESO) responsible for electricity system planning and electricity network planning across GB. As set out in the UK Transmission Acceleration Action Plan, the UK Government has committed to develop a Strategic Spatial Energy Plan, which will bridge the gap between government policy and infrastructure development plans across the whole energy system, land and sea, across Great Britain. The Scottish Government is broadly supportive of a more strategic approach to energy planning however, we are continuing to press the UK Government to ensure that the SSEP respects the devolved competencies of the Scottish Parliament.

We are committed to engaging with stakeholders to help inform the specification of the Single Building Assessment (SBA).

As part of this we established a Technical sub group, the SBA Task and Finish Group, which has met over the period November 2023 – March 2024 and has included developers, technical experts, building standards officials and fire engineers.

Additionally, we have contracted with external consultant fire engineers, The Joule Group, who have been reviewing from an independent perspective the use of PAS 9980 as the basis for the SBA within the Scottish Context.

The recruitment and promotion of Senior Civil Servants must include a robust selection process. Standards for hiring Senior Civil Servants (SCS) are set by UK Cabinet Office. These include the use of additional forms of assessment including psychological assessment, which have supplemented interviews for SCS for over 10 years. Academic research suggests that interviews alone are a poor predictor of future job performance, and supplementing interviews with other forms of assessments, including psychological, strengthens hiring decisions.

A Prior Information Notice was published on 13 February 2024 to inform the market of our intention to issue an Invitation to Tender for a new assessment contract for Senior Civil Service recruitment and promotion. The Tender is yet to be published and a new contract will be awarded, after all bids are assessed for quality of service and value for money, later in 2024. In the last 12 months, the current provider of psychometric assessments to the Scottish Government assessed 125 candidates for 30 SCS recruitment and promotion campaigns, at a cost of £165,401. This is in line with equivalent Cabinet Office contracts per SCS Campaign.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-25489 on 9 March 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/questions-and-answers

The statutory levy will be applied across Great Britain and will be used to support potential spending on projects and services across all three nations to reduce gambling related harms.

We continue to work with the UK Government and the Welsh Government over the levy proposals to ensure that Scotland receives a fair allocation of this funding. It is Scottish Government’s view that this should be, at least, reflective of a population share of the funding.

The Scottish Government has welcomed regular engagement with the Department for Culture, Media and Sport officials in UK Government to discuss a range of gambling policy matters, including its proposals to introduce stake limits for online slot games. The Scottish Government has also met and will continue to meet with a wide range of gambling stakeholders, including the Gambling Commission and public health organisations to inform our policy thinking.

The Scottish Government expects fair work principles to be adhered to in the college sector. To support fair work in the college sector, the Scottish Government recently introduced legislation to add trade union nominees to college boards, which will improve trade union recognition and confidence in college governance.

While operational decisions on pay and staffing matters are the responsibility of individual colleges, the Scottish Government has been clear that compulsory redundancies should only be considered as a last resort, after all other options have been fully explored in collaboration with trade unions.

The Scottish Government remains concerned by the impact of potential action on students and expects that institutions take action to mitigate those impacts.

As with previous years, the Scottish Funding Council expects to publish this year’s indicative college funding allocations in early spring with final funding allocations expected in late Spring for the academic year 2024-25.