Chamber and committees

The redevelopment of Queen Street Station continues to make progress with the introduction of 7-car electric services from December 2017 and 8-car electric services with improved journey times from December 2018 on schedule.

Further progress was made on 31 March 2017 with Scottish Ministers approval of the Transport and Works Scotland Order application for the station redevelopment. This grants Network Rail the necessary powers to proceed with the works and develop a programme to take the station forward to completion.

Bullying of any form is entirely unacceptable and we need to be vigilant in challenging any racist and abusive behaviour in our schools. We want all children and young people to learn tolerance, respect, equality and good citizenship to address and prevent prejudice. In March 2016, we published the Race Equality Framework for Scotland, and are taking forward a number of actions to ensure that minority ethnic pupils have confidence in, and are effectively supported by, approaches in schools to prevent and respond to prejudice-based bullying and racist behaviour or incidents.

In addition, we funded 'Show Racism the Red Card' (Scotland) £50,000 in 2016-17 to deliver a programme of anti-racism education to young people in Scottish schools.

All schools and local authorities should have anti-bullying policies in place. The Scottish Government agreed to a request from the Scottish Parliament’s Equalities and Human Rights Committee for further engagement on the development of the Government’s refreshed anti-bullying guidance with a range of stakeholders. This revised guidance will be clear that all types of bullying, including prejudice-based bullying is unacceptable and must be addressed whenever and wherever it arises.

To support a proactive approach to addressing bullying, the Scottish Government fully funds respectme, Scotland’s anti-bullying service to provide direct support to local authorities, schools, youth groups and all those working with children and young people to build confidence and capacity to address all types of bullying effectively.

The Scottish Government has also been working across government and with key stakeholders to update our action plan on child internet safety to ensure we have appropriate frameworks of training, support and information in place for professionals and families, including children and young people. The updated action plan will be published in April 2017.

Patients and the public deserve to have complete confidence in the cleanliness of Scottish hospitals and the quality of NHS services. That is why we have introduced these inspections as one of a range of measures to tackle healthcare associated infections. I have made clear my expectation that all health boards across Scotland must make cleanliness and infection control a priority.

Clearly this was a disappointing report and fell short of the required standards of environmental cleanliness and the state of patient equipment. I recently met with the board's chair and incoming Chief Executive to set out my concerns with the report's findings and made it very clear that I expect these to be addressed as a priority.

I have been personally reassured that the board are addressing the issues identified and they have an action plan in place to drive forward improvements. The board have also requested support from Health Protection Scotland to assist this process.

Addressing social isolation and loneliness is key to improving wellbeing and supporting people of all ages to participate in their community. That is why we created a £500,000 Social Isolation and Loneliness Fund (2016-17) to support 36 community-based projects tackling social isolation and its impact. We have also supported projects that tackle these issues through our Equality Budget (£20.3m) and Empowering Communities Fund (£20m).

We are developing a National Strategy to ensure a holistic approach across government to problems of loneliness and isolation, and we are engaging with partners and a wide range of interests in the development of this.

As I announced to Parliament on 23 March, our vision for the expansion of the Early Learning and Childcare entitlement to 1140 hours will be underpinned by a new service model which prioritises and safeguards quality provision while offering parents a greater choice of settings.

This Funding Follows the Child model, which will be implemented nationally in 2020, will ensure financially sustainable provision and will be underpinned by a national standard which will make it a more open, proportionate and consistent process for becoming a funded provider.

We will establish a new Service Models Working Group, who will develop the details of the new funding follows the child model, and produce the new national standard for becoming a funded provider.

Furthermore, as announced by the First Minister on 18 March, we will invest
£50 million to extend payment of the Living Wage to all childcare staff delivering the funded entitlement in private and third sector nurseries by the end of this Parliament.

The Scottish Government is committed to supporting prisoners to secure appropriate housing on release and to addressing homelessness amongst prisoners and their families. All those assessed as unintentionally homeless by local authorities, including prisoners upon liberation, are entitled to settled accommodation as a legal right.

The Scottish Government recognises the particular challenges that may be faced by prisoners and their families and the support that may be required. The Scottish Government and the Scottish Prison Service, together with a number of partners, are supporting on-going work to develop a consistent and shared approach to housing provision for prisoners across the country. This work focusses on the coordination and planning of offenders’ housing needs while in custody and on liberation.

Local authorities help prisoners with their immediate housing needs and, through the housing options approach, may consider other issues such as employability, need for mediation and the life skills needed to cope in society.

Through the Reducing Reoffending Change Fund (RRCF), the Scottish Government funds a range of offender mentoring services that provide practical one-to-one support to individuals leaving prison, and helping them to engage with the public services they need to reintegrate into the community – including housing or homelessness services. Over 2012-17 the Scottish Government has committed £13.5 million to the RRCF.

Drug taking amongst the general population in Scotland is falling and the number of young people taking drugs remains low, but we remain determined to tackle the damaging impact of all problem drug use, and to make recovery a reality, through our national drugs strategy, The Road to Recovery. This has already led to reduced waiting times, with 94% now being seen within three weeks of referral, and the introduction of ‘Quality Principles’ ensuring that those accessing drug and alcohol services have access to the highest quality services to enable and support their recovery. Furthermore, through the Partnership for Action on Drugs in Scotland (PADS) and its subgroups we are engaged in a range of activities with our partners to reduce the impact of problem drug use. We continue to invest significant resources to support this strategy and have invested over £630 million since 2008 to tackle problem drug and alcohol abuse.

The Scottish Government's Youth Employment Strategy, Developing the Young Workforce, sought from the outset to expand the Modern Apprenticeship offer to create more opportunities and to better align the Modern Apprenticeship programme with key sectors and areas of economic growth, as well as to increase participation from under-represented groups. The introduction and expansion of Foundation Apprenticeships provides young people in their senior phase at school the opportunity to start their apprenticeship journey and complete elements of a Modern Apprenticeship while they are still at school, further promoting the career opportunities a Modern Apprenticeship provides.

The Scottish Government supported Scottish Apprenticeship Week 2017. This was the most comprehensive to date with all Scottish Government Ministers undertaking an event related to it. Also involved in the activities were schools, employers, apprentices, colleges, councils and training providers.

In addition the Scottish Government's skills agency Skills Development Scotland have recently promoted events and campaigns including:

The Scottish Apprenticeship Shows in Glasgow and Edinburgh in October. These events were aimed at pupils from S2 to S4 and their families. The shows provided the chance to meet apprentices and their employers to get hands-on experience of the opportunities available.

Additional regional events were held throughout November where SDS worked with a range of partners to promote apprenticeships to young people in Inverness, Dundee, Aberdeen, Ayrshire, Forth Valley, Dumfries and Galloway, Argyll and Bute and the Borders.

Furthermore, Skills Development Scotland promote Modern Apprenticeships in a number of ways including its new Apprenticeship.scot website and My World of Work. It is also widening the reach of the programme through its equality action plan and as part of its regular engagement with businesses across Scotland.

These are important means to help with the Scottish Government's ambitious plans to grow and enhance the Modern Apprenticeship programme to 30,000 new starts a year by 2020.