Chamber and committees

The local government finance settlements were maintained over the period 2012-16 with extra money for additional responsibilities and the total settlement for 2016-17 amounts to over £10.3 billion. Moray Council receives its fair share of this total sum, through the needs based formula, which amounts to over £164.7 million tin 2016.

The vast majority of the revenue funding, including funding for additional support needs in schools, is being provided by means of a block grant and as a result funding for individual services is not separately identifiable. It is the responsibility of individual local authorities to manage their own budgets and to allocate the total financial resources available to them on the basis of local needs and priorities, having first fulfilled their statutory obligations and the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities.

The 2015 annual report to Parliament on the implementation of additional support for learning legislation indicates that education authorities spent just over £4.8 billion on education in Scotland. Of that, £579 million is spent on additional support for learning. This is an increase of £24 million on 2014 expenditure. This equates to just over 12% of the overall spend on education in Scotland and an increase of 1% on 2014.

The following table provides the median gross weekly earnings for full-time employees in Scotland for 2015 by Scottish parliamentary constituency.

Scottish Parliamentary Constituency	Median Gross Weekly Pay (£)	Rank
Aberdeen Donside	595.3	1
Aberdeen South and North Kincardine	526.9	2
Edinburgh Western	524.9	3
Edinburgh Pentlands	516.7	4
Cowdenbeath	513.7	5
Aberdeenshire West	510.1	6
Glasgow Pollok	489.1	7
Edinburgh Eastern	485.7	8
Edinburgh Central	481.5	9
Glasgow Kelvin	466.1	10
Shetland Islands	463.0	11
Edinburgh Southern	454.6	12
Aberdeen Central	454.6	13
Dumbarton	447.0	14
Glasgow Shettleston	444.7	15
Airdrie and Shotts	439.8	16
Falkirk East	439.6	17
Uddingston and Bellshill	438.4	18
Dundee City West	430.2	19
Rutherglen	427.3	20
Renfrewshire North and West	426.2	21
Clackmannanshire and Dunblane	425.6	22
Perthshire South and Kinross-shire	424.8	23
Almond Valley	424.3	24
Linlithgow	423.7	25
Dundee City East	423.5	26
Argyll and Bute	423.3	27
Na h-Eileanan an Iar	420.0	28
Falkirk West	417.7	29
Paisley	415.5	30
East Kilbride	412.9	31
Glasgow Maryhill and Springburn	411.3	32
Kilmarnock and Irvine Valley	409.4	33
Glasgow Southside	409.0	34
Ettrick, Roxburgh and Berwickshire	407.3	35
Stirling	407.3	36
Glasgow Anniesland	403.9	37
Midlothian South, Tweeddale and Lauderdale	402.8	38
Strathkelvin and Bearsden	402.6	39
East Lothian	401.7	40
Glasgow Cathcart	398.2	41
Cumbernauld and Kilsyth	393.1	42
Motherwell and Wishaw	391.7	43
Inverness and Nairn	387.8	44
Dunfermline	386.4	45
Edinburgh Northern and Leith	384.4	46
Glasgow Provan	383.3	47
Aberdeenshire East	382.0	48
Cunninghame South	382.0	49
Caithness, Sutherland and Ross	380.4	50
Coatbridge and Chryston	378.4	51
Renfrewshire South	377.5	52
Ayr	377.0	53
Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse	376.6	54
Mid Fife and Glenrothes	376.3	55
Perthshire North	372.5	56
Moray	371.6	57
Cunninghame North	370.9	58
Greenock and Inverclyde	367.8	59
North East Fife	366.4	60
Kirkcaldy	358.4	61
Midlothian North and Musselburgh	357.8	62
Banffshire and Buchan Coast	356.1	63
Clydesdale	349.7	64
Dumfriesshire	346.9	65
Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley	345.4	66
Clydebank and Milngavie	341.4	67
Galloway and West Dumfries	338.5	68
Angus South	337.2	69
Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch	335.6	70
Orkney Islands	334.1	71
Angus North and Mearns	332.9	72
Eastwood	311.9	73

Source: Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2015, Office for National Statistics

Notes:

- Covers employees aged 16+ on the PAYE system on adult rates and whose pay was not affected by absence.

- Full-time defined as employees working more than 30 paid hours per week (or 25 or more for the teaching professions)

- The median, which is used in this answer, is the preferred measure for earnings as the arithmetic average can be skewed by extreme outliers.

- Based on Scottish parliamentary constituency boundaries and are workplace based i.e. include all those that work in the constituency area regardless of where they live.

<>The Bus Route Development Fund specific grant was rolled up and included in the general revenue grant funding from 1 April 2008 and, as a result, there are no allocations for individual local authorities. From that date it has been the responsibility of each local authority to manage their own budget and to allocate the total financial resources availableto them on the basis of local needs and priorities, including any funding for bus route development, having first fulfilled their statutory obligations and the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities.

The Scottish Government does not hold data on the number of routes subsidised. The Scottish Transport statistics do provide information on the levels of government spend on bus services. Table 2.9 gives figures for central and local government support for bus services between 2004-05 and 2014-15. Table 10.3 gives information on the net revenue expenditure on roads and transport by council and type. Table 10.5 provides the gross capital account expenditure on local authority roads and transport by council.

http://www.transport.gov.scot/sites/default/files/documents/rrd_reports/uploaded_reports/j415388/j415388.pdf

Public Transport support and other bus expenditure across local authority can be found in the Provisional Outturn & Budget Estimates 2014-15 Workbook

http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Local-Government-Finance/ReturnPOBE/POBE2014Workbook

12 non-Scottish nations fish in the seas around Scotland: Spain, France, Germany, Netherlands, Faroe, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Poland, Belgium, Ireland and the rest of the UK.

