Chamber and committees

The second milestone of the Energy Efficiency Standard for Social Housing to 2032 (EESSH2) requires social landlords to ensure their stock meets, or can be treated as meeting, EPC Band B, or is as energy efficient as practically possible, by the end of December 2032 and within the limits of cost, technology and necessary consent.

The EESSH2 milestone does not change landlords’ responsibility to manage their investment policy to ensure that it is cost-effective, especially where substantial additional investment has a potential impact on rents. The Scottish Government guidance for landlords makes it clear that we do not expect landlords to invest in measures that are unaffordable or where the costs are disproportionate to the benefits to tenants. Landlords have broad discretion to decide if potential energy efficiency measures are too expensive or are not value for money in their stock. We will continue to work in partnership with the sector to find the most effective ways to tackle the shared challenge of the climate emergency together.

Scottish Government modelling suggests that it could cost a total of £3.4 billion to bring 62% of Scottish social housing up to EPC band B using existing technology. Historically, a large part of the expenditure needed to improve homes has come from landlords' own resources or borrowing as part of their continuing investment to improve their homes. The Scottish Government provides guidance to help landlords identify funding sources, including Energy Company Obligation, UK Government Schemes, and funding from the Scottish Government.

Through our Social Housing Net Zero Heat fund, the Scottish Government has already committed to make available £100 million over the next parliament to support existing social landlords across Scotland to install zero emission heating systems and energy efficiency measures across their housing stock. In addition, the Low Carbon Infrastructure Transition Programme and its successor programme will invest £400 million over the next five years in large-scale heat decarbonisation infrastructure. We will continue to work with the sector to assess the impact of funding to date and ensure that our funding effectively supports further acceleration of the decarbonisation of our social housing stock alongside the ongoing investment of social landlords in maintaining the efficiency and quality of their stock.

We recognise that local carer support services have been under additional pressure during the pandemic.

Local authorities and integration authorities are responsible for carer support under the Carers Act and commission third sector organisations to provide much of that support on their behalf. The 2021-22 budget contains an additional £28.5 million in the local government settlement for Carers Act implementation. Added to similar (baselined) increases in previous years since the Act came into force in April 2018, this brings the total additional investment for 2021-22 to £68 million per year.

The previous Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport wrote to local authorities in March 2021 to highlight the importance of using this additional funding to expand carer support: www.gov.scot/publications/carers-act-finance-2021-2022-letter .

The Scottish Government also funds the Time to Live scheme, administered by Shared Care Scotland, to enable local carer organisations to provide small grants for carers to spend on short breaks or something that gives them a break from caring. In response to the pandemic, we have put an additional £910,000 into the scheme in 2020-21 and a further £250,000 in 2021-22.

The Evaluation of the Scottish Strategy for Autism has been completed. The report is being finalised and is expected to be published soon.

The issue of body-worn cameras is a policy and operational decision for Police Scotland, acting under the oversight of the Scottish Police Authority. However, as part of our budget allocation for policing this year, we have provided one-off funding of £500,000 to support their use by armed officers.

Police Scotland are currently running a public consultation on a wider roll-out body-worn video across the service which will assist them in protecting the public, their officers and staff and provide best evidence at court.

This consultation launched on the 1 June and is due to close on 31 August 2021. The results will help inform protocols, a code of practice and training to ensure that cameras are used in appropriate and proportionate way .

The Scottish Government recognises the vital importance and multiple benefits of appropriate tree planting and development of green spaces and we are working hard with a range of stakeholders, including local authorities, to encourage and support these activities.

In terms of planning, measures in this area include The Planning (Scotland) Act 2019, which requires planning authorities to prepare and publish a ‘forestry and woodland strategy’ setting out the planning authority’s proposals in their area as to the development of forestry and woodlands, including the expansion of woodlands of a range of types to provide multiple benefits to the physical, cultural, economic, social and environmental characteristics of the area.

Scottish Planning Policy (SPP) also states that ‘Planning should protect, enhance and promote green infrastructure, including open space and green networks, as an integral component of successful placemaking.’ SPP sets out that local authorities’ local development plans should seek to enhance existing and promote the creation of new green infrastructure.

