Chamber and committees

The numbers of cases involving alleged contravention of environmental protection legislation referred to the Procurator Fiscal service by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency are set out in the table.

The decision on whether or not to proceed with prosecution in a particular case is for the Procurator Fiscal. The numbers of cases proceeded with and convictions secured are shown in the table.

	1/4/1996 to 31/3/1997	1/4/1997 to 31/3/1998	1/4/1998 to 31/3/1999	1/4/1999 to 31/3/2000	1/4/2000 to 26/1/2001
Cases referred to Procurators Fiscal1	37	70	73	84	51
Cases proceeded with	26	49	38	48	172
Percentage of cases proceeded with	70%	70%	52%	57%	33%2
Cases resulting in conviction	24	44	30	43	15
Percentage of cases proceeded with resulting in conviction	92%	90%	79%	90%	88%

Notes:

1. Figures may differ slightly to those published in SEPA's annual reports, depending on when legal proceedings were resolved.

2. 25 cases are currently under consideration by the Procurator Fiscal service.

The following tables show the latest information available on teachers taking early retirement. No information is held centrally which could identify separately those teachers who resign.

As you are aware I have recently sent a report on the supply of teachers to the Convener of the Education, Culture and Sport Committee detailing the background to the current position on the collection of information relevant to teacher supply and outlining planned improvements to current methods. Copies of this report have been placed in the Parliament's Reference Centre for the information of all members. These tables will be inserted into the report as Annex H.

Teachers Taking Early Retirement (headcount), from Education Authority schools, from April 1995 - April 1996, by Education Authority and sector
		Total	Nursery	Primary	Secondary	Special
Scotland		294	4	152	131	7
Aberdeen City		0	0	0	0	0
Aberdeenshire		0	0	0	0	0
Angus		0	0	0	0	0
Argyll & Bute		0	0	0	0	0
Clackmannanshire		19	0	6	13	0
Dumfries & Galloway		0	0	0	0	0
Dundee City		0	0	0	0	0
East Ayrshire		0	0	0	0	0
East Dunbartonshire		13	0	8	5	0
East Lothian		14	1	10	3	0
East Renfrewshire		7	1	3	3	0
Edinburgh, City of		25	0	6	15	4
Eilean Siar		0	0	0	0	0
Falkirk		8	0	4	4	0
Fife		72	0	40	32	0
Glasgow City		30	0	19	10	1
Highland		0	0	0	0	0
Inverclyde		5	0	3	2	0
Midlothian		13	1	9	3	0
Moray		6	0	2	3	1
North Ayrshire		26	0	13	12	1
North Lanarkshire		0	0	0	0	0
Orkney Islands		0	0	0	0	0
Perth & Kinross		0	0	0	0	0
Renfrewshire		0	0	0	0	0
Scottish Borders		5	0	4	1	0
Shetland Islands		0	0	0	0	0
South Ayrshire		0	0	0	0	0
South Lanarkshire		0	0	0	0	0
Stirling		0	0	0	0	0
West Dunbartonshire		0	0	0	0	0
West Lothian		51	1	25	25	0

Teachers Taking Early Retirement (headcount), from Education Authority schools, from April 1996 - April 1997, by Education Authority and sector
		Total	Nursery	Primary	Secondary	Special
Scotland		1,758	15	737	918	88
Aberdeen City		61	0	33	27	1
Aberdeenshire		80	0	48	30	2
Angus		46	0	23	16	7
Argyll & Bute		33	0	16	16	1
Clackmannanshire		32	1	19	12	0
Dumfries & Galloway		27	0	9	16	2
Dundee City		61	1	25	33	2
East Ayrshire		19	0	5	14	0
East Dunbartonshire		56	0	39	17	0
East Lothian		33	0	16	16	1
East Renfrewshire		19	0	8	11	0
Edinburgh, City of		56	2	30	23	1
Eilean Siar		12	0	4	8	0
Falkirk		68	0	41	25	2
Fife		108	0	40	61	7
Glasgow City		315	1	111	179	24
Highland		86	2	30	52	2
Inverclyde		8	0	5	3	0
Midlothian		36	3	16	13	4
Moray		27	1	12	11	3
North Ayrshire		22	0	12	9	1
North Lanarkshire		66	1	21	42	2
Orkney Islands		18	0	7	11	0
Perth & Kinross		54	0	27	25	2
Renfrewshire		34	0	15	13	6
Scottish Borders		68	0	34	29	5
Shetland Islands		8	0	3	5	0
South Ayrshire		19	0	11	8	0
South Lanarkshire		165	0	12	153	0
Stirling		42	1	21	13	7
West Dunbartonshire		51	1	28	18	4
West Lothian		28	1	16	9	2

