Chamber and committees

The National Strategy for Economic Transformation sets out the need to strengthen Scotland’s position in new markets and industries, generating new, well-paid jobs through a just transition to net zero and a highly skilled workforce is critical to the delivery of that ambition.

Our No One Left Behind approach will support a growing number of green jobs and innovation activity by offering all-age employability support to all who require it with a focus on helping those furthest from the labour market with the most complex barriers to gaining and sustaining fair work, such as carers, single parents, and those on low incomes.

The Student Awards Agency Scotland (SAAS) awards a range of loans, bursaries and living-cost grants to eligible students to assist with their expenses while studying. This can include providing support with living costs for those who have had to reduce their working hours in order to undergo training and upskilling. Detailed information for specific groups can be found on the SAAS website including grants for lone parents and undergraduate students with the lowest household incomes - Student Awards Agency Scotland - SAAS - Funding Your Future .

The Climate Emergency Skills Action Plan (CESAP) sets out a framework for green skills planning and a clear direction for the changes needed in the skills system, signalling the role that industry, communities and individuals across Scotland will play in achieving this.

The Plan commits to maximising the uptake of all skills pathways relevant to supporting the transition to net zero across training, education and work-based learning through a range of short, medium, and long-term actions and can be found here: climate-emergency-skills-action-plan-2020-2025.pdf (skillsdevelopmentscotland.co.uk) .

As noted in S6W-19781, we committed to publish the Climate Emergency Skills Action Plan Update by the end of the year alongside the Climate Change Plan.

The UK Government’s 11th hour decision to undermine DRS in Scotland will have affected businesses across Scotland that were preparing for the launch of the Scottish scheme. We wrote to the UK Government on 16 May, 19 May and 23 May 2023 to inform them of the potential impact a delayed decision on the IMA exclusion, or not providing an exclusion, would have on businesses. In our letter dated 2 June 2023, we specifically highlighted our concerns about the impact this would have on Circularity Scotland Limited (CSL).

Administrators (Interpath) were appointed on 21 June 2023, and are currently working through the details of the administration process for CSL. The administration process will assess if any businesses has been directly financially affected by CSL going into administration.

The Scottish Government remains committed to the delivery of a successful DRS in October 2025 and are pushing the UK Government to set out how this can be delivered across the UK. The onus is now on DEFRA to work with the devolved nations, industry and wider stakeholder to ensure this scheme is launched successfully and on time.

The Scottish Government does not hold the specific information you have asked for. However, information about Circularity Scotland Limited’s (CSL) creditors is available on Companies House at the following link CIRCULARITY SCOTLAND LIMITED filing history - Find and update company information - GOV.UK (company-information.service.gov.uk) .

The UK Government’s 11th hour decision to undermine DRS in Scotland will have affected businesses across Scotland that were preparing for the launch of the Scottish scheme. We wrote to the UK Government on 16 May, 19 May and 23 May 2023 to inform them of the potential impact a delayed decision on the Internal Market Act exclusion, or not providing an exclusion, would have on businesses. In our letter dated 2 June 2023, we specifically highlighted our concerns about the impact this would have on CSL.

On 28 June the Scottish Government published the Purpose and Principles for post-school education, research and skills . The Initial Priorities paper that was published alongside makes it clear that we agree that significant system reform is required if we are to achieve the long-term vision and outcomes.

The commitments on skills planning, employer engagement, funding, post-school pathways, the need for meaningful parity of esteem and consistency of language, clearly accept the basis of several recommendations made by James Withers in the Independent Review of the Skills Delivery Landscape.

Our work, with partners, to take forward these actions will further inform our response to the detail of Withers’ recommendations, which we will set out in the context of lifelong education and skills reform in the coming months.

The aim of the Green Growth Accelerator model is to unlock investment over the medium term in low carbon infrastructure. This unlocking would be supported by payments from the Scottish Government to the local authority which are tied to delivery of a set of pre-defined and agreed outcomes.

It takes time to develop infrastructure projects, so to support the initial pilot phase the Scottish Government has provided £720k in resource funding from the 2021-22 budget for six pathfinder projects (£120k per project) to develop business cases to pilot the GGA model across a range of geographical areas and project types. The six pathfinder pilots were selected following an open call for proposals from local authorities.

The Scottish Government provided a further £832k in resource funding through the GGA in 2022-23 to support local authorities with developing their pipeline of low carbon infrastructure projects.

A range of policy documents were shared with the Scottish Government by Circularity Scotland (CSL) during the application process for the scheme administrator role for the Deposit Return Scheme. Documents which supported the scheme administrator application by CSL were the subject of an Environmental Information Request and subsequent review, details of which are published on our website at https://www.gov.scot/publications/foi-202200298347/.

I refer the member to the answer to S6W-20272 on 17 August 2023. In addition, the EIR response referenced alludes to comments made by the Scottish Government regarding the logistics and infrastructure sections within the application documentation.

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 is providing £4.3m of funding in 2023-2024 to expand the network of Climate Action Hubs across the country. The Hubs empower communities to engage in collective climate action, supporting peer-to-peer learning and helping groups to take advantage of funding opportunities. The network has now been expanded with Climate Action Hubs in Highland, Orkney and Shetland (Highlands & Islands Climate Hub), Fife, Moray and the Outer Hebrides in addition to Aberdeen City and Aberdeenshire (NESCAN). In most other areas of Scotland, hubs are expected to launch by the end of the financial year, ensuring wide coverage of the country.

The Scottish Government is also committed to supporting the growth of community energy through CARES, which aims to help communities engage in and benefit from the energy transition to net zero. The scheme has advised over 900 organisations and offered £60 million in funding to over 680 projects. It has supported the installation of 57.9MW of renewable energy, and has supported a wide range of projects from community owned wind and hydro to decarbonising community buildings and installing solar PV on faith buildings.

The Scottish Government also supports communities through other initiatives, for example the Investing in Communities Fund (ICF), a multiyear communities fund that is delivered as part of the Empowering Communities Programme. The fund targets the most disadvantaged communities to deliver projects, services and activities that address poverty and disadvantage on their own terms.