Chamber and committees

Environmental Standards Scotland's (ESS) report published on 23 June 2026, Protecting Scotland's seafloor: an assessment of Scottish Ministers' implementation of the Marine Strategy Regulations 2010, contains ESS’ findings and recommendations relating to the Scottish Ministers’ implementation of those Regulations, including findings and recommendations regarding the contribution of measures in Part 3 of the UK Marine Strategy towards seafloor integrity objectives and targets.

The Scottish Government is carefully considering the ESS report and will work constructively with ESS to seek to agree an appropriate action plan within the timescale suggested in the report. The Scottish Government's position on the report's findings and recommendations will be set out through that engagement and in its formal response.

Social Security Scotland routinely publishes statistics on the number of parents or carers actively in receipt of Scottish Child Payment. These statistics also include the number and value of payments by local authority and financial year since launch and are available at: Scottish Child Payment statistics to 31 March 2026.

The latest published statistics show that, as of 31 March 2026, 189,620 parents or carers in Scotland were receiving Scottish Child Payment.

The most recent Scottish Government take-up analysis, published on 14 October 2025, estimated that Scottish Child Payment had a take-up rate of 94% among those eligible in Scotland in the financial year 2024-2025. The publication also includes estimated take-up rates for each local authority area and is available at: Take-up rates of Scottish benefits: October 2025.

Environmental Standards Scotland's (ESS) report published on 23 June 2026, Protecting Scotland's seafloor: an assessment of Scottish Ministers' implementation of the Marine Strategy Regulations 2010, contains ESS’ findings and recommendations relating to the Scottish Ministers’ implementation of those Regulations, including regarding timescales for the implementation of measures specified in Part 3 of the UK Marine Strategy.

The Scottish Government is carefully considering the ESS report and will work constructively with ESS to seek to agree an appropriate action plan within the timescale suggested in the report. The Scottish Government's position on the report's findings and recommendations will be set out through that engagement and in its formal response.

The recommended community benefit fund level for solar developments will be set out in the refreshed Good Practice Principles for Community Benefits from Onshore Renewable Energy Developments. Decisions on implementation arrangements, including when any revised recommended fund levels should take effect, are subject to Ministerial approval.

The Good Practice Principles are non-statutory guidance and the recommended community benefit fund levels are voluntary. The Scottish Government continues to call on the UK Government to use its reserved powers to mandate community benefits for mature onshore renewable energy technologies.

The Scottish Government is carefully considering Environmental Standards Scotland’s (ESS) report Protecting Scotland’s Seafloor: as assessment of Scottish Ministers’ implementation of the Marine Strategy Regulations 2010, and will work constructively with ESS to seek to agree an appropriate action plan within the timescale suggested in the report.

I refer the member to the answer to question S7W-00690 on 10 June 2026. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.

As this is an application which may come before Scottish Ministers for determination, it would not be appropriate to comment on the specific merits of the proposal.

The latest data for the position to the end of March 2016 demonstrated that there were 16 Government funded SBAs completed and 1 developer led SBA completed.

The Scottish Government are seeking to accelerate progress in a number of ways.

Those in receipt of grant funding are required to initiate the SBA within a required time frame, and we will only provide final funding upon receipt of a completed SBA.

Since the SBA is a relatively new standard, we have run workshops with the industry on how the SBA works in practice and to identify any challenges in application. We have also engaged directly with factors to better understand barriers to commissioning assessments and to support a more consistent and timely approach across the private sector. This engagement is helping to identify practical solutions to issues affecting delivery and inform ongoing improvements to programme guidance and support.

We have commissioned Local Delivery Plans from Local Authorities and Registered Social Landlords whose buildings currently comprise over 75% of the programme. These plans provide greater visibility of assessment timelines and key milestones enabling us to monitor progress more closely, engage where delays arise and hold delivery partners to account for delivery.

The same data release demonstrated that 149 Government-funded SBAs and 21 developer-led SBAs were underway. As SBAs involve detailed assessment of complex buildings, they can take time to complete; however, the significant number currently underway demonstrates progress. Importantly, where an SBA identifies urgent life-safety concerns, action to mitigate risk can be taken immediately and does not depend on the assessment being fully completed.

The next data release, covering the position to the end of June, will be published on 15 September. For the first time, this will include information on the number of completed SBAs that have been submitted to the Scottish Government for review and compliance checking against the published SBA standard, providing a more complete picture of assessment progress.

The changes approved by the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) Board will be delivered over the next 5 years with SFRS developing a change programme.

a) In the short term, there will be no net savings from the review as the total number of wholetime firefighters employed by SFRS will not reduce and there will be additional on-call firefighters (20 new posts) to be recruited. 69 wholetime firefighters in front-line fire stations will be redirected to the essential training and prevention roles. It is expected any savings from building maintenance or future capital expenditure avoided will be invested in other parts of the SFRS estate.

b) With regards to Helensburgh Fire Station, when the changes are implemented, around four wholetime pump crews (17 people), equating to £779,000 salary costs, would be available for reallocation elsewhere in the service, as only one expanded crew would be required for operating the Day Shift Duty System (DSDS). Additional on call staff, costing approximately £109,000 per annum, will be required for providing additional resilience in the evenings and weekends for the DSDS/On-call pump. Costs of approximately £67,000 in relation to training the on call crew and swift water and flood response capability will also be required. This reduced staff footprint will realise property related cost reductions of approximately £23,000 annually. It should be noted that Helensburgh and the wider area will benefit from staff being redeployed into community safety/prevention and training roles.

S7W-00815 refers to prostate cancer screening. Information on both bowel and prostate cancer screening is set out below.

Since 2009, Scotland has offered bowel screening in line with the current UK National Screening Committee (UK NSC) recommendations; screening is offered every two years to people aged between 50 and 74. Those aged 75 and over can also request a kit every two years. In July 2026, the Scottish Government submitted a proposal to the UK NSC to review their recommended age range, highlighting that the number of bowel cancers are increasing in those under the age of 50.

As noted in the answer to S7W-00815, our initial focus is on strengthening existing high-risk surveillance pathways for prostate cancer, which already allow eligible men to access testing in line with the UK NSC recommendation. This work will progress at pace, and will be completed ahead of any implementation of a national screening programme, which will require a number of formal processes to be developed, including a dedicated IT system.

To support both pieces of work, we have established a multi-disciplinary Prostate Cancer Screening Working Group (PCSWG).