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Awareness and promotion of the Young Person’s Guarantee among employability staff was achieved using existing networks and communication channels.

The Scottish Government continues to work closely with local government partners in each local authority to promote and drive an increase in the reach of our services across all of Scotland.

The Scottish Government set out the policy approach to Employability within the No One Left Behind: review of employability services report which was published on 5 December 2018. Support and Guidance has been provided through the development of national products, including the Customer Charter, Shared Measurement Framework, Service Standards and other materials which are designed to support development and implementation of services at a local level whilst maintaining national coherence.

We continue to work in partnership with local government, key stakeholders, and service users to build capacity for promoting and delivering the Scottish Approach to Service Design in Employability and inter-related national products. This creates the optimum conditions and framework for quality services and how to evaluate them.

The Scottish Government works in partnership with Local Government and Local Employability Partners to offer key worker led, person-centred holistic support. At a local level they work in communities and with partners to deliver employability services to those who are experiencing or are at risk of becoming long term unemployed. This includes people with disabilities or long-term health conditions. We engaged with all Scottish Local Authorities when we undertook reviews in the delivery of Supported Employment and Individual Placement and Support (IPS) to consider the most appropriate approach for improved outcomes.

Supported employment including IPS can offer assistance to those requiring intensive and specific help. Officials are working with a range of partners to develop and expand our Supported Employment offer which is currently delivered through Fair Start Scotland. From 2024 this type of support will be made available through our No One Left Behind approach with local partners.

In addition, we are considering the recommendations from the implementation evaluation of No One Left Behind and the Young Person’s Guarantee, alongside the outputs from our recent national stakeholder discussion events and actions will be reviewed to identify improvement measures.

Design and delivery of employability services that meet the needs of users and local labour markets is the responsibility of the local employability partnership. To support this, and ensure national coherence, we co-designed employability service standards with partners and users. Local Employability Partnerships (LEP) are required to uphold the expectations set out in the service standards, including ensuring their services are accessible and take account of the experience of users.

Third sector partners have a key role to play in the design and delivery of services at LEP level and adherence to the service standards whilst actively engaged in delivery supports them in ensuring services are accessible for disabled people.

Third Sector organisations based in Scotland were invited to apply to the Workplace Equality Fund 2022-2024 which is a source of financial support for Scottish businesses and organisations striving to address longstanding barriers in the labour market that particular priority groups, including disabled people, face. Workplace Equality Fund investment is just over £590k across 10 projects this year, four of which focus specifically on disability, totalling over £3m to 71 projects since 2018.

We recognise the important role the third sector can play in supporting people to access support they are entitled to and are committed to working in partnership to develop our devolved approach to employability.

Support for young people now forms part of our all-age employability support delivered through No One Left Behind. Employability support is designed and delivered at a local level by Local Employability Partnerships.

Local Authorities have the responsibility of developing approaches with partners, including engaging with employers, to meet local needs. Local Employability Leads will be able to provide local information on employer engagement.

Employability contacts for each local authority can be found on the Employability in Scotland website which can be accessed here: https://www.employabilityinscotland.com/local-employability-services/

Data collected is recorded as a collective for 16–24-year-olds and not broken down by funding stream. Therefore, we are not able to provide a breakdown of training opportunities that are funded through Young Person’s Guarantee. Our Devolved Employment Services: statistical summaries, which included data on‎ 16–24-year-olds, are published quarterly and are available on our gov.scot website.

Our employability services are designed and delivered at a local level by Local Employability Partnerships who determine the level of funding allocated to Employer Recruitment Incentives within their areas.

Specific details on funding Employer Recruitment Incentives are not held by the Scottish Government, therefore requests for this information would need to be directed towards Local Authorities.

Employability contacts for each local authority can be found on the Employability in Scotland website which can be accessed here: https://www.employabilityinscotland.com/local-employability-services/

I have committed to updating the Scottish Parliament on Phase 3 of the Learning Estate Investment Programme by the end of October.

The Scottish Government has robust processes in place for assessing outcomes, performance and value for money in relation to expenditure from Portfolio budgets.

Accountable Officers are in place to ensure that public money is used efficiently and effectively in line with guidance published in the Scottish Public Finance Manual. This includes scrutinising significant policy proposals or plans to start or vary major projects/policies, and then assess whether they measure against the required standards for regularity, propriety, value for money and feasibility.

As you will be aware, the Scottish Government’s National Performance Framework tracks progress toward our national outcomes and the associated national indicators. There are further tools that are more specific to the Education and Skills portfolio. For example, the primary purpose of the National Improvement Framework since January 2016 has been to bring together an enhanced range of information and data at all levels of the system, to drive improvement for children and young people in early learning and childcare settings, schools, and colleges across the whole of Scotland.

Furthermore, all recipients of grant funding receive letters which clearly outline their objectives and expected outcomes from the funding and targets/milestones in which progress against these objectives and outcomes will be measured.

The Scottish Government has collected six-monthly reports from local authorities on school counselling services since January 2021.

The number of young people that accessed the service in each period, broken down by local authority can be found below. It is acknowledged that some young people accessed the service in multiple periods so may be recorded twice.