Seòmar agus comataidhean

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-39323 on 5 August 2025. 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.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-39323 on 5 August 2025. 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.

The Scottish Government does not currently have any plans in place to remember former patients of historic asylums who were buried in unmarked graves. Details of any burial carried out in a burial ground by a burial authority are recorded in the statutory burial register so that the deceased are not forgotten.

The Scottish Government has outlined a number of actions that will be undertaken to improve data collection – both qualitative and quantitative - in the recently published National Transitions to Adulthood Strategy. The intention is to utilise this data to:

• build a more accurate picture across Scotland of the number of young disabled people;
• have a better understanding of the experiences and outcomes of young disabled people who are making the transition to adulthood;
• focus on making the right improvements at a national and local level; and
• report and monitor progress.

The Scottish Government is already providing funding to Association for Real Change (ARC) Scotland who have developed Compass in response to the identified need to improve how we collect and use information from people with lived experience to better inform decisions about practice, commissioning and policy.

The development of a Children’s Services Plan requires planning partnerships to use available data and intelligence to undertake a multi-agency joint strategic needs assessment to identify the needs of children, young people and families living in that area, and inform service planning. This joint strategic needs assessment should be used to inform service planning and local strategic commissioning processes for the Children’s Services Plan, with specific consideration of the needs of young people as they move between receipt of children’s and adult services.

As set out in the strategy, there is also an action to deliver an enhanced offer of practical support to Children’s Services Planning Partnership Strategic Leads as they begin to develop their 2026-2029 Strategic Plans. This will include a joint workshop with Children’s Service Planning Partnership Strategic Leads and the Integration Joint Board Strategic Planning and Performance Officers Group focused on best practice for transitions between children’s and adult services as well as the role of planning and commissioning in transitions.

The Scottish Government is also progressing work to improve the equality evidence base more broadly which will support these intentions. This includes:

• developing the Equality Evidence Finder data platform, which will present available intersectional data on young disabled people;
• continuing to improve the availability of disability data through specific actions outlined in the Equality Evidence Strategy 2023-2025; and
• undertaking a Disability Evidence Review to support the delivery of the Disability Equality Plan. This Evidence Review will be finalised in partnership with Disabled People’s Organisations and will include intersectional evidence on disabled young people where possible.

Scotland’s Census also enables intersectional analysis of data on disabled young people, supporting a deeper understanding of experiences and outcomes across a range of policy areas at national and local levels.

The Scottish Government plan to publish the first progress report on the National Transitions to Adulthood Strategy by the end of 2026.

There are a number of existing frameworks and legislative measures that already facilitate better joining up of activities across sectors, including:

• the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004 and associated Regulations
• the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014
• the Public Bodies (Joint Working) (Scotland) Act 2014
• the Getting it Right for Every Child and the Getting It Right for Everyone approaches

There are also a number of specific actions within the National Transitions to Adulthood Strategy to improve communication and collaboration across sectors which include:

• Updating the Additional Support for Learning statutory guidance by the end of this parliamentary term (May 2026), including the section on co-ordinated support plans to provide clarity on the relationship between co-ordinated support plans and other types of child plans.
• Delivering an enhanced offer of practical support to Children’s Services Planning Partnership Strategic Leads as they begin to develop their 2026-2029 Strategic Plans. This will include a joint workshop with Children’s Service Planning Partnership Strategic Leads and the Integration Joint Board Strategic Planning and Performance Officers Group focused on best practice for transitions between children’s and adult services as well as the role of planning and commissioning in transitions.
• Working with participating areas and the Association for Real Change (ARC) Scotland to gather a full picture of what local agencies are already doing to collectively improve transitions in their area in order to share effective and innovative practice. This will build on the examples collated within the Principles into Practice Impact Report published in May 2023 and the Spotlight Examples hosted on the Principles into Practice website.

