Chamber and committees

The onshore wind summit held on 9 July 2015 was attended by over 200 representatives from the onshore wind sector and provided an opportunity to hear first-hand the many concerns and impacts the UK Government proposals will have on businesses and communities in Scotland. Feedback from the summit highlighted a number of important actions which the UK Government should take. These included providing developers and investors with the necessary certainty ahead of the Energy Bill receiving Royal Assent and a Renewables Obligation grace period extending to community owned projects and projects in planning. I have raised matters these directly with the Secretary of State.

The Scottish Government will continue to press the UK Government to provide the required clarity on the long-term policy for the renewables sector to ensure investment in renewable energy projects, including onshore wind, can continue. This includes resolving uncertainty caused by proposals to close the Renewables Obligation early, clarity on Contracts for Difference and market signals beyond 2020.

Expenditure on policies to support renewables, including onshore wind, is paid for through UK consumers’ energy bills and governed by the Levy Control Framework cap set by HM Treasury. The Scottish Government does not have any budget that would enable us to pay additional support for reserved matters.

HEEPS: Warmer Homes Scotland

Warmer Homes Scotland has a contract value of £16-32 million per year with the Scottish Government committed to making at least £16 million available per year. The contract is for five years with the potential to extend to seven years.

Spend on Fuel Poverty since 2009

The following table sets out Scottish Government domestic fuel poverty budgets since 2009. These figures relate to the Scottish Government’s fuel poverty budget line and cover spend against those lines in the financial year. They may not match spend figures in the Home Energy Scotland Outcomes Reports which tie annual budgets to work done and can give a more accurate picture of the outcomes delivered in a given year, but which may have been supported by funding from different financial years.

Domestic Fuel Poverty Budgets By Programmes (£ million)

Breakdown of households assisted

It is not possible to deliver a breakdown of all households assisted by local authority and year. Many of these households received assistance through energy company obligation schemes such as the Carbon Emissions Reduction Target (CERT) and Community Energy Savings Programme (CESP), which were administered by Ofgem. Figures provided by Ofgem indicate that 545,000 dwellings in Scotland received either loft or cavity wall insulation (or both) through CERT⁶. Ofgem figures also indicate that 23,388 dwellings in Scotland received measures via CESP⁷. Energy company activity in Scotland was augmented by Scottish Government programmes, with funding designed to attract as much investment north of the border as possible.

Analysis of Scottish Government programmes since 2009 is available by local authority and year and is published on the Energy Saving Trust’s (EST) website here. These figures demonstrate that over 230,000 households received energy efficiency measures through our schemes since 2009. Cumulatively, therefore, since 2008, when CERT and CESP were introduced, over 700,000 thousand households in Scotland have received assistance to improve the energy efficiency of their home.

It is likewise not possible to determine the average cash saving per household as some were assisted through CERT or CESP. We can estimate however that, as a result of measures installed through Scottish Government programmes since 2009, there has been a net gain in household incomes of almost £1.3 billion over the lifetime of the measures installed. This equates to an average saving of £5,529 per household over the lifetime of the measure.

Notes:

1. Figures for 2015-16 are based on budgets rather than outturn.

2. The Energy Assistance Scheme was replaced by Warmer Homes Scotland on 1 September 2015.

3. The final outturn for this year does not reflect the substantial accrual from the Energy Assistance Package which resulted in a total spend of nearly £30 million.

4. HEEPS Cashback was previously Green Homes Cashback and transferred to the fuel poverty budget from the Heat and Energy Efficiency budget in September 2014.

5. The increase in this budget in 2015/16 reflects the transfer of responsibility between directorates within Scottish Government who had previously jointly funded this.

6. http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN06196/SN06196.pdf

7. https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/ofgem-publications/58763/cesp-final-report-2013final-300413-pdf

8. More information on this can be found on the EST website here: http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/home-energy-efficiency-programmes

The Scottish Government accepts the main recommendations of the Task Force for the Future of Residential Care in Scotland report in principle and has been working with COSLA and the other stakeholders on implementing many of those recommendations.

We are committed to improving the quality of care in Scotland and believe that attracting the right people and raising the status and public image of social care as a profession is key to delivering this.

We have met with COSLA and other stakeholders and are currently undertaking analysis to better understand the costs of making progress towards the living wage in the social care sector.

The Scottish Government commissioned Health Protection Scotland to undertake a survey in 2011 to review effectiveness of the regulations. The survey captured the views of both local authority regulators and of a sample of sunbed premises operators.

The majority of regulator respondents reported that the legislation had proven to be effective, in particular the provisions which require proof of age and the prohibition of use by under-18s. In addition, it found that environmental health teams in local authorities were proactive in monitoring sunbed premises and also concluded that the majority of enforcing authorities had not determined formal enforcement to be necessary in ensuring compliance.

Information on the number of new cases and incidence rate of malignant melanoma of the skin and non-melanoma skin cancer by year of diagnosis is published on the Information Services Division Scotland website under the cancer statistics topic area via the following link: https://isdscotland.scot.nhs.uk/Health-Topics/Cancer/Publications/2015-04-28/i_cancer_skin.xls.

We have met with COSLA and other stakeholders and are currently undertaking analysis to better understand the cost implications of making progress towards the living wage in the social care sector.

I refer the member to the answer to question S4W-27589 on 1 October 2015. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

Figures published by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills estimate that in 2013, the onshore wind sector in Scotland supported approximately 5,400 jobs. 

Scotland has 8.2 GW of renewable generation projects consented, with a further 4.3 GW in planning. While a number of these projects will meet the grace period criteria or have contract for difference (CfD) contracts, many more have no clear route to market due to the changes to the Renewable Obligation and the continuing uncertainty surrounding future CfD allocation rounds. 

The Scottish Government will continue to engage with industry to see how we can support them over the coming months.

Since the UK Government’s announcement, the Scottish Government hosted a summit to hear industry concerns, and followed this up with a letter to Amber Rudd, Secretary of State, seeking a flexible approach to the Renewables Obligation (RO) grace period criteria. This issue was also raised during a face to face meeting over the summer. We asked that those projects in the planning system who have not yet had planning approval or those with approval after 18 June 2015 should fall within the grace period as these had already invested heavily in anticipation they would receive the RO.