Teachers Taking Early Retirement (headcount), from Education Authority schools, from April 1997 - April 1998, by Education Authority and sector
		Total	Nursery	Primary	Secondary	Special
Scotland		204	9	74	112	9
Aberdeen City		15	0	10	4	1
Aberdeenshire		11	0	7	4	0
Angus		9	0	2	7	0
Argyll & Bute		2	0	1	1	0
Clackmannanshire		1	0	1	0	0
Dumfries & Galloway		8	0	4	4	0
Dundee City		1	0	0	1	0
East Ayrshire		7	1	2	3	1
East Dunbartonshire		3	0	1	2	0
East Lothian		1	0	1	0	0
East Renfrewshire		1	0	1	0	0
Edinburgh, City of		10	0	3	6	1
Eilean Siar		2	0	0	2	0
Falkirk		3	0	1	2	0
Fife		13	0	10	3	0
Glasgow City		30	5	0	25	0
Highland		4	1	1	2	0
Inverclyde		0	0	0	0	0
Midlothian		7	0	3	3	1
Moray		4	0	0	2	2
North Ayrshire		14	0	7	7	0
North Lanarkshire		21	0	6	14	1
Orkney Islands		3	0	1	2	0
Perth & Kinross		5	0	4	1	0
Renfrewshire		3	1	1	1	0
Scottish Borders		0	0	0	0	0
Shetland Islands		2	0	1	1	0
South Ayrshire		6	0	1	4	1
South Lanarkshire		2	0	0	1	1
Stirling		13	1	3	9	0
West Dunbartonshire		0	0	0	0	0
West Lothian		3	0	2	1	0

Teachers Taking Early Retirement (headcount), from Education Authority schools, from April 1998 - April 1999, by Education Authority and sector
		Total	Nursery	Primary	Secondary	Special
Scotland		196	2	72	119	3
Aberdeen City		7	0	3	4	0
Aberdeenshire		5	0	3	2	0
Angus		5	0	1	3	1
Argyll & Bute		0	0	0	0	0
Clackmannanshire		4	0	4	0	0
Dumfries & Galloway		4	0	2	1	1
Dundee City		4	0	0	4	0
East Ayrshire		17	0	6	11	0
East Dunbartonshire		3	0	0	3	0
East Lothian		1	0	1	0	0
East Renfrewshire		2	0	2	0	0
Edinburgh, City of		20	0	6	14	0
Eilean Siar		8	0	0	8	0
Falkirk		2	0	0	1	1
Fife		12	0	5	7	0
Glasgow City		18	0	2	16	0
Highland		2	0	1	1	0
Inverclyde		0	0	0	0	0
Midlothian		4	0	2	2	0
Moray		7	0	5	2	0
North Ayrshire		10	0	6	4	0
North Lanarkshire		20	0	8	12	0
Orkney Islands		0	0	0	0	0
Perth & Kinross		2	0	2	0	0
Renfrewshire		2	2	0	0	0
Scottish Borders		0	0	0	0	0
Shetland Islands		6	0	2	4	0
South Ayrshire		10	0	5	5	0
South Lanarkshire		14	0	1	13	0
Stirling		6	0	5	1	0
West Dunbartonshire		1	0	0	1	0
West Lothian		0	0	0	0	0

Teachers Taking Early Retirement (headcount), from Education Authority schools, from April 1999 - April 2000, by Education Authority and sector
		Total	Nursery	Primary	Secondary	Special
Scotland		86	3	40	39	4
Aberdeen City		2	0	0	2	0
Aberdeenshire		17	0	8	7	2
Angus		6	0	4	2	0
Argyll & Bute		0	0	0	0	0
Clackmannanshire		0	0	0	0	0
Dumfries & Galloway		0	0	0	0	0
Dundee City		0	0	0	0	0
East Ayrshire		11	2	3	4	2
East Dunbartonshire		2	0	2	0	0
East Lothian		0	0	0	0	0
East Renfrewshire		1	0	0	1	0
Edinburgh, City of		0	0	0	0	0
Eilean Siar		0	0	0	0	0
Falkirk		2	0	2	0	0
Fife		8	0	3	5	0
Glasgow City		5	1	4	0	0
Highland		0	0	0	0	0
Inverclyde		0	0	0	0	0
Midlothian		0	0	0	0	0
Moray		2	0	2	0	0
North Ayrshire		2	0	0	2	0
North Lanarkshire		2	0	0	2	0
Orkney Islands		0	0	0	0	0
Perth & Kinross		12	0	4	8	0
Renfrewshire		0	0	0	0	0
Scottish Borders		0	0	0	0	0
Shetland Islands		0	0	0	0	0
South Ayrshire		0	0	0	0	0
South Lanarkshire		10	0	4	6	0
Stirling		2	0	2	0	0
West Dunbartonshire		2	0	2	0	0
West Lothian		0	0	0	0	0

