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The final report of the independent group chaired by Professor Elizabeth Aston, was published today https://www.gov.scot/ISBN/978-1-80525-352-5 .

The final report has been published alongside five associated reports that helped contribute to the Group’s work. The final report confirms that Scotland is in a strong position to seize the opportunity to become world leading in adopting a rights-based, ethical, evidence-based, consultative approach to innovation and adoption of emerging technologies in policing.

The Scottish Government’s response to the report has also been published today www.gov.scot/publications/emerging-technologies-in-policing-report-scottish-government-response

The Scottish Government stands ready to work with policing stakeholders on how they plan to follow up the recommendations made by the Group. This will enable the Scottish Government to continue to work with policing bodies to ensure that new technology will be used in ways which help in the detection and prosecution of crime, as well as protecting our communities first and foremost.

The consultation document will be published on Scottish Forestry’s website on 22 February at 10:00 am. The consultation will be open for 12 weeks. I would welcome all those interested in the future of forestry in Scotland to respond.

National Security, which includes the Prevent strategy, is reserved to the UK Government but delivered through devolved functions in Scotland. Prevent has been a statutory duty on Policing, Healthcare, Education, Local Authorities and Prisons in the UK as a whole, Scotland included since 2015.

The collective focus of Prevent in Scotland is always on identifying the earliest opportunity to offer support to individuals who may be vulnerable to being drawn into or supporting terrorism, or who are exposed to divisive extremist narratives.

There is no fixed profile for someone who may benefit from support in this context. However, as exposure to radicalisation and a range of extremist narratives has grown in the online space in particular, referrals to Prevent across the UK have indicated an increase in individuals being exposed to such harms at a younger age.

Scottish Government works closely with Police Scotland and other key partners including the education sector to ensure proportionate responses to such challenges across a broad spectrum of threat.

Our alignment of Prevent to existing safeguarding processes such as the Getting It Right For Every Child (GIRFEC), seeks to ensure Prevent works in a supportive, multi-agency way in line with other strategies designed to prevent harm and safeguard children from exposure to such issues as drug use, criminal gangs, physical abuse and sexual exploitation.

A Prevent referral allows for a multi-agency safeguarding assessment to be conducted where appropriate, and all referrals are carefully assessed based on the specific details of the case.

Where a referral is deemed appropriate for Prevent case management, the type of support available is wide-ranging, and can include help with education, parental or carer support or child social care involvement. The ongoing provision of training and online guidance aims to ensure that when a Prevent referral is made, it is robust and appropriately informed, and that the response is considered and proportionate.

The publication of Prevent referral statistics on an annual basis is reflective of efforts to ensure as much transparency as possible in respect of the Prevent programme, within the confines of what is appropriate in line with the protection of individuals’ data.

We are taking all the action we can to help students overcome the issues they face through the cost of living crisis, including food insecurity.

No one should have to compromise on food or other essentials. We are supporting students directly by providing £16.8m in hardship funding for the current academic year to support Higher Education students experiencing financial hardship, in addition to tuition fees and a range of living cost support.

We have also provided £135m in student support for Further Education students attending college in the current academic year. Colleges can use these funds flexibly to meet demand across Further Education student bursaries, childcare and hardship funding.

The Scottish Government recently provided an additional £2.4 million funding for groups that can get vital support to people quickly – and with an emphasis on cash grants so that people can access food with dignity and choice.

We encourage anyone who is struggling financially to get advice through their local authority, a local advice service, or Social Security Scotland as well as visiting our cost of living website - www.gov.scot/news/accessing-help-for-cost-of-living

Yes, the felling of trees is regulated through the issuing of Felling Permissions, under the Forestry and Land Management (Scotland) Act 2018. Permission must be granted before felling, thinning or deforesting an area of woodland; the sale and transfer of land has no impact on this requirement. The potential effects on flood risk would be taken into account when assessing applications to fell trees.

Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS) is well placed to assist with the implementation of the Scottish Government policy to expand the range and size of the beaver population within Scotland over the next 10 years.

It is working closely with colleagues in Scottish Government land agencies, partners, and landowners/managers with an interest in actively expanding the beaver population into new areas within Scotland.

FLS is an active member of the newly formed Beaver Advisory Group, which has replaced the Scottish Beaver Forum.

The Offers of Accommodation scheme set out to replace the previous two-stage Expression of Interest process which enabled potential hosts to submit information about their properties, with a streamlined, single-stage online form, designed on user-centred principles and built by the Scottish Government’s Digital teams. The new Offer to Host form can be found at Offer to host - Start page (ukrainehostoffers.service.gov.scot) The form went live, initially for a limited trial, on 22 November and was promoted through a news announcement, social media and a distribution of a partner toolkit. Since the form went live, it has had 442 completed submissions as of 14 February, which are now being checked by Local Authorities and fed back to Matching teams.

The Offers of Accommodation form now feeds in directly to the Warm Scottish Welcome Matching Tool used by the National Matching Service since September 2022. This digital tool was designed by Scottish Government Digital teams, in collaboration with COSLA and Scottish Government operational officials, to facilitate the matching of Ukrainian Displaced People in Welcome Hub accommodation to longer term hosting and social housing opportunities across Scotland.

The Matching Tool is currently being rolled out to a small selection of Local Authorities, with the ambition of all 32 Local Authorities being invited to have access to the platform over the course of the coming months. Ahead of the wider roll-out, staff at all Scottish Local Authorities have been invited to begin necessary background checks on 17 February.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-14804 on 22 February 2023. 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

As noted in my answer to question S6W-14449, work on the two-year report on the activities of the National Performing Companies was suspended due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

I will consider whether this work should be restarted given the National Performing Companies all publish their own annual reports on their individual websites including information relating to their community and education programmes, financial figures and key artistic achievements.

Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS) have identified eight sites on Scotland’s national forests and land where within range translocations of beavers are considered to be ecologically feasible. We anticipate beavers to be moved to these sites after the kit dependency period in 2023.

A further three projects for range expansion translocations are at early stages of investigation and the number of suitable sites is as yet undetermined. It is expected these sites to be ready to accept beavers from 2024 onwards.