Of these, France, Germany, Ireland and the Netherlands also have limited access for particular stocks in specific areas of UK territorial waters under Scottish jurisdiction between 6 and 12 nautical miles from the base line.

Scotland is an integral part of the UK delegation at those international negotiations from which the Scottish quota derives. These include the annual EU December Fisheries Council (at which the UK negotiates with other EU member states in its own right), and the pure coastal states negotiations and bilateral coastal states negotiations with Norway and with the Faroe Islands (at which the UK negotiates as part of the EU delegation).

The EU December Fisheries Council gives rise to the annual fishing opportunities regulation which is binding on all EU member states with fishing interests, including the UK. The pure coastal states agreements are signed by various combinations of the EU, Norway, Faroe, Iceland and the Russian Federation, depending on the stock in question. The bilateral coastal states agreements between the EU and Norway and the EU and Faroe Islands are signed by those parties respectively.

There were 1,957 active licences under Scottish administration on 1 January 2016. All licence holders are eligible to receive a quota allocation through membership of a producer organisation or through the nationally managed non-sector pools.

The provisional total value of all landed species to Scotland in 2015 was £437 million, of which quota species comprised £364 million.

Five parties have a direct interest in coastal states negotiations: the EU group (comprising 28 member states), Norway, Faroe Islands, Iceland and the Russian Federation. In addition, other fishing parties such as Greenland regularly attend as observers.

The pure coastal states negotiations agree the management of the main pelagic stocks including mackerel, blue whiting and Atlanto-Scandian herring. The bilateral coastal states negotiations with Norway and with the Faroe Islands agree the management of a significant number of key demersal stocks including cod, haddock, whiting and saithe.

For the pure coastal states negotiations, there are currently 22 active Scottish administered pelagic vessels that are affected. For the bilateral coastal states negotiations, the remaining 1,935 vessels in the Scottish administered fleet are affected in one way or another.

The provisional total value of all landed pelagic quota species in 2015 was £160 million of which mackerel comprised £131 million. The provisional total value of all landed demersal and shellfish quota species in 2015 was £204 million.

The Flood Risk Management (Scotland) Act 2009 has facilitated an ambitious strategic approach to reducing flood risk across Scotland. This legislation provided, for the first time, clarity as to who the responsible authorities are for implementing actions to reduce flood risk. This has helped Scottish Environment Protection Agency to develop the 14 Flood Risk Management Strategies, published in December 2015, which, taken together, provide the first ever national plan for flood risk management in Scotland. The Strategies set out the causes and receptors of flooding and prioritised actions to reduce flood risk in the first six year planning cycle

The clarity provided by the legislation has helped responsible authorities to work in partnership with each other to support the development of the strategies and the associated local delivery plans and their engagement with wider partners, including local communities and businesses. In parallel with other local plan districts, the local delivery plan for Findhorn, Nairn and Speyside was published on 22 June 2016.

The unprecedented scale of flooding, both in terms of scale of flooding situation and wide geographic coverage, required substantive and immediate action to support those communities affected. As such, in January 2016 the First Minister announced that the Scottish Government would provide funding to local authorities to allow them to pay out grants of £1,500 to people whose properties were flooded at any point from July 2015 to 31 March 2016. The support package provided in January 2016 was a response to these exceptional events and it is not anticipated that it would be an automatic response to any future flooding events.

The Scottish Government appreciates the devastating impact that flooding can have and is working to reduce flood risk across the whole of Scotland through the implementation of the Flood Risk Management (Scotland) Act 2009, and the continued funding of flood protection schemes. To support those affected by flooding the Scottish Government provides financial support to the Scottish Flood Forum and Flood Re, which was launched on 1 April 2016, should enable homeowners to find affordable flood insurance.

The key economic and fiscal levers that influence investment and activity in the sector remain with the UK Government; however, the Scottish Government is using our devolved powers to support the industry. We set up the Energy Jobs Taskforce, which continues to coordinate action across the sector and, in February 2016, we introduced a £12 million Transition Training Fund (TTF) to support individuals transition to other employment. We have seen a substantial increase in applications to the TTF in recent weeks following the launch of a dedicated website and we continue to look to review criteria on an on-going basis to ensure its impact is maximised.

The Partnership Action for Continuing Employment (PACE) is the Scottish Government’s initiative dedicated to helping individuals and employers with the advice and support they need when faced with redundancy. Delivery is led by Skills Development Scotland with partners including Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE). In addition to the National PACE Team, there are 18 local PACE Teams across Scotland. The Highland PACE Partnership covers Caithness and Sutherland, Moray and Lochaber, ensuring a speedy and effective responses to redundancy situations.

HIE are also continuing to support the oil and gas sector. In 2015-16 HIE invested £458,000 in two companies servicing the international oil and gas sector based in Moray. These investments, all other things being equal, are anticipated to lead to turn over growth of £9.6 million for those companies of which £8.1 million will be from international sales. HIE’s leadership team approved £200,000 towards start-up costs of an electronics firm with high growth potential which specialises in technology for the offshore oil and gas and aerospace industries. In addition HIE will invest £376,000 in upgrading facilities to enable manufacturing to be undertaken within the Moray area.