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The final Retail Industry Leadership Group meeting of this year took place on the morning of 26 November, prior to the announcement of the UK budget, so no discussions took place at that time. However, we anticipate this will be a topic of discussion at the next ILG meeting, taking place in the first quarter of 2026.

Local authorities are responsible for developing and delivering flood protection schemes, supported by Scottish Government funding.

The 2015 Flood Risk Management Plans contained 42 flood protection schemes. 40 were initially eligible for funding. 9 were removed because they were no longer required, subject to alternative arrangements or failed to meet progress deadlines.

The total grant funding provided to these 9 schemes is £28.31m. This includes £22.973m provided to Falkirk Council for Grangemouth Flood Protection Scheme. GFPS remains under development, but subject to alternative funding arrangements.

Flood protection schemes can have impacts on individuals, communities and the environment, and require careful and thorough planning. Like all infrastructure projects, it can take many years for flood schemes to progress from option appraisal to completion.

Please see table for 10 schemes that are in progress below;

The Community Needs Assessment (CNA) methodology recognises how crewing levels, working hours and crew location influence service design. For each assessment, the relevant operator will be asked to check that crewing information used to inform an understanding of current service delivery on each route is accurate. Equally, for the generation and appraisal of options to address identified transport connectivity needs, the methodology recognises the importance of ensuring that these are deliverable, including the impact on personnel of options that would mean a change in the route service level. At appropriate stages in the assessment, further input and validation from the operator, including from crew, port staff and their representatives, will be needed to ensure that the outputs from the assessments are based on a full understanding of how the services are delivered and the operational impact of any changes.

For example, for the Cowal Community Needs Assessment published in September 2024, crew and trade unions were briefed on the future options for Gourock-Dunoon ferry services and fed back on the report before decisions were made on implementation. Crew were then instrumental in supporting the development of new draft timetables to meet the requirements of the CNA prior to consultation on those with the community.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the number of youth perpetrated attempted murders, as the data we receive from Police Scotland for the Recorded Crime statistics is a simple count of the number of recorded crimes by crime type.

Police Scotland have provided the following management information on the number of people under the age of 18 who were accused of attempted murder between the first quarter of 2024-25 (i.e. 1st April to 30th June 2024) and the second quarter of 2025-26 (1st July to 30th September 2025). Data for earlier years are not available from the single standardised national system used by Police Scotland to gather details of those involved in crime, which became fully operational from January 2024.

It should be noted that the table below is not a total of attempted murders by those under the age of 18 as some cases may have had multiple perpetrators.

We are committed to enabling regional co-operation, which is why last month the First Minister announced a plan to bring forward legislation in the next parliament to allow Regional Partnerships to become legal bodies. As is normal practice, we will provide details of the timetable for the next legislative programme in the next Parliament.

This year NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is being supported with an initial resource budget of £3,123.5 million, along with capital allocations of £41.26 million for maintaining the NHS estate and replacing and upgrading equipment.

Boards are expected to make the best use of these resources, to ensure that patients continue to receive a high standard of care.

In addition, we are supportive of NHS GG&C developing a design for the façade of Inverclyde Royal Hospital and Scottish Government will make a decision on funding when a design is complete and full costs are known.

We are currently working with all NHS Health Boards to develop a whole system NHS infrastructure plan to inform long-term investment priorities across Scotland – this includes NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde.

The review of the carbon levy commenced in summer 2025. The review is being led by the Scottish Governments Travel Management Team in consultation with Scottish Procurement and Property Directorate, Directorate for People and the Office of the Chief Economic Advisor. External stakeholders include CTM North Ltd and Enterprise Rent-a-Car ltd.

The levy is a corporate policy which applies to travel undertaken by core Scottish Government staff. If the recommendations of the review are taken forward, they will be published internally. No external publication is planned.

The following table shows how many drug- related and alcohol-related hospital stays were recorded in Inverclyde in each of the last five years.

Number of drug-related and alcohol-related hospital stays, Inverclyde

As of 8 December 2025, the Oil and Gas Transition Training Fund has received 818 applications since its launch in July 2025.

We continue to support the revitalisation of town centres through the Town Centre First Principle and delivery of the Town Centre Action Plan. National Planning Framework 4 further embeds this approach by recognising town centres as national assets, and promotes the reuse of empty buildings and town centre living to boost local economic activity.

We also support town centre regeneration through our regeneration capital investment programmes, as well as our support for Scotland’s Towns Partnership, Business Improvement Districts and the Scotland Loves Local programme.

Since 2014 Inverclyde Council has received over £13m regeneration capital investment from the Scottish Government, which has supported the transformation of empty properties into commercial, residential and enterprising activity. Examples include enhancement work in Port Glasgow’s Lower Town Quarter and improvements to Customhouse Square in Greenock.

We are also supporting local authorities to address vacant retail spaces in our high streets and town centres through a range of measures, using the levers available to us. This includes our competitive non-domestic rates regime, and supporting the re-use or repurposing of vacant units through the Fresh Start Relief and Business Growth Accelerator Relief.