Chamber and committees

From 04:00 on Friday 15 January 2020, passengers travelling to Scotland from outside the Common Travel Area must have a valid negative COVID-19 test result before boarding their vessel. This will be checked by operators, and passengers with a positive test result or an invalid certificate will be refused boarding. A valid test result must be from a PCR test, or another highly reliable test with at least 99% specificity and 97% sensitivity for detecting COVID-19; it must show the test was taken within three days of beginning the journey; and the result must be presented in English, French or Spanish. Children aged 10 and under are not required to take a test, and there are a very limited range of further exemptions that will be specified in regulations.

Border Force will undertake spot checks of passengers arriving in Scotland as an additional measure to ensure compliance with this requirement, and will be able to apply a Fixed Penalty Notice of £480 if they identify travellers without a valid certificate.

This new requirement, being implemented by administrations across the UK, provides an additional level of protection to guard against importation of the virus. This is important due to the emergence of variants of the virus across the world. Pre-departure testing does not replace the requirement to quarantine on arrival – passengers must isolate for 10 days, unless they have travelled only in countries or territories on the exempt list; or they are able to claim one of the limited sectoral exemptions.

Under the current restrictions in Level 3 and 4 across the country, it is illegal to travel to or from Scotland without a reasonable excuse. People should not be travelling unless it is genuinely essential they do so.

We have reviewed the border health measures closely over the last 28 days and have assessed that there continues to be a requirement for the regulations to remain in place to reduce the risk of imported transmission and safeguard public health in Scotland. The regulations continue to be an important and proportionate part of the Scottish Government response to managing the pandemic. We continue to keep country and sectoral exemptions under review and where there is clear evidence we will not hesitate to make changes to the regulations.

The Scottish Government has assessed that pre departure testing for all international arrivals is required to minimise the risk of imported transmission and we will introduce this measure as soon as is practically possible. Pre departure testing will complement our existing international travel regulations and ensure that we safeguard against imported cases and in particular protect against new strains of coronavirus such as those identified in Denmark and South Africa.

There remain outstanding operational and practical issues to resolve but we will aim to have this measure in place to a similar timeframe as the other UK nations. I will report back to Parliament with further detail when these issues have been resolved and pre departure testing is ready to be implemented in Scotland. It remains the case that non-essential travel to or from Scotland is currently illegal and will not change with the introduction of pre departure testing.

Covid-19 continues to present unprecedented challenges for business across Scotland with many employers delaying and pausing recruitment decisions. Unfortunately, this has and will continue to have, an impact on apprenticeship provision.

Due to the continued uncertainty in the labour market and the extension of the Job Retention Scheme, to the end of April 2021, it is clear we will not now meet our target of 30,000 apprenticeship starts this year. Whilst disappointing, we have moved from a period which delivered historically low levels of unemployment and achieving our ambitious targets on youth unemployment, to a much more challenging labour market with young people already being more severely impacted by the pandemic.

The latest Office for National Statistics (ONS) UK Gross Domestic Product (GDP) monthly estimates, published 10 December 2020, show that in October 2020 GDP is now 23.4% higher than its April 2020 low. However, it still remains 7.9% below the levels seen in February 2020 before the full impacts of Covid-19. The Scottish Government has and will continue to do all we can to promote and maximise the uptake of apprenticeships highlighting the benefit that they can bring to businesses, individuals and the economy.

Apprenticeships remain at the heart of our skills system in Scotland and are integral to Scotland’s Young Person’s Guarantee. As we continue to support our young people and apprentices, we have introduced additional funding for interventions, such as Pathway Apprenticeships, increased support for Adopt an Apprentice and an additional £15 million funding for the Apprenticeship Employer Grant, to encourage employers to recruit and retain apprentices supporting the long-term future of work-based learning and the economy.

We will work closely with Skills Development Scotland to maximise the number of apprenticeships and related opportunities available.

