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Social Security Scotland does not currently publish statistics on the number of people who receive more than one benefit from Social Security Scotland. Social Security Scotland recently published Official Statistics on the number of individual clients paid and in 2024-25, Social Security Scotland paid 962,525 individual clients (excluding clients in receipt of Carer’s Allowance Supplement).

Telecommunications policy, which includes mobile connectivity, is currently reserved to the UK Government. Whilst the Scottish Government has not conducted any analysis on the economic impacts of poor mobile connectivity, we do recognise the social and economic importance of high-quality and reliable mobile services, particularly for our rural and island areas. Through our Scottish 4G Infill (S4GI) programme, we have invested £28.75 million to deliver and activate 55 mobile masts in areas that previously had no coverage.

Super off-peak journeys account for 0.2 per cent of all journeys made on ScotRail services. Only a very small number of journeys actually qualify for the ticket, and there are restricted travel times aimed at the quietest trains on particular routes, between 11am and 3pm, and after 8pm. Details of all ScotRail fares and products, following the removal of peak fares on 1 September 2025, will be available in early August.

As set out in the Social Security (Scotland) Act 2018, Scottish Ministers have a statutory duty to promote take-up of devolved benefits across the Scottish social security system. Reserved benefits remain the responsibility of the UK Government and the Scottish Government has no formal role in the administration of these payments. We continue to urge the UK Government to more actively promote reserved benefits and to follow Scotland's example by developing a Benefit Take-Up Strategy.

Welfare rights advice services, supported by Scottish Government investment, continue to assist people to take up benefits they may be entitled to, including reserved payments. In 2025-26, we are allocating over £15 million for provision of free income maximisation support, welfare and debt advice services.

Responsibility for measuring Scotland’s inward investment performance, which includes planned jobs and supply chain impacts for involved projects, rests with Scottish Enterprise. The independent EY Attractiveness Survey and the UK Government’s Department for Business and Trade’s (DBT) annual inward investment results provide an additional performance indicator for inward investment. Collectively, the results provide robust estimates of Scotland’s inward investment activity and performance.

Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) is not a classification that the Scottish Government, Scottish Enterprise nor EY use when measuring the performance of inward investment projects into Scotland.

Scotland has a strong record in attracting foreign direct investment and our Inward Investment Plan (IIP) plays a central role in supporting our ambitions to be a destination of choice for global inward investors. Information on how Scotland has performed in terms of attracting inward investment projects is available via the EY attractiveness survey (the latest results can be found here: ey-uk-attractiveness-survey-scotland-06-2025.pdf) and the Department for Business and Trade Inward Investment Results (the latest results can be found here: DBT inward investment results 2024 to 2025 - GOV.UK). Scottish Enterprise results will be published in the Autumn.

Scottish Development International (SDI) is the international arm of Scottish Enterprise (SE). The SDI teams in overseas offices are made up of staff employed by FCDO on behalf of Scottish Enterprise. The breakdown by location of these FCDO employed staff is included in the following table. There are also Scotland and London based staff working in the international arm of SE. SE's international teams based in Scotland currently employ 150 staff; and 8 in London.

As responsibility for promoting the take-up of Pension Credit lies with the UK Government, the Scottish Government has not had any specific discussions with the UK Government regarding access to the Department for Work and Pensions or HM Revenue and Customs data for the purposes of promoting take up of Pension Credit.

However, I have wrote to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions last year, highlighting the need for a targeted campaign to increase awareness of Pension Credit and offered our support in promoting take-up, which we will continue to do to ensure everyone receives the support they are entitled to.

The Scottish Government has had no recent discussions with the DVSA about the expansion of locations offered by the Scottish Driving Assessment Service.

The Scottish Driving Assessment Service is a matter for NHS Boards, and is hosted by NHS Lothian on behalf of NHS Scotland. The service is free for users and is currently funded through contributions from NHS Boards to NHS Lothian.

The NHS Directors of Planning Group has agreed to oversee a review of the Scottish Driving Assessment Service (SDAS) and present a paper to the NHS Boards Chief Executives group. A Working Group will oversee a detailed scoping exercise to understand the demand for driving assessment in Scotland, and how this is currently being met.

It is proposed that the review will conclude with an Option Appraisal, supported by NHS Ayrshire and Arran, enabling stakeholders from throughout Scotland to discuss and appraise potential future service delivery models for driving assessment in Scotland.

The Scottish Government is in regular contact with NHS Ayrshire and Arran, and the review is expected to conclude in late 2025.

As part of the Endoscopy and Urology Diagnostic Recovery and Renewal Plan, the Centre for Sustainable Delivery (CfSD) has published a number of clinical pathways and guidance, co-designed with clinicians from specialty delivery groups to manage patients referred routinely for colonoscopy. This includes the recently published qFIT clinical consensus document and National guidance for specifically managing Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) symptoms. It is for Health Boards and clinicians to embed these pathways locally and ensure capacity within the six week diagnostic standard. The pathways are published on Health Board websites, and it is expected all boards should be implementing these locally.

Clinicians can also refer to IBD UK’s IBD Standards for advice on delivering high-quality care at every point in a patient’s journey.

The Scottish Government recognise that there may be occasions where Health Boards require access to agency workers in order to supplement their workforce. In keeping with our national approach, such workers should only be deployed by exception.

Where such exceptions are met, the Scottish Government expects Health Boards to use one of the approved suppliers on the relevant National Procurement Framework (such as Staffscanner) to obtain temporary staff.

For care services, it the statutory responsibility of local Integration Joint Boards (IJBs) to ensure that appropriate social care support services are in place to provide people with the right care, in the right place and at the right time.