Enabling redevelopment of vacant and derelict land has been identified as a key consideration and more information about this will feature in a draft National Planning Framework (NPF4), which will be laid in parliament in autumn 2021.

There are a number of measures in place to support local authorities in the planting of trees and development of green spaces. This year we opened our new £50m low carbon Vacant and Derelict Land Investment Programme to applications from all Scottish local authorities and Clyde Gateway Urban Regeneration Company. It will help unblock the reuse of persistent vacant and derelict land, especially in disadvantaged areas, and bring forward opportunities for new green infrastructure, as part of place based approaches to regeneration and support to a just transition to net zero.

We are also investing in the quality of our greenspaces with the development of the Central Scotland Green Network, Europe’s largest greenspace project. Through this fund we have invested more than £7 million since 2010 in projects that are promoting active travel, woodland planting, community growing and restoring land.

The Scottish Government recently launched the Nature Restoration Fund (NRF), which included £5 million going to Local Authorities to support new or existing projects that will help address the twin crises of biodiversity loss and climate change. These may well include tree planting and development of green spaces.

In the Programme for Government 2020-21, we announced our intention to pilot Miyawaki forests, which are also known as ‘tiny’ or ‘wee’ forests. These are small densely planted, fast growing woodlands largely planted in urban areas. The Scottish Government, alongside NatureScot, are currently exploring options for delivery, which will involve Local Delivery Partners, such as local authorities.

Scottish Forestry also offer grants to tenants and occupiers of local authority land who have a tenancy or occupancy agreement for 20 years or more to plant trees where the local authority has no plans to do so on the same area. Scottish Forestry also provide grants for creating a management plan for woodlands in and around towns (WIAT), and supports communities active on local authority land through the Forestry Development Fund.

The Scottish Government has committed to a review of the Victim Notification Scheme and work in relation to this is being taken forward.

The minutes from the meeting of the Victims Taskforce on 10 March 2021 where this matter was discussed can be accessed here: Victims Taskforce papers: March 2021 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) .

Decisions on whether individuals accused of criminal offences should be remanded in custody are for the independent court to make within the overall legal framework. For anyone held on remand, they can seek a bail review at any time so that their position is re-assessed by the court.

The number of individuals held on remand as a proportion of the overall prison population has increased during Covid-19 as a result of the impact of Covid-19 on the processing of criminal cases. A key reason why the Scottish Government has provided an additional £50 million to the justice system this year is so that criminal cases can be progressed, including for those on remand, and justice carried out in each case.

Prior to Covid-19, there were concerns about the use of remand within the justice system and the Scottish Government is committed to taking action to address this. This includes investing in robust alternatives to remand – specifically £550k in bail supervision and an additional £1.5m for bail support for women each year. This is in addition to the £117m annual investment in community justice services. We are also working with partners to implement electronically monitored bail across Scotland – providing a further monitoring capability for courts.

As set out on page 63 of the Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment (BRIA) for Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme (DRS), we do not anticipate online retailers being adversely impacted by our DRS. The BRIA is available here:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/deposit-return-scheme-scotland-full-business-regulatory-impact-assessment-2/documents/ .

It is vital to the success and fairness of our DRS that online retailers charge the deposit and provide a service to allow it to be redeemed and the container returned.

Police Scotland have advised that there are currently 256 body worn cameras in use within North East Division and 5 body worn cameras in use within Fife Division. These are in daily use and managed in accordance with Data Protection impact assessments.

In addition, Police Scotland have access to 50 body worn cameras available from legacy force areas, including the Football Policing Unit.

Police Scotland have confirmed that they are proceeding with the development and introduction of additional body worn cameras for armed policing officers in advance of the Climate Change conference COP26 in November 2021.

The Scottish Government is committed to improving and embedding inclusive communication within Government and across public bodies, this is a focus of one of our Equality Outcomes for the 2021-25 reporting period, as well as being a 2020 PfG commitment. The Scottish Government intends all local services to be accessible to all citizens in Scotland, regardless of circumstances of an individual service user.

We believe that as professionals, Social Workers are best placed to make a professional judgment based on their assessment of need exactly what, if any additional support is required. This assessment will include consideration of need for Spoken Language Interpreters, British Sign Language and any form of verbal/non-verbal communication requirements.