Travel restrictions remain essential to reduce the risk of spreading COVID-19 from areas of high to low prevalence. We have reviewed the travel restrictions in place between Scotland and the rest of the Common Travel Area and concluded that the current restrictions should remain in place and that therefore people should not travel without a reasonable excuse between Scotland and England, Northern Ireland, Wales, Jersey and County Donegal in the Republic of Ireland. Further information on these travel restrictions can be found at Coronavirus (COVID-19):
guidance on travel and transport - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) .’

We have reviewed the border health measures closely over the last three weeks and have assessed that there continues to be a requirement for the regulations to remain in place to reduce the risk of imported transmission and safeguard public health in Scotland. We have considered sectoral exemptions from the requirement to self-isolate, and intend to introduce exemptions for TV production, performing arts professionals, and professional journalists. We continue to keep countries under review and where there is clear evidence we will not hesitate to make changes to our country specific exemptions list. We propose to review these regulations at least every 28 days going forward, with the next review to be completed by 11 January 2021.

The Scottish Government has asked the Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service (SNBTS) to start preparing to make changes to the questions blood donors are asked in order to move to a more individualised assessment of whether donors may be at risk of a blood-borne virus infection, regardless of their sex, gender or sexual orientation. The changes will ensure a fairer and more up to date assessment of risk is applied to all donors; and men will no longer be automatically deferred from donating blood if they have had sex with another man in the past three months.

These changes will adopt the recommendations of the UK-wide For Assessment of Individualised Risk (FAIR) steering group. The Advisory Committee on the Safety of Blood, Tissues and Organs (SaBTO) reviewed the proposals outlined by the group and confirmed they would not impact on the safe supply of blood and blood components for recipients in the UK. SNBTS will work with the other UK blood services to make preparations and raise awareness with donors and potential donors about the changes. It expects to implement these changes by summer 2021.

We have been clear throughout this pandemic that interventions to reduce the transmission of COVID-19 must be proportionate to the public health benefits and take account of clinical advice. I am glad to confirm that, following agreement by the four nations CMO group and advice from the Chief Medical Officer, the period of isolation for close contacts of people who have tested positive for COVID-19, and for people arriving from countries not on the exemption list will reduce from 14 days to 10 days.

This change will come into effect on Monday 14 December and is an important step in ensuring that, where the clinical advice supports it, we can minimise the impact of measures taken to ensure that we reduce transmission of the virus and save lives.

The current, agreed, remit for the Review already covers assessment and qualifications. However, as part of the suite of work I announced following the 2020 SQA exam results, I asked the OECD to expand this work to have a deeper focus on the future of assessment and qualifications approaches in the Senior Phase curriculum in Scotland. The aim of this is to analyse Scotland’s approach to assessment and qualifications and develop options to enhance our approach, informed by international good practice.

Officials have been working with the OECD to scope the additional work on assessment and qualifications, and we have agreed with the OECD that this work will involve:

• Employing an additional international expert to undertake a desk-based analysis of Scotland’s approaches to student assessment in relation to national qualifications in the Senior Phase in comparison with approaches in other education systems. The comparative analysis will consider education systems that are relevant to Scotland’s experience and objectives in education.

• A second seminar with stakeholders (in addition to that planned for the wider Review) to present and discuss the preliminary findings from the desk-based analysis; and to gather stakeholders’ feedback and suggestions on how to move forward.

• The production of a comparative paper building on the desk-based analysis and stakeholder engagement seminar and provides a set of options for Scotland to consider.

This work will be aligned with the current OECD Review of the implementation of Curriculum for Excellence, and the final comparative paper will be published later in the summer 2021, following the publication of the CfE Review Report in June 2021.

I have also written to the Convenor of the Education and Skills Committee to update them on this work.

I am pleased to confirm that the Inquiry will formally begin its work on 30 November 2020. The Inquiry setting up date marks the point at which I hand over full responsibility of the Inquiry to Lord Bracadale and the work of the Inquiry will commence.

One of the key elements to be completed was the appointment of assessors to support Lord Bracadale in his work. I am also pleased to announce today the appointment of two highly experienced individuals – Raju Bhatt and Michael Fuller. Both bring a wealth of knowledge to the role and I am confident they will bring diversity, balance and vital experience to support Lord Bracadale during the Inquiry.