Chamber and committees

Approximately 600 people registered to attend the three regional information events. A total of 90 people registered to attend the information event held on 20 June 2015. Any parents, children and young people who attended any of these public information events were offered support for travel costs and childcare and any costs incurred were met from within the overall £100,000 budget for public information events.

A total of 500 places were available at regional information events held by the Scottish Government. A total of 90 places were available at the information event for parents, carers, children and young people held on 20 June 2015.

The Scottish Government is providing funding for a number of public information events on the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014. It has budgeted £100,000 for this purpose.

The Scottish Government has held three regional information events on the Act that were open to the public. No expenses or incentives were offered at these events. A further information event specifically for parents, children and young people was held on Saturday 20 June and parents, children and young people attending that event were offered support for travel costs and childcare. Gift vouchers were made available to those parents and carers attending the event who wished to accept them to thank them for attending. Gift packs were provided to children and young people who attended. The costs were met from the overall total Scottish budget of £100,000 for public information events on the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014.

The Scottish Government has budgeted £100,000 for public information events on the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014.

Yes – Scottish Water will continue to provide wholesale water and sewerage services to all schools and hospitals, and indeed all customers, who are connected to the public network.

The Peterhead Carbon Capture and Storage project, which I recently visited, could secure the future of unit 1 at Peterhead for 15 years.

Scotland is an energy rich country that consistently exports a significant proportion of electricity generated to the rest of the UK. In 2013, 28% of electricity generated in Scotland was exported, up from 26% in 2012. With the correct market and regulatory support there is no reason that Scotland cannot continue to be a net exporter of electricity – indeed it is very much in the interests of the rest of the UK, with UK capacity margins at such low levels.

However with 13% of generation and 42% of generator transmission charges the future of conventional stations is obviously less certain than were a fair scheme to be applied throughout the UK.

This is a matter for the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service. The information requested is not held centrally.

The Scottish Government has had no discussions with the UK Government on this matter.

<>The Scottish Government published its updated carbon management plan in 2014 and commissioned energy saving audits on all of the buildings on our estate. The result was our carbon management project register. Projects are prioritised based on their carbon savings, cost and payback. To date we have chosen projects which have reduced the Scottish Governments energy consumption including boiler replacements, LED lighting upgrades, Building Management System upgrades and improvements to our computer room air conditioning units. Solar will be considered as part of this process however we will continue to prioritise technology with has the greatest impact on our energy consumption and carbon emissions.

The Scottish Government currently has renewable technology in the form of solar heating panels at our offices at Saughton House in Edinburgh and Tweedbank near Galashiels and biomass boilers at our offices in Faskally and Inverurie. We will pursue installing further renewable technology when funding is available and the cost, payback and carbon savings makes it value for money over other energy efficiency projects.