The cost of producing the adverts was £115,542 and the media costs to place the adverts were £735,000. This was part of a £4.6 million three-stage pig meat advertising campaign run by the MLC.This MLC Pig Meat advertising campaign was not run in Scotland. The Scottish Executive was not involved in the campaign, did not contribute to it and no Scottish Minister had been in contact with the MLC about this initiative. A separate £600,000 MLC-funded Scottish campaign promoting pork as a "lean and healthy" product was run by Quality Meat Scotland.

This is a matter for Aberdeen and Grampian Tourist Board and its funding partners to decide.

Decisions on the provision of air support are operational matters for Chief Constables and police authorities and it is for them to take decisions on the costs and benefits of specific investment proposals in light of the resources available. Since 1997-98 there have been no formal applications for funding for the provision of air support. At that time an ACPOS Working Group concluded that if air cover was to be provided for Scottish police forces, the preferred approach would involve a national arrangement. This has been considered since by the Scottish Executive, police authorities and ACPOS without a final conclusion being reached. Earlier in the current financial year, Tayside Police wrote to the Scottish Executive Justice Department with an outline business case for setting up an air support unit in conjunction with Fife Constabulary. The response indicated that in the light of previous work on air support the department was unwilling to provide central funding for local provision, although that did not of course rule out the use of local funding where a case might be justified on the basis of local circumstances. This is the approach that has been adopted by Strathclyde which has leased a helicopter.

I understand that just over 15,000 organisations in the above categories are affected by withdrawal of reliefs.Total revenue forgone as a result of existing reliefs to these bodies is as set out in the table. The withdrawal of reliefs is being phased in over a five-year period. For some groups, withdrawal began in April 2000, and for the remainder will begin in April 2001.

Authority	£000
East of Scotland	7,299
North of Scotland	5,404
West of Scotland	6,259
TOTAL	18,962

These figures also take no account of the possibility that many organisations will take advantage of water metering, where this will reduce their costs. It is therefore likely that additional income to the authorities will accordingly be reduced.

The Executive is aware of the potential benefit of digital technology to rural areas. The Arkleton trust (Research) Ltd produced a report for Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) in 1995 evaluating the Highlands and Islands Telecommunications Initiative (HITI). The report showed that the initiative had exceeded its job creation targets. Presently HIE attribute over 3,000 jobs in the call centre sector in the region to the publicly supported infrastructure projects of the past decade, including the HITI.The Executive is aware that local loop unbundling may have an impact on rural areas and has asked Scottish Enterprise and Highlands and Islands Enterprise to collaborate on a study to consider the likely extent of local loop unbundling in Scotland and to suggest measures to maximise its impact.

The Executive is currently considering how the procurement of public sector broadband services might stimulate the wider supply of high bandwidth services by the industry to businesses and the community.However, the Executive recognises that Public/Private Partnerships may be needed to overcome the scale of demand delivery in the more remote parts of Scotland, and welcomes the current activities of the Highlands & Islands Partnership to secure European support for infrastructure development in such areas.

The Scottish Police College offers workplace and open and distance learning as well as residential training involving the use of special facilities so that there is no single measure of its training capacity. However its ability to offer residential training is constrained by the number of bed places it can provide. The number of bed places available on a daily basis over the past five years is as follows:

1996-97	1997-98	1998-99	1999-2000	2000-01
432	316	425	425	733

The figure for 1997-98 was affected by a move from dormitory accommodation to study bedrooms. The figure for 2000-01 reflects the sharing of bedrooms by probationers. This is intended to be a short-term measure for dealing with exceptionally high levels of recruitment by police forces.

Strathclyde Police currently have access to air support through an air support unit based at the city heliport in Glasgow. Funding for the police is provided annually through the GAE process and resources are not allocated to specific operational areas or policing tasks.