As far as the statutory registers of births, marriages and deaths are concerned, two copies of each register are created, one of which is held by the local registration service which created it, and one which is sent to the General Register Office for Scotland (GROS) in New Register House in Edinburgh. The registers held in New Register House will be preserved indefinitely. No decision has yet been taken on what will be done with the duplicate statutory registers held by local registration services when the digitisation of statutory registers has been completed. The registers themselves are the property of the Registrar General, while provision of storage and record accommodation is a matter for local registration services. Provision for the duplicate registers from a particular area will therefore be a matter for discussion between the Registrar General and the local registration service. GROS will be happy to be flexible in their approach to this, as they have been on previous occasions when registers have been replaced by microfiche.The other main sets of records that are being digitised by GROS are the open census records and the Old Parish Registers of the Church of Scotland, both of which are held at New Register House. These, again, will be preserved indefinitely.The Digitally Imaging the Genealogical Records of the Scottish people (DIGROS) project, under which the GROS is creating digital images of all its records, is expected to be completed by late 2003.

I refer the member to the answer given to his question on 28 October 2002. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/search_wa.

I am sorry for the delay in providing a substantive answer to the original question. This was due to a combination of inquiries being made and administrative oversight.

Representatives of our Sea Fisheries Division attended the fisheries working group on 7 November 2002.

Home ownership has increased substantially in recent years, from 1,132,000 dwellings (52.4% of stock) in 1991 to 1,506,000 dwellings (64.2% of stock) in 2001. This creates more opportunities for new households and those moving into home ownership for the first time. They also currently benefit from historically low interest rates.The Executive's policy is to support Scottish households who aspire to home ownership whenever the financial circumstances of the household make this a sensible option. Our two main policies in this connection are the right to buy for those in the social rented sector and grant funding for low cost home ownership through Communities Scotland.In the three financial years to March 2002, a total of 40,934 houses were sold to sitting tenants by local authorities and Scottish Homes, and a further 2,134 by housing associations. Although sales of individual houses are not classified into rural and urban, 25% of local authority sales were in those 14 authorities with the most substantial rural areas, which held 23.5% of the local authority housing stock in 2001.Communities Scotland and its predecessor, Scottish Homes, approved grant linked to low cost home ownership schemes for 2,906 households in urban areas and 770 in rural areas in the last three financial years to end March 2002. Expenditure in those three years for these purposes was £67.9 million.

During 2001-02 Fisheries Research Services (FRS) employed the equivalent of 230 full-time scientists. It is currently estimated that the work of some 35 FRS scientists is dedicated to white fish stock assessments and related issues. The work of this group represents the Scottish contribution to the wider UK and international effort focussed on white fish issues.

Much of the work contained in the recently published Scottish Executive Environment and Rural Affairs Department/Industry/Science Partnership Report was designed to assess the impact of the technical measures agreed upon under the cod recovery plan; other assessments have been conducted by the Fisheries Research Services Marine Laboratory. The Advisory Committee for Fisheries Management projections already take account of some of the measures.The Scottish Executive has stated clearly that the impact of the technical measures adopted by Scottish fishermen must be properly taken into account when decisions are made regarding future fishing arrangements.

I have asked Mr Bob Millar, Chief Executive of Communities Scotland to respond. His response is as follows:Communities Scotland's housing investment programme has increased access to social housing for local people in urban and rural areas by providing new or improved housing, to meet the needs of those on low incomes seeking to rent social housing and through providing housing to replace or improve non-effective or poor quality housing thus improving the quality of life of the residents.As a result, Communities Scotland expenditure on social rented housing in Urban and Rural Areas (1999-2000 to 2001-02) has been as follows:Communities Scotland - Expenditure on Social Rented Housing in Urban and Rural Areas (2000-01 to 2002-03)

Year	Urban Areas (£ million)	Rural Areas (£ million)
1999-2000	129.0	34.6
2000-01	138.3	38.3
2001-02	141.6	48.6

