Chamber and committees

Building safety is a matter for the owner - who in this case would be individual local authorities - acting in accordance with the relevant health and safety legislation. Before any decisions can be taken on funding, it is important to understand the scope and nature of the issue.

Health and Safety legislation is not devolved to the Scottish Government. The Health & Safety Executive is the UK-wide regulator for health and safety and they intend to carry out research into buildings which contain RAAC. The research methodology is in the final stages of development which includes assessment tools to help measure the risks associated with RAAC planks. We will monitor the research when it is commissioned and apply the findings and recommendations appropriately.

The Scottish Government does not routinely collect data on out-of-catchment applications and does not hold information about the number of applications that have been submitted for pupils in primary and secondary schools or what proportion of those were successful.

Local authorities are responsible for procedures for dealing with out-of-catchment applications for school places and will hold such data locally.

Building safety is a matter for the owner - who in this case would be individual local authorities - acting in accordance with the relevant health and safety legislation. Moreover, health and safety legislation is not devolved to the Scottish Government.

The issue of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete was discussed at the Building and Fire Safety Ministerial Working Group in both January and June of this year. The minutes can be accessed at: Building and Fire Safety: Ministerial Working Group - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) .

Building safety is a matter for the owner - who in this case would be individual local authorities - acting in accordance with the relevant health and safety legislation. Moreover, health and safety legislation is not devolved to the Scottish Government.

The Scottish Government’s guidance ‘Included, Engaged and Involved Part 1: a positive approach to the promotion and management of attendance in Scottish schools’ makes clear the need for schools to follow up absence immediately, and to continue to follow up absence for those for whom there are welfare concerns.

Local authorities are expected to have robust processes and guidance for children who do not attend school from the first day they are absent until they are re-engaged with education. Where children are missing for extended periods of time, or are not on a school roll or being educated otherwise, the Children Missing from Education Guidance and Service can support local authorities in this.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on children persistently absent from school centrally. Information on rates of children persistently absent from school would be for local authorities to collect.

Scottish Government does not hold information on the numbers of children who are home educated in Scotland.

The number of support for learning teachers employed in state schools is shown in Table 1. The Scottish Government collects data on teachers through an annual census in September, so the following information refers to teachers employed in September rather than April.

These statistics include teachers in all sectors (Primary, Secondary, Special and Centrally Employed).

Table 1. Support for learning teachers in Scottish schools

The number of visiting specialist teachers is recorded in September of each year as part of the teacher census. Data for 2023 is not yet available. Visiting specialists are centrally employed by local authorities and data on the school sector in which they work is not collected in the teacher census.

Statistics on centrally employed visiting specialists at Scotland level are available in Table 5.2 of the teacher census supplementary statistics: https://www.gov.scot/publications/teacher-census-supplementary-statistics/

The following table provides a breakdown of measures installed and the number and value of grants and loans paid in full through the Scottish Government’s Home Energy Scotland Grant and Loan Scheme (formerly HES Loan and Cashback Scheme) for domestic properties in the Financial Year 2022-23.