Chamber and committees

Developing the Young Workforce (DYW) aims to create an excellent, work relevant education offer to all of our young people in Scotland, giving them the skills for the current and anticipated jobs market. This includes creating new vocational learning options; enabling young people to learn in a range of settings in their senior phase of school; embedding employer engagement in education; offering careers advice at an earlier point in school; and introducing new standards for careers guidance and work experience.

The DYW programme has eleven Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) which underpin the programme in terms of areas where we are focusing on improvement – including increasing the number of looked after children in positive destinations by 4 percentage points per annum.

For the purposes of the programme, we have chosen this indicator as we are committed to improving opportunities and outcomes for young care leavers. When determining KPIs for the DYW programme, the decision was made to align with the headline figures from the Educational Outcomes for Looked After Children publication – those looked after for the full year. This allowed us to make use of an existing data source, with this figure representing the greatest proportion of looked after children in Scotland. We currently report outcomes for young people who have been looked after for part of the year are currently reported within the aforementioned publication, with the latest figures published in June 2017.

The Scottish Government funds a number of survivor support organisations which provide support, including advocacy, to adult survivors of childhood abuse.

The Scottish Government also created a support fund, run by Future Pathways, for survivors who were abused in care. Future Pathways offers help and support which is individually tailored to each survivor.

The Inquiry has been set up under the Inquiries Act 2005 and is independent of government.

The Scottish Government has commissioned NHS Education Scotland to lead the development of a comprehensive National Trauma Skills and Knowledge Framework for anyone working with people affected by complex trauma, such as child sexual abuse. The framework will equip practitioners working in the statutory and voluntary sectors with the knowledge and skills to be able to identify those affected, or those at risk of abuse, and be able to respond in a way which will enhance the safety of children and adults in Scotland.

The Scottish Government funds survivor support organisations which offer many forms of support to survivors of childhood abuse.

The Dignity at Work Survey was fully confidential and responses cannot be tracked back to individuals. Webropol has been asked to report on the responses to all questions, including whether or not they had experienced bullying or harassment from their manager and/or from other colleagues, both at national and Board level.

Although section 37 of the Scotland Act 2016 allows the Scottish Parliament to introduce, in relation to the Scottish functions of Scottish or cross-border public authorities (other than board appointments), protections and requirements that supplement (but do not modify) the existing provisions of the Equality Act 2010, the power to create new protected characteristics in addition to those in the Equality Act 2010 remains reserved to the UK Parliament.

The Scottish Government collects data on arts and cultural participation through various means, including the Scottish Household Survey, which collects data on people (aged 16 and over) who engage with culture either by attending or visiting a cultural event or place or by participating in a cultural activity. There are also questions on out of school activities such as going to live performances, museums, cinemas and libraries and participating in organised activities, collected through the Growing Up in Scotland (GUS) study which tracks the lives of children from birth. The oldest children in GUS are now 12-13 years old. Both data sources can be broken down by socio-economic criteria and by age (and other demographic criteria).

In addition, Creative Scotland hold detailed data relating to targeted youth arts programmes, the Youth Music Initiative, Time to Shine and Cashback for Creativity as well as wider data on the Regular Funded Organisations who deliver youth arts programmes. Independent evaluations of all Creative Scotland administered targeted funds may be found on their website:- http://www.creativescotland.com/ .

The Scottish Government does not provide any direct support to the National Youth Orchestras of Scotland (NYOS). The level of funding, conditions and criteria set against NYOS are a matter for Creative Scotland. I have asked Creative Scotland's Chief Executive Janet Archer to respond to the member.

The Scottish Government’s long-standing investment of £109 million since 2007 in the Youth Music Initiative has made a huge impact helping young people across Scotland access music making opportunities, including participation with orchestras. The Scottish Government also support Sistema Scotland which has Big Noise Centres in Raploch, Govanhill, Torry and Douglas. Our £2.5m four-year funding package is enabling the youth orchestra programme to sustain and build on its work to enhance the health, wellbeing and prospects of young people in the communities of Stirling, Glasgow, Aberdeen and Dundee. Creative Scotland also work with a range of partners to ensure young people have the opportunity to participate in orchestras.

The Inquiry has been set up under the Inquiries Act 2005 and is independent of government. This includes the complete independence to consider how best to engage with survivors of in care child abuse, in terms of either awareness raising or on-going communication. However, the Scottish Government and its funded services do alert survivors to the existence of the Inquiry and offer advice on how to contact it, whenever appropriate. We are aware that some survivors may choose not to come forward to the Inquiry and we respect their right to choose.

Future Pathways, Scotland’s In Care Survivor Support Fund, works with adults who experienced abuse or neglect in care in Scotland as a child. The fund co-ordinates access to, and the delivery of, resources, integrated care and support so that survivors can achieve their goals. The Scottish Government also funds survivor support organisations who provide support to all adult survivors of childhood abuse.

In November, we published a delivery plan for Equally Safe, our strategy to prevent and eradicate all forms of violence against women and girls. Specific commitments include running a major national campaign on sexual harassment and sexism, to raise awareness and encourage behaviour change; encouraging employers to put in place robust processes to deal with instances of sexual harassment; and developing a pilot Equally Safe employer accreditation programme in order to lever better employment practice in tackling gender based violence experienced by the workforce. Officials are currently scoping out this work.