Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government is committed to a Scottish public inquiry, and will begin to take the necessary steps during our first 100 Days in office to establish such an inquiry. Since the UK inquiry was announced we have been considering how the Scottish inquiry would interact with that. Detailed work will be done on the terms of reference and the timescale, and we are clear that we expect the inquiry to begin its work by the end of this year.

A review of the energy standards of the Scottish building regulations is currently under way. This is considering options to further improve the energy performance of both new residential developments and all other new buildings. It also considers the energy performance requirements where relevant new construction work is carried out to existing buildings.

The consultation can be accessed at:

Scottish Building Regulations: Proposed changes to Energy Standards and associated topics, including Ventilation, Overheating and Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure - Scottish Government - Citizen Space (consult.gov.scot) .

The new energy performance requirements are programmed to take effect in 2022.

No meetings with Yes.scot campaign employees have taken place with the First Minister, the Cabinet Secretary for the Constitution, External Affairs and Culture, or Special Advisors.

No meetings have taken place with The National and the Sunday National since the beginning of the current parliamentary session.

The presence of working interlinked fire alarms is proven to save lives and is one of the most important investments home owners can make to protect life and property. Regulations setting out this new standard were unanimously approved by the previous Local Government and Communities Committee at their meeting on 18 December 2019.

Home owners are responsible for the costs of on-going work needed to protect and preserve their own property, which includes the costs for the fire alarms to meet the new standard. The cost of the alarms will vary according to what householders choose to install. We estimate that the cost for an average three bedroom house which requires three smoke alarms, one heat alarm and one carbon monoxide detector will be around £220. This is based on using the type of alarms that can be installed by the homeowner, without the need for an electrician.

In our Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment for the Housing (Scotland) Act 1987 (Tolerable Standard) (Extension of Criteria) Order 2019 we estimated that 600,000 owner occupied properties were likely to fall below the proposed standard. Updating this to the latest 2019 Scottish House Condition Survey data: of the approximately 1.55m owner occupied properties in Scotland, 7% (or around 100,000) of homes did not have any smoke alarm at all, and around a quarter (or 400,000) had only one alarm. This indicates that around 500,000 owner-occupied properties are likely to fall below the proposed standard. It is possible that a proportion of the remaining 1,005,000 properties with more than one alarm would also not comply with the standard, although it is not possible to determine this from the available data.

It is not possible to determine exactly how many owner occupied homes have alarms of the prescribed type installed as this information is not currently collected as part of the Scottish House Condition Survey. In the future, when the regulations on the new fire alarm standard have come into effect, it will be possible to collect more precise data because compliance with the tolerable standard is included in the Survey. This will allow us to monitor progress in bringing Scotland’s homes up to the new standard.

The Scottish Government accepts in full the Air Quality Expert Group's (AQEG) conclusions and recommendations in this report. The AQEG report concludes that the most effective approaches for reducing NEE are to reduce the overall volume of traffic, lower speeds on trunk roads and motorways, and promote driving behaviours which reduce braking and high speed cornering.

The Government's new air quality strategy 'Cleaner Air for Scotland 2 - Towards a Better Place for Everyone', which was published on 15 July 2021, sets out how we intend to address non-exhaust emissions (NEE) from road traffic. Actions include exploring opportunities across traffic management, behaviours and legislation/standards to reduce NEE, and contributing to research into developing a consistent method for measuring NEE.

Other actions in the new air quality strategy, which links closely to the National Transport Strategy, for example further investment in and promotion of active travel and reducing motor vehicle kilometres by 20% by 2030, will also contribute to NEE reductions.

The following data was collected via energy performance certificates (EPCs) submitted for all new build completions in Scotland since 2016. This indicative data is based on analysis of new build EPC records lodged on the EPC register between Q1 2016 and Q4 2020. A total of 92,900 EPC records were analysed.