As outlined in the Mental Health in Primary and Community Care Progress Report (Dec 2024), we remain committed to delivering increased mental health and wellbeing workforce capacity in general practice when it is feasible to do so. As the member will be aware, the Emergency Budget review meant that recruitment of additional roles was paused. We are prioritising investment to maintain mental health capacity in primary care through Action 15 of the Mental Health Strategy 2017-2027 and the Primary Care Improvement Fund.

The Mental Health in Primary and Community Care Progress Report also sets out what is needed to improve access to support, assessments and treatment from general practice. It contains a range of actions, including improving access to adult mental health treatment – expanding the NHS 24 Mental Health Hub, by December 2025, to provide access to digitally enabled psychological interventions and therapies for people who may benefit from early treatments.

This is in the context of wider support for general practice: the Scottish Government has already allocated over £1.3 billion to primary medical services this year with a further £56 million on course for pay rises and to provide new preventative services.

This follows an increase of £59.6 million last year to meet the Review Body on Doctors' and Dentists' Remuneration recommendations and to cover population growth as well as a further £13.6 million to help GP practices meet the costs of inflationary pressures and deliver local enhanced services.

The Scottish Government and its partners already collect and publish evidence on the outcomes of disabled people. However, we recognise that there are some areas where additional data publication would be valuable. The Data Collection and Measurement section of the recently published National Transitions to Adulthood Strategy outlines the Scottish Government’s actions to address these gaps.

As part of this commitment, we will conduct an audit of existing data collected and published on disabled children and young people. This audit will identify gaps in the data currently published on disabled young people, including instances where data is collected but not published. The findings will inform discussions on priorities for future evidence gathering to support better planning for transitions.

Officials will also engage with UK-wide developments on guidance on disability data collection and harmonisation. This will include considering where and how Scottish Government may adopt revised approaches, where appropriate.

In addition, the Scottish Government is continuing to provide funding to Association for Real Change (ARC) Scotland through financial year 2025-26. Part of this funding will support ARC Scotland to maintain and continually improve the Compass tools; to promote the wider implementation of Compass and to publish anonymised evaluation reports with the data generated.

Specific data on staffing expenditure from Pupil Equity Funding in schools, broken down by local authority, is not held centrally.

Since Pupil Equity Funding’s introduction in 2017-18, over £1billion has been allocated to Scotland’s schools, empowering headteachers to take the best approaches that suit the needs of their pupils, including using it to support significant numbers of additional staff, to help close the poverty-related attainment gap. Scottish Attainment Challenge funding, which includes annual Pupil Equity Funding of £130 million to 97% of schools, supports up to 3,000 additional staff, including up to 700 FTE teachers.

Across the country we continue to trust and empower Scotland's headteachers to use this extra funding to support their pupils - whether through extra support staff, family link workers or through support for mental health, for example. The recently published PEF Report highlights some of the ways Headteachers are investing their funding to improve outcomes for children impacted by poverty:- pupil_equity_funding_report_2025_.pdf

Data on how much each local authority spends on agency staff is not held or collected by the Scottish Government. It is the responsibility of local authorities to allocate the total financial resources available to them, including setting school budgets, on the basis of local needs and priorities, after fulfilling their statutory obligations and the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities.

Data on local authority expenditure on teachers is available from the Local Government Financial statistics data collection. The latest figures are available from LFR01 at https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-local-government-finance-statistics-slgfs-2023-24-workbooks/.

Teachers in Scotland are employed by local authorities, not agencies. This includes supply teachers and teachers on short term contracts.

Since August 2020 there have been 123 Critical Incidents and 1041 Disruptive Incidents on the A720 Edinburgh City Bypass section managed by Transport Scotland. This period covers approximately 1688 days. Critical Incidents cover the most significant incidents where there are full closures. Disruptive Incidents include these closures but also where the road has remained open but there have been significant delays caused, for example by breakdown or collisions. Unfortunately we are unable to confirm the delays associated with these incidents.