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We have undertaken a literature review and engaged with a range of specialist organisations to understand the issue and what is required to address it. We are currently developing a policy definition of extended family abuse, including exploring how it interacts with intimate partner abuse and honour based abuse and other forms of VAWG.

We will continue to work with specialist organisations and academics in the Addressing Violence Against Minority Ethnic Women and Girls Network, and mainstream services including Social Work Scotland, Police Scotland, COPFS, NHS Scotland and local authorities to inform our work. We will share the draft policy definition with partners in Autumn 2025.

There are 360 secondary schools in Scotland recorded in the 2024 school census. The following is a table of how many of these are currently signed up to ESAS, broken down by local authority area.

The Scottish Government were aware of concerns that the link between health professionals and Police Scotland has not always been clear when victims of spiking present to emergency departments.

Through the collaborative work of the multi-agency Spiking Roundtable, the Scottish Government has been exploring a range of initiatives with partners from policing, victims organisations and COPFS, as well as representatives from colleges and universities, community safety groups, and the night-time economy sector to ensure our response is robust and effective.

To address these concerns it was recently announced here: Public urged to be vigilant against spiking ahead of summer events on 11 July 2025 that the Scottish Government, in collaboration with NHS 24 and Police Scotland, has developed a consistent narrative for health professionals. The guidance ensures that victims receive clear and uniform advice regarding the roles of health professionals and the police when they report incidents of spiking. This approach has been endorsed by the Royal College of Emergency Medicine.

As part of this multi-agency national response, Scotland’s 111 service has also been updated to include spiking-related guidance, helping to better identify and support victims.

Additionally, the NHS are introducing changes to their digital system which will allow recording of those who present to emergency departments as potential victims of spiking. This will provide invaluable data on previously unrecorded incidents and will allow for a better understanding of the extent to which these lead on to formal police reporting.

Defining an issue is a vital first step towards creating a shared understanding of the problem. This lays the foundation for ensuring our collective response is more effective and leads to better outcomes for victim-survivors. This is particularly important in relation to honour-based abuse which has been misunderstood by professionals, meaning it is often not recognised and the required support to survivors not offered.

We have developed a policy definition of honour-based abuse that will provide staff responding to survivors with a consistent understanding of honour-based across different sectors. To do so, we undertook a literature review and worked with specialist organisations and academics in the Addressing Violence Against Minority Ethnic Women and Girls Network, and mainstream services including Social Work Scotland, Police Scotland, COPFS, NHS Scotland and local authorities to inform our work. We are currently working with these partners to explore practical ways the definition can be applied across services.

Developing a statutory definition will require extremely careful consideration and consultation to ensure it captures the complexities of honour-based abuse and aligns with legal frameworks. We will continue to work with our experts and partners to work through these challenges thoughtfully and ensure that our approach to addressing honour-based abuse, including a statutory definition if necessary, is robust and effective.

Our Equally Safe Strategy Delivery Plan committed to develop a campaign to work with men and boys to recognise that we need to challenge misogyny to pave the way for the effective dismantling of the gender-based structures and attitudes which enable and support violence against women and girls. We recognise that men and boys need to be part of the solution.

Officials have undertaken extensive desk research and insight discovery work to support the development of a campaign to tackle this issue. This work has been supported by an investment of £35,000 to date and further investment planned this year to develop, produce and launch the activity in the first quarter of 2026. We will work closely with our partners in the statutory and third sectors throughout the campaign development.

Scottish Government does not hold information on the number of postgraduate places that have been offered at Scottish universities.

Information on the number of students enrolled on postgraduate courses is published by the Scottish Funding Council annually. Latest publication: Higher Education Students and Qualifiers at Scottish Institutions 2023-24 - Scottish Funding Council.

The Scottish Government is committed to implementing the Children (Scotland) Act 2020 and ensuring that Scottish Ministers are complying with their duties under the Act. The Act covers a wide range of areas, many of which involve complex implementation activity. On that basis, the Scottish Government has approached the commencement of provisions in the Act - and the duties on Scottish Ministers in those provisions - in stages.

A number of provisions are already in force: The Children (Scotland) Act 2020 (Commencement No. 1 and Saving Provisions) Regulations 2020.

• Section 13: promotion of contact between looked after children and siblings
• Section 14: duty to consider contact when making etc. compulsory supervision order
• Section 15: clarification of order-making power
• Section 23: funding for alternative dispute resolution (commenced to allow Scottish Ministers to make reports on progress with implementation)
• Section 24: pilot of mandatory information meetings on alternatives to court (commenced to allow Scottish Ministers to make reports on progress with implementation)
• Section 25: opportunity to participate in hearing
• Section 26: appeal against relevant person decision
• Sections 32, 33, 34, 35: final provisions

Sections 23 and 24 are not yet implemented for remaining purposes, but six progress reports on have been laid in the Scottish Parliament to date.

A number of provisions have been commenced for certain purposes in The Children (Scotland) Act 2020 (Commencement No. 2) Regulations 2021:

• Section 7(3) and (4): register of solicitors where person prohibited from conducting their own case [superseded by Part 3 of the Victims, Witnesses and Justice Reform Bill]
• Section 9: register of child welfare reporters – for purposes of making regulations
• Section 10(1) and (3): regulation of child contact services
• Section 17(1) and (3): register of curators ad litem – for purposes of making regulations

In terms of the duties contained in those provisions:

• Section 7 will be repealed and replaced by provisions in Part 3 of the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform Bill and will be implemented following enactment of the Bill.
• An update on timings in relation to section 9 of the 2020 Act was provided to the Equalities, Human Rights and Civil Justice Committee on 24 June 2025 [see below]. Implementation of the register of curators ad litem under section 17 will be carried out at the same time.
• Scottish Ministers plan to lay secondary legislation to regulate child contact services in the coming weeks, but intend to use powers in the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Act 2010, rather than section 10 of the 2020 Act.

We made a further set of commencement Regulations on 22 May 2025: The Children (Scotland) Act 2020 (Commencement No. 3 and Saving Provision) Regulations 2025 covering:

• Section 1(2): on the views of the child being considered when parents are making major decisions.
• Section 30(1), (3), (4), (5), (6) and (7): on delay in children’s hearings and adoption and permanence proceedings.

We plan to make a further set of commencement Regulations in October 2025 as committed to at a meeting of the Committee on unimplemented legislation on 24 June 2025: Official Report (see columns 10 to 14).

Forestry and Land Scotland received independent professional advice prior to the purchase of Glen Prosen from their appointed advisers. That advice informed the decision to make an offer and its level.

The Scottish Government is clear that there should be no unnecessary delays in responding to patients, regardless of their location. The Scottish Ambulance Service’s 2025-26 budget is £437.2 million. This represents increased investment of £88 million from 2024-25, including additional funding to provide for prior year pay deals as well as a range of funding to support vital frontline services, including in rural and island communities.

The Scottish Government does not provide Scottish domiciled students with doctoral research loans.

Scottish Government does not hold information on the number of Scottish domiciled students accessing doctoral loans for universities out with Scotland.