Numbers in the tables have been rounded to the nearest ten. This is the best currently available data:

For all woodland creation proposals, applicants are required to undertake land surveys as part of their due diligence. This due diligence includes surveying for peat soils, including deep peat. Where peat soils are found, further more intensive surveys are required, to produce a detailed soil survey map which is submitted to Scottish Forestry for approval. Depending upon the distribution of peat and peat depths across the proposal area, further peat surveys may be required before a contract for woodland creation is approved and a final detailed peat and soil survey map is accepted. At this time, a species and constraints map is also agreed and areas of deep peat are excluded from the agreed contract. We have released new cultivation guidance on 26 July and this will prevent the use of high impact cultivation techniques on peat and organo-mineral soils over 10cm.

Applicants and agents use existing soil survey maps for Scotland as a baseline ahead of beginning on site land surveys. Subsequently areas of deep peat are demarcated on site and cultivation contractors are provided with soil and species maps to ensure cultivation is undertaken in line with the agreed contract.

All young people 16 to 17 years of age are now being offered the coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccination in Scotland. In line with the latest advice from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), they will be offered a first dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. People who are 16 or 17 in mainland Scotland will be invited to register their interest through the online portal at NHS Inform, and will then be sent an appointment via SMS or email. Eligible young people in Shetland, Orkney and Western Isles will be contacted by their health board and invited to attend clinics.

Drop-in clinics are available for 16 to 17-years-olds. Anyone who doesn’t register an interest or attend a drop-in clinic, will be sent an appointment invitation through the post.

The Scottish Government follows the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) Guidance in developing guidance as the vaccination programme makes progress towards increasing levels of COVID-19 immunity in the population. Current JCVI advice remains that the single greatest risk of mortality and severe disease from COVID-19 is increasing age and COVID-19 risk increases exponentially with age.

Following the recent JCVI advice, young people aged 12 to 15 with severe neuro-disabilities, Down’s Syndrome, immunosuppression and multiple or severe learning disabilities, as well as people who are household contacts of individuals who are immunosuppressed, will be eligible for vaccination soon. The JCVI is not currently advising routine vaccination of children outside of these groups, based on the current evidence.

All young people 16 to 17 years of age will now be offered the coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccination in Scotland. In line with the latest advice from the JCVI, they will be offered a first dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. People who are 16 or 17 in mainland Scotland will be invited to register their interest through the online portal at NHS Inform, and will then be sent an appointment via SMS or email. Eligible young people in Shetland, Orkney and Western Isles will be contacted by their health board and invited to attend clinics.

Drop-in clinics are available for 16 to 17-years-olds. Anyone who doesn’t register an interest or attend a drop-in clinic, will be sent an appointment invitation through the post. It is expected that everyone in this age group will have been offered a vaccination appointment by the end of September.

The advice to protect against the risks of contracting COVID-19 or developing any associated ‘Long COVID’ signs and symptoms, remain the same for those who are vaccinated as those unable to receive vaccination for medical reasons. There is further detailed advice available, which is continuously updated in line with protection levels advice, for those who have been shielding for health reasons published here: Coronavirus (COVID-19): shielding advice and support - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) .

Like all medicines, no vaccine is completely effective, but we do know the vaccination of a high proportion of the population will assist in reducing symptomatic disease and transmission. As the vaccination programme progresses, the Scottish Government advises everyone to follow the protection level rules set for each Local Authority area, as well as to follow general public health guidance issued on non-pharmaceutical measures which help to reduce the spread of COVID-19.

In addition to the individual level of protection against severe disease or hospitalisation afforded by vaccination, a further benefit of the vaccination programme is to assist in developing widespread community immunity and thereby reduce the force of transmission and viral reproduction rate, controlling the prevalence of COVID-19.

Research by Public Health England (PHE), which monitors vaccine efficacy within the UK, shows that those who became infected 3 weeks after receiving one dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or AstraZeneca vaccine were between 38% and 49% less likely to pass the virus on to their household contacts than those who were unvaccinated. Protection was seen from around 14 days after vaccination, with similar levels of protection regardless of age of cases or contacts. Data is published here: One dose of COVID-19 vaccine can cut household transmission by up to half - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) . Further research into the COVID-19 vaccines’ impacts on transmission is underway.

The inoculation of a large proportion of the population will help to provide a degree of ‘passive protection’ in the community for those who cannot receive vaccination for medical reasons and those who may develop a weaker immune response to vaccination due to old age, immunosuppression or illness.