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Seabed leasing for offshore wind is administered by Crown Estate Scotland. Crown Estate Scotland appraises lease applications as part of its internal assessment and due diligence process to confirm developer suitability, experience and financial strength, only making awards to organisations that satisfy this assessment process. As part of this process companies must provide a written statement to Crown Estate Scotland to confirm they have not been convicted of unlawful activity, including corruption, bribery, fraud, and human trafficking and exploitation, within the last five years. The criteria underpinning this assessment process is published for the purposes of transparency and accountability.

For the ScotWind leasing round, Crown Estate Scotland required a statement of commitment from each applicant and any project partners confirming that they are not, and have not been, in contravention of a range of legislation, including sanction regimes. This requirement safeguarded against the successful participation of companies convicted of unlawful conduct either within the UK or internationally, including unlawful conduct in relation to ecologically damaging developments. In terms of ScotWind, companies that have proposed a change in ownership or structure following the award of a lease option agreement, Crown Estate Scotland undertakes a review of any incoming party to ensure they have the required capability, financial standing and have provided a duly signed statement of commitment, before consent to such a change in the project is granted.

Crown Estate Scotland also has responsibilities under the Scottish Government’s Slavery and Human trafficking statement and follow guidance on due diligence in relation to human rights.

Crown Estate Scotland are committed to taking all appropriate action to prevent the Scottish seabed from being used by any company that does not meet its terms of lease.

Crown Estate Scotland reserves the right to void any application (or terminate agreement) in relation to ScotWind, or other developments which is found to have provided false information.

The Scottish Government ensures that Police Scotland, NHS Boards, and local authorities work together to support our most vulnerable adults through the framework established by the Adult Support and Protection (Scotland) Act 2007. This legislation sets out the criteria for identifying an adult at risk and requires public bodies to work together and share information when they believe an adult may be at risk of harm. Where action is needed to support and protect the person, the case must be referred to the local council for the area where the adult is located.

Additionally, in respect of supporting people in distress the Scottish Government has worked with the Partnership Delivery Group (PDG) to publish the Framework for Collaboration and the Collaborative Commitments Action Plan to strengthen multi-agency working between Police Scotland, NHS Boards, and local authorities. These initiatives are designed to ensure that individuals experiencing distress or crisis receive timely, appropriate, and compassionate care and support.

The information requested on how many clinicians in Scotland are currently qualified to prescribe attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) medication, broken down by (a) profession and (b) NHS board is not held centrally.

A search has been performed of the COPFS database for charges received by COPFS under a) the Trade Marks Act 1994, and b) a key word search for counterfeit or fake goods on charges under the Scottish Government Classification of "Fraud”.

During the period 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025 there were no charges where a Fiscal Fine was offered by COPFS and accepted in relation to either individuals or companies.

The information is provided under the caveat that COPFS uses a live, operational database to manage the processing of reports submitted to Procurators Fiscal by the police and other reporting agencies throughout Scotland. It is designed to meet business needs in the processing of criminal cases, rather than for statistical analysis, and the information within it is structured accordingly.

The numbers were arrived at following an interrogation of relevant charges however a manual review was not conducted to confirm accuracy.

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring publicly owned companies deliver services that are high-quality, provide best value, support fair work and contribute to inclusive economic growth. This includes an expectation in favour of in-house delivery where functions can be undertaken effectively within the organisation and where this is demonstrably in the public interest.

However, any decision whether to outsource or utilise in-house functions is for individual, publicly owned companies to make in line with their legal duties, operational requirements and a full assessment of any impacts, including quality of service, value for money and public benefits before such a decision to outsource is made.

The current project plan is on track to have this business case completed by summer 2025. Once completed it will be reviewed through the appropriate governance processes.

The First Minister convened the meeting on 12 June to focus on the views of those working in the youth work sector on violence among young people.

We recognise there are a wide range of organisations working to support young people and families across communities who are undertaking valuable prevention and early intervention work. To ensure those attending were able to put forward views in the time available, it was necessary to restrict numbers, so were unable to invite everyone with an interest in this matter.

The Scottish Government remain open to meeting with organisations wishing to contribute to this discussion to help inform the overall response to strengthen support to young people and communities.

No Green Freeport relief had been granted by October 2024, when mid-year estimates of non-domestic rates income for 2024-2025 were collected. This is the latest available data.

Provisional outturn data for 2024-2025 will be published later in the summer as part of the Non-domestic rates income statistics series, and I will write to the member as soon as this is published.

The Wellbeing Economy Monitor will be published on the Scottish Government webpages and can be found using the site search facility when searching for the terms “Wellbeing Economy Monitor” or “Wellbeing Economy”. We intend to bring together the Wellbeing Economy material as a collection on our webpages including previously published monitors which should add to its prominence.

The Scottish Government has worked closely with Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) to develop and refine the eligibility criteria for the Islands Business Resilience Fund (IBRF) and identify how this targeted funding can reach those businesses which meet the criteria and have been impacted by reductions in ferry services.

HIE carried out detailed analysis of data and statistics provided by Transport Scotland and CalMac relating to ferry disruption. Based on this, the islands of South Uist, Colonsay, North Uist, Eriskay, Benbecula, Berneray, Grimsay and Arran were identified as eligible for the Fund, as they each had experienced more than 15% ferry cancellations over the last three operating seasons, with limited alternatives. For comparison, the average disruption to ferry services, across the CalMac network was around 6-7%.