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We have made significant investment to introduce more than 80 extra counsellors across institutions and have committed funding to maintain support through to the end of this academic year.

No decision has yet been taken with regard to funding beyond the current academic year.

There is no reliable data held or published which we can refer to answer this question: Whilst Public Health Scotland publish the total number of patients waiting for specialist mental health services, detail of the individual types of assessment or diagnosis is not held.

The publications for both CAMHS and Psychological Therapies waiting times for the quarter ending December 2022 can be found at Publications - Public Health Scotland .

The Scottish Government’s National Neurodevelopmental Specification for Children and Young People sets out seven standards for service providers to ensure that children and young people who have neurodevelopmental profiles with support needs receive the support that they require. The Specification is purposefully inclusive and includes support for those who may be identified with autism spectrum disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

While the powers to take meaningful action in regard to energy pricing sit with the UK Government, we are doing everything we can to support households with high energy bills.

We recently tripled our Fuel Insecurity Fund to £30m for 2023-24, to support anyone at risk of self-disconnection, or self-rationing their energy use. That fund continues to provide a lifeline to households at risk of self-rationing or self-disconnecting their energy. We also made an additional £1.2 million available to help our advice services meet increasing demand last year.

Our new Winter Heating Payment replaces DWP’s Cold Weather Payment and provides a stable, reliable annual £55 which will help around 400,000 low-income individuals with their heating expenses each winter.

We have allocated £350m to heat, energy efficiency and fuel poverty measures in 2023/24, including £119m targeted at fuel poor households, while our £1.4m Islands Cost Crisis Emergency Fund is supporting those in our island communities who traditionally see higher costs for food and fuel.

We have called repeatedly on the UK Government to provide additional, targeted support for consumers in vulnerable circumstances. I am due to meet with the UK Government Minister for Energy Consumers later this month and will raise again the need for further action to support those who have been most affected by the ending of the Energy Bills Support Scheme ending as well as the need for a social tariff for energy consumers.

The Talent Attraction and Migration Service will be delivered through an online digital platform. Users will be able to access the service from anywhere in Scotland. The service will help employers navigate the UK’s immigration rules and provide reception support to people moving to Scotland. The service is still in the design stage, but we expect the service to help a wide range of employers across the Scottish economy and individuals moving to Scotland.

Work is continuing on the review of the policies and operating arrangements which underpin the Home Owners Support Fund (HOSF). We now expect this work to conclude later this year due to the additional timescales required for the modelling work to be completed. We will continue to take account of stakeholders’ views as recommendations for any changes to the existing arrangements are developed.

Up to £30 million is being made available to the Rural and Islands Housing Fund during this parliamentary term.

There is no mandatory curriculum within Scottish schools and local authorities have the flexibility to decide upon the content of their lessons at the local level taking account of the needs and circumstances of children and young people in attendance at their schools.

However it is important that we all know how to stay safe in and around Scotland’s waters. We are fully aware that conditions in open water sites change constantly and can be dangerous. Indeed, there is a significant difference between swimming in a heated indoor swimming pool and a cold open water site such as a loch. Therefore issues such as the importance of floating to live or the dangers of cold water shock also must be communicated in order to prevent drownings.

Water Safety Scotland and Education Scotland have launched a full progression pathway for water safety education for schools in Scotland. This pathway focuses on the provision of age and stage appropriate water safety education to support all children and young people aged 3-18 to develop valuable lifesaving knowledge, skills and understanding.

This pathway is available for use by all school practitioners when delivering water safety education, and it is available on Education Scotland’s website through the following link: Water Safety | Learning resources | National Improvement Hub (education.gov.scot) .

Furthermore, the Scottish Government will continue to work with Scottish Swimming, Education Scotland, sportscotland and Scottish Water to develop interventions and approaches to provide opportunities for children to become confident, safer and competent swimmers.

The shellfish industry is an increasingly important aquaculture and food sector, creating and sustaining employment opportunities in many of Scotland’s remote rural, island and coastal communities and which supplies healthy and delicious Scottish shellfish to domestic and international markets and businesses.

I was pleased to support the Association of Scottish Shellfish Growers conference held in Oban last year, in addition to the Shellfish Association of Great Britain conference to provide an update on progress across our priorities in Scotland, which of course is producing substantial amounts of the UK’s shellfish either through wild or farmed stocks. This year’s annual conference will be held in London in June and I was grateful to receive an invite to attend from David Jarrad, Chief Executive of the Shellfish Association of Great Britain.

Scottish Government officials are currently considering attendance at the event.

The Scottish Government does not hold this data. Guidance was issued to Health Boards in April 2022 setting out our expectation that Health Boards will ensure Ukrainian refugees have access to GP practices.

The following two tables provide details of funding:

1. Awarded under various funding schemes to each of the local authorities for public EV charging infrastructure and to local authorities and other public bodies for public sector fleet EV charging infrastructure.

2. Awarded through the Energy Saving Trust to private businesses and domestic customers.

In addition to the figures in the Table 1, North Lanarkshire and South Lanarkshire Councils jointly benefited from a £5.3m grant to supporting public EV charging infrastructure through project PACE between 2019 and 2021, this resulted in the installation of 167 new charge points at 44 hubs across the region.

Table 1. Funding to Local Authorities