Chamber and committees

The Health and Care (Staffing) (Scotland) Act 2019: Overview - Health and Care (Staffing) (Scotland) Act 2019: overview - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) commenced on April 2024, the Act places duties on Health Boards to ensure that at all times suitably qualified and competent individuals are working in such numbers as are appropriate for the health, wellbeing and safety of patients, the provision of high-quality care and the wellbeing of staff.

Under the Act, there is a Duty on Health Boards to submit a report on how they complied with their legislative requirements. Following this, Scottish Ministers must publish these reports alongside setting out how they have taken into account and plan to take into account, in their policies for the staffing of health service, the information included in the combined report. The first Health Board Annual Reports are due 30 April 2025.

The full expanded version of Scotland's Migration Service will be launched on 19th November 2024.

The Regional Land Us Frameworks (RLUFs) developed as part of the Regional Land Use Partnership (RLUPs) pilot programme have captured a range of land use priorities for each region including, but not limited to, native woodland expansion, flood mitigation and community wealth building. More information on these is available on the respective RLUP websites:

• South of Scotland region: Delivery & Strategies | South of Scotland Regional Economic Partnership (southofscotlandrep.com)
• North West Highland region: Land+ Project | NORTHWEST2045
• Cairngorms National Park region: Cairngorms National Park Partnership Plan 2022-27 - Cairngorms National Park Authority
• Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park region: Read The Plan - Here. Now. All of us. - Loch Lomond & The Trossachs National Park (lochlomond-trossachs.org)

Whilst the Scottish Government sets the strategic policy direction for the NHS in Scotland, operational matters including staffing requirements are in the first instance the responsibility of the relevant NHS board. Recruitment is a matter for health boards who will take into account turnover, retention, absence rates and budgets when making recruitment decisions. This can mean that vacancies fluctuate across boards and by specialism. It is for health boards to ensure safe and effective staffing levels, and recruit to these to provide services.

Whilst the Scottish Government sets the strategic policy direction for the NHS in Scotland, operational matters including staffing requirements are in the first instance the responsibility of the relevant NHS board. Recruitment is a matter for health boards who will take into account turnover, retention, absence rates and budgets when making recruitment decisions. This can mean that vacancies fluctuate across boards and by specialism. It is for health boards to ensure safe and effective staffing levels, and recruit to these to provide services.

Tackling all forms of violence including knife crime is a key priority for this government.

Law enforcement and prosecution are essential in our overall approach to tackling violence, including knife crime. In addition to this, Scotland’s Violence Prevention Framework uses a public health approach to address violence, including knife crime, that focuses on identifying and tackling the underlying root causes of violence. We want to prevent people from picking up a knife in the first instance.

Through the Framework and our partner organisations, a range of activity is being taken forward to divert people away from violence, including reducing knife crime. This includes supporting and monitoring the effectiveness and progress being achieved on the following;

• YouthLink Scotland’s No Knives, Better Lives programme which provides training to practitioners and engages directly with young people on the risks and consequences of violence including knife crime.
• Medics Against Violence’s schools education programme, which delivers violence prevention lessons within schools and other settings.
• The Scottish Violence Reduction Unit are working within communities to provide violence prevention training including the carrying and use of weapons.

We will also utilise national statistics to monitor levels of handling offensive weapon crimes, which includes knife carrying and would hope to maintain the improvements we have seen over the longer term.

As part of implementation of the Framework, we committed to developing a Measurement Framework which will monitor high-level progress towards the Framework’s vision over the long term. This will be published following publication of the findings from the 2023-24 Scottish Crime and Justice Survey in 2025, thereby aligning it with the very latest national data available on violence victimisation.

The Scottish Government pathways report: Pathways into, through and out of Residential Rehabilitation in Scotland: Results from the Residential Rehabilitation Providers Survey (www.gov.scot), published in November 2021, serves as a baseline to help identify specific barriers and facilitators to accessing Residential Rehabilitation (RR). Public Health Scotland’s Evaluation of the Scottish Government Residential Rehabilitation programme: Evaluation of the Scottish Government Residential Rehabilitation programme 13 February 2024 - Evaluation of the Scottish Government Residential Rehabilitation programme - Publications - Public Health Scotland, published on 13 February 2024, also provides details of some of the barriers individuals, including women, face when seeking access to RR, and the actions already taken to address these.

The main barriers women face while accessing RR is the awareness of rehab, including funding, and how to access services and the lack of provision for individuals with caring responsibilities.

The Residential Rehabilitation Rapid Capacity Programme (RRRCP) was established to provide funding to increase RR capacity, with a particular focus on improving provision for women and those with childcare responsibilities.

Through the RRRCP, funding has been awarded to support the establishment of two Aberlour mother and child recovery units, one in Dundee and the other in Falkirk. It has also supported the establishment of Phoenix Future’s Harper House, in Saltcoats, that offers a unique national family services which can support up to 20 families at one time.

Our rural economies will be hit by the proposed changes to Inheritance Tax’s Agricultural Property Relief.

The current maximum legal noise level for fireworks is defined in UK-wide legislation, the Pyrotechnic Articles (Safety) Regulations 2015.

While we recognise that some retailers label fireworks as silent or low noise consultations with various stakeholders had confirmed that no formal standard or specification exists to identify or differentiate these products.

We are keen to stay informed about advancements in this area, and I have written to the new UK Government to request a meeting to discuss possible updates to fireworks regulations on a UK wide basis. I recognise we share the goal of enhancing community safety and wellbeing, and I plan to address noise as part of these discussions.

Within the powers available to us, we have taken a series of proportionate, evidence-based steps to strengthen the law around access to and use of fireworks.

The Scottish Government already has a well established partnership with the Crown Estate that was fundamental to the Scotwind and INTOG licensing rounds for offshore wind. Our current focus is not on new leasing opportunities but delivering Scotland’s strong pipeline of clean energy and supply chain opportunities.

To support this the Scottish Government and UK Government Department of Energy Security and Net Zero developed a shared objective for Great British Energy to maximise the benefits of its activities in Scotland. Through developing partnerships with existing Scottish public bodies active within the clean energy sector (Crown Estate Scotland, the Enterprise Agencies and the Scottish National Investment Bank) organisations will work together to deliver joint objectives to maximise impact and value for money from Scottish projects.