Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government cannot comment on individual cases.

The Post Office Horizon scandal is a unique situation requiring urgent action to ensure those wrongly convicted can finally access justice. That is why we are bringing forward legislation to ensure that Scottish victims of this large scale miscarriage of justice have their convictions quashed and can access compensation.

As set out in the 2021-22 Programme for Government, the Scottish Government is committed to “Introduce a Natural Environment Bill, putting in place key legislative changes and statutory targets to restore and protect nature” before the end of the current parliamentary term.

Future legislative programmes will be announced in relevant Programmes for Government in the usual way. Meantime, we continue to take action to deliver nature restoration through, for example, our £65 million Nature Restoration Fund, which has already committed nearly £40 million since 2021.

In line with longstanding practice, the Scottish Government does not publish advice to Ministers.

Since 2011, Transport Scotland has invested over £65 million on behalf of Scottish Ministers to support the installation of public EV charge points across Scotland as part of the ChargePlace Scotland public EV charging network. As a direct result, Scotland has the best provision of public charge points per head of population of anywhere in the UK, outside of London, and the most rapid charge points per head of population of any region.

Last year, the Scottish Government published Vision for world class public electric vehicle charging network | Transport Scotland , highlighting the need for a transition towards a public charging network that is largely financed and delivered by the private sector. Through the £30m EV Infrastructure Fund we are supporting local authorities across Scotland to work with the private sector to leverage an additional £30m of private investment to continue to grow the provision of EV charging in Scotland at pace and scale.

Since 2021, 1,232 additional public EV charge points have been added to the Scottish Government funded ChargePlace Scotland network. We do not hold information relating to any other public electric vehicle charging networks.

Since 2021 a total of 15,615 EV charge points have been supported through Scottish Government grant funding for fleet, business, third sector and domestic charge point installations.

We have no plans at this time to consult on introducing an independent regulator for Scottish football. However, I am hosting a round table meeting on the subject of Enhancing Scottish Football on 8th May and I look forward to on interesting discussion on a range of topics.

We are continuing to engage with Vestas around potential investment into Scotland. Most recently, the First Minister met with the CEO of Vestas on 3 April 2024. Throughout our engagement with Vestas it has continued to emphasise its commitment to Scotland.

Our fast-growing offshore wind industry provides us with significant opportunities to attract inward investment, generate green jobs and grow our regional and national economies.

We are taking a “Team Scotland” approach across the public sector when engaging with companies such as Vestas to ensure we maximise investment opportunities.

And we are investing up to £500 million over 5 years to anchor the offshore wind supply chain in Scotland and maximise the economic benefits the sector can bring.

I have asked Teresa Medhurst, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS), to respond. Her response is as follows:

Those individuals with an Order for Lifelong Restriction (OLR) have a risk management plan (RMP) that is approved by the Risk Management Authority (RMA).

Within this RMP there are strategies identify for intervention which aims to target and reduce risk factors associated with that individual’s offending/harmful behaviour. Where an offending behaviour programme is identified as being appropriate, individuals are placed on a national waiting list which prioritises individuals based on their critical dates.

I have asked Teresa Medhurst, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS), to respond. Her response is as follows:

OLRs are subject to an annual review of their LSCMI risk assessment which is carried out by Prison Based Social Work (PBSW). In addition to this, each OLR has a Risk Management Plan (RMP), which is largely part of the risk assessment prepared for the courts and updated at significant points of change during their sentence.

In 2023 there were 40 RMPs revised for OLRs and 10 revised thus far in 2024. SPS currently do not hold data on the number of OLRs whose LSCMIs have been updated within the past year.

I have asked Teresa Medhurst, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS), to respond. Her response is as follows:

The Order for Lifelong Restriction (OLR) figures are available publicly on the Risk Management Authority (RMA) website. The OLR sentences made in the last 5 years are as follows:

We are in the process of analysing the approximately 1650 responses to our consultation which closed on 8 March 2024. This will allow us to take into account the feedback and perspectives from those who responded as we consider next steps. This follows the commitments made to develop proposals for legislative change, including in relation to Heat in Buildings as established in the Programme for Government where the legislative programme for 2023-24 is set out.