The available information relates to the offences of the illegal importation, cultivation, supply or possession of drugs. Other offences may be drug-related, such as those committed to fund a drug habit, but these cannot be separately identified within the recorded crime and court proceedings statistics held centrally.Information on crimes recorded by the police is not available by sheriffdom. The requested information on crimes recorded by police force area is published in Table 4A of the statistical bulletin Recorded Crimes in Scotland. Copies of the bulletins for 1997 to 2001 are available in the Parliament's Reference Centre (Bib. numbers 24795, 16613, 7079, 13119 and 20798).The available information on persons proceeded against where the charge is proved is given in the following table. The statistics dealing with recorded crime and court proceedings are not directly comparable as a person may be proceeded against for more than one crime involving more than one victim, and a crime may be recorded in one year and proceedings taken in a subsequent year. Charges recorded by the police may also be altered as a result of the judicial process.Persons with a Charge Proved for Drug Offences¹, by Sheriffdom and Police Force Area, 1997-2000

Sheriffdom/Police Force Area	Total Number with a Charge Proved				Percentage of All Proceeded Against
	1997	1998	1999	2000	1997	1998	1999	2000
Sheriffdom
Glasgow and Strathkelvin	1,318	1,437	1,347	1,048	77	80	77	75
Grampian, Highland and Islands	1,215	1,173	909	675	92	92	92	91
Lothian and Borders	935	821	763	699	96	94	92	91
North Strathclyde	1,028	1,174	996	813	83	85	83	82
South Strathclyde, Dumfries and Galloway	1,157	1,083	1,087	1,050	85	81	82	83
Tayside, Central and Fife	1,047	968	988	819	86	85	86	87
Police force area
Central	271	234	248	223	91	85	91	91
Dumfries and Galloway	244	175	143	116	89	85	89	89
Fife	344	302	265	146	80	83	83	80
Grampian	826	811	611	415	93	92	92	92
Lothian and Borders	935	821	763	699	96	94	92	91
Northern	389	362	298	260	90	90	91	91
Strathclyde	3,259	3,519	3,287	2,795	81	81	80	79
Tayside	432	432	475	450	89	85	85	88
Scotland2	7,005	6,918	6,400	5,383	85	85	83	83

Notes:1. Where main offence.2. Includes High Court and court or police force not known.

Information on crimes recorded by the police is not available by sheriffdom. The requested information on crimes recorded by police force area is published in Table 4A of the statistical bulletin Recorded Crimes in Scotland. Copies of the bulletins for 1997 to 2001 are available in the Parliament's Reference Centre (Bib. numbers 24795, 16613, 7079, 13119 and 20798).The available information on persons proceeded against where the charge is proved is given in the following table. The statistics dealing with recorded crime and court proceedings are not directly comparable as a person may be proceeded against for more than one crime involving more than one victim, and a crime may be recorded in one year and proceedings taken in a subsequent year. Charges recorded by the police may also be altered as a result of the judicial process.Persons with a Charge Proved Housebreaking¹, by Sheriffdom and Police Force Area, 1997-2000

Sheriffdom/Police Force Area	Total Number with a Charge Proved				Percentage of All Proceeded Against
	1997	1998	1999	2000	1997	1998	1999	2000
Sheriffdom
Glasgow and Strathkelvin	549	491	554	363	77	76	81	78
Grampian, Highland and Islands	621	575	573	500	88	86	88	89
Lothian and Borders	485	366	331	387	89	88	90	88
North Strathclyde	456	512	532	471	78	79	79	80
South Strathclyde, Dumfries and Galloway	380	400	372	366	72	76	79	82
Tayside, Central and Fife	779	618	652	592	79	79	81	85
Police force area
Central	159	102	139	108	77	73	79	88
Dumfries and Galloway	99	116	103	108	83	85	87	86
Fife	347	294	330	292	89	89	92	89
Grampian	497	469	469	429	90	87	88	89
Lothian and Borders	485	366	331	387	89	88	90	88
Northern	124	106	104	71	84	85	86	87
Strathclyde	1,286	1,287	1,355	1,092	75	76	79	79
Tayside	273	222	183	192	71	71	68	77
Scotland2	3,275	2,977	3,021	2,686	81	80	82	84

Notes:1. Where main offence.2. Includes High Court and court or police force not known.