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The Scottish Government has commissioned an independent evaluation to assess the effectiveness of the current approach to early medical abortion at home. The evaluation is being led by NHS Lothian, along with a number of academic experts. The Scottish Government will make a decision on the long-term future of early medical abortion at home once this evaluation has been completed. The Ministerial approval for early medical abortion at home in Scotland is currently being reviewed, with a view to enabling the current arrangements to be extended temporarily in order to allow them to continue until the evaluation has been completed and its findings have been considered.

Statistics on homelessness, based on administrative data, are collected by local authorities in the course of processing homelessness applications and for households in temporary accommodation. A limitation of this approach is that data is not collected for any households, including students, that are homeless but do not engage with their local authority. Data is available for a number of characteristics including age, gender and ethnicity but not in relation to those in full or part time in further and higher education. The Scottish government does not collect economic activity in the collection, some LAs may however collect the information for their own purposes but the extent of this is unknown. The latest statistics publication is available here: Homelessness in Scotland: 2020 to 2021 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

The Scottish Government has already started work on a Review of Purpose Built Student Accommodation which is running in parallel with the development of a Rented Sector Strategy both of which will inform a comprehensive Student Accommodation Strategy.

Tariffs are set by charge point owners, taking into account local demand and use, to cover a number of costs including electricity provided. In July 2021 Transport Scotland published a joint report with Scottish Futures Trust highlighting the importance of tariffs to attract private sector investment to expand the public charging network. In January we announced a new £60m fund to grow the public charging network in Scotland and, as part of this, our work with local authorities will consider the levels of tariffs required to ensure the public network is financially sustainable. In parallel, following a UK-wide consultation on consumer experience at public charge points last year, the Scottish Government is engaging with the UK Government Office for Zero Emission Vehicles on progress with development of regulatory powers related to electric vehicle charging tariffs and will keep outcomes of work in this area under review.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-06031 on 28 February 2022 which provides an update on publication of the Project Neptune report.

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
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I refer the Member to the answer to question S6W-06576 on 14 March 2022. 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
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A further £40,000 of the additional £0.5 million Care and Repair funding has been transferred to Care and Repair Lanarkshire.

The Flood Risk Management Plans for the period 2022 to 2028 were published by SEPA on 17 January 2022. The plans are accessible from SEPA's website.

Flood Risk Management Plans | SEPA

The Scottish Government introduced the Animals and Wildlife, Penalties, Powers and Protections (Scotland) Act 2020 in November 2020. We made a number of important changes to legislation on wildlife crime including;

? Increasing the penalty for a range of wildlife offences to a maximum of 5 years imprisonment and/or an unlimited fine.

? Extending the time allowed to investigate wildlife crimes.

? Extending the offence of vicarious liability to apply to offences relating to the illegal use of traps and snares.

? Bringing forward a power to introduce fixed penalty notices for less serious wildlife crimes.

Scottish Ministers do not currently monitor any variance in the level of electric vehicle charge point tariffs. The charge point owner is responsible for the setting of any tariffs on their electric vehicle charge points. The Scottish Government do not have a position on the levels of tariffs that the hosts can set, however, we expect these to be in line with the recovery of costs.

We set out our commitment to establish an independent taskforce to consider whether the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (Scottish SPCA) should be given extra powers to investigate wildlife crime in both the 2021-22 Programme for Government and in our Scottish Government and Scottish Green Party Shared Policy Programme.

The taskforce’s role will include due consideration of the potential implications of any proposed changes to the powers of the Scottish SPCA. The taskforce will report back by the end of 2022.

We will set out the remit of the taskforce in more detail in due course.