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The Scottish Government remains committed to Keeping The Promise by 2030, working in partnership with all partners including Local Authorities, the third sector and importantly the care community to create the conditions for change at a national and local level.

We continue to support a wide range of projects and initiatives across communities in Scotland that improve outcomes for children, young people, adults and families who are care experienced and those on the edges of care.

The Scottish Government has committed £4 million per year up to March 2025 for The Promise Partnership Fund which launched in 2021. This has been established to help organisations with early intervention and to deliver changes to better support children, young people and families in or on the edges of care.

The 2023-24 budget allocated £30 million towards Keeping The Promise to children and families with care experience. In addition, £50 million has been allocated for Whole Family Wellbeing Funding. This funding will focus on the system changes required to shift investment towards early intervention and prevention activities, to ensure families can access support before they reach crisis point.

The Scottish Government is committed to keeping The Promise and improving the outcomes of care experienced children and young people in education. To achieve this we continue to work with partners, including Education Scotland, COSLA and ADES.

Our national guidance, Included, Engaged and Involved Part 2 , is clear that exclusion should be used as a measure of last resort. The guidance includes particular considerations regarding the exclusion of care experienced young people.

Engagement activity includes with the Scottish Advisory Group for Relationships and Behaviour in Schools (SAGRABIS), to consider exclusion in the context of promoting positive relationships and behaviour in schools.

The Scottish Government is committed to ending the placement of under 18s in Young Offenders Institutions (YOI) and supporting care based alternatives. We have already made significant progress, with the number of under 18s in YOI down to 4 on 28 February from over 200 in 2007. The Children (Care and Justice) (Scotland) Bill, introduced to Holyrood on 13 December 2022, will end this practice if it gains Parliamentary approval.

Such action is integral to Keeping the Promise, a pledge which has cross party support and to which this government remains steadfastly committed.

Beyond legislative change we are working closely with Local Authorities and the third sector to create the conditions for change. A practice guide for community alternatives has been drafted with key partners for expected publication by May 2023. The Children and Young People’s Centre for Justice are supporting engagement with key partners and children and young people on the future of secure care, including defining issues, developing options for change and delivering on this, where agreed with Ministers.

We are engaging with secure care providers and local authorities to increase secure care capacity for under 18s. We are exploring funding options to provide financial sustainability for secure care providers going forward.

Together with Public Health Scotland, the Scottish Government is developing a consensus statement on substance use prevention for young people. This will provide an agreed expert view and understanding in where our collective efforts should lie in improving practice and associated outcomes for children and young people. It will be used to support planning and delivery at a national and local level, and will include consideration of the specific needs of care experienced children and young people.

The Scottish Government’s whole family approach to drug and alcohol services is supported by our annual investment of £3.5 million through Alcohol and Drug Partnerships. Additional funding, such as the £3 million Children and Families Fund administered through the Corra Foundation, is in place to improve support for children, young people and families impacted by drug use.

Ensuring sufficient community pharmacy provision is the responsibility of NHS Health Boards in their local areas. Arrangements are set out in the NHS (Pharmaceutical Services) (Scotland) Regulations 2009 and decisions regarding pharmacy provision are made through a Board’s Pharmacy Practices Committee (PPC). The process is independent of Scottish Ministers and Government.

The Whole Family Wellbeing Funding (WFWF) requires a collaborative approach. A cross portfolio ministerial group oversees the programme at a high level, whilst Governance is provided by the Programme Board which consists of Directors from across the relevant portfolios as well as key external stakeholders.

WFWF is funded by the Education and Justice portfolio for financial year 2022-23 and will again be funded through this portfolio in the financial year 2023-24 as set out in the Scottish Budget.

The Scottish Government is committed to supporting the sustainability of local news as a key part of the public interest news sector in Scotland. In 2021, we established the Public Interest Journalism Working Group to consider the long-term sustainability of public interest journalism, including local news, and to recommend ways to ensure its ongoing resilience. We responded to the Group’s recommendations on 24 June 2022. This included a commitment to facilitate a Roundtable event to support the creation of a new Scottish Public Interest Journalism Institute, which was held on 23 November. While it is not for Scottish Government to influence the remit of the Institute, it is likely, in line with the Working Group’s recommendations, that part of its role will be to support local news.

The Scottish Government and public bodies also use local media, including newspaper, to promote initiatives such as public health campaigns.

Since 2016, the Scottish Government has provided funding to ensure that adult social care workers, delivering direct care in the third and independent sectors, are paid at least the Real Living Wage (RLW).

From April 2023, these workers will see their pay increase to a minimum of £10.90 per hour; in line with the RLW rate for the 2023/24 Financial Year. This represents an increase of 3.8% from the £10.50 minimum rate that was introduced in April 2022 and is a 14.7% increase for these workers in the last two years; with pay rising from at least £9.50 per hour in April 2021 to at least £10.90 in April 2023.

This funding will be delivered through Local Government contracts and the Scottish Government will transfer £100 million to Local Government to deliver this uplift to providers in the third and independent sectors; this investment takes Scottish Government recurring funding for adult social care pay in commissioned services to £0.6 billion per year.

As the implementation of the City Centre Recovery Task Force report continues, the Scottish Government is supporting our cities to decide how best to prioritise their own recovery plans. This includes investing £2m in a Recovery Fund, with a focus on inclusive and sustainable growth.

Important progress to deliver the ambitions of the Town Centre Action Plan Review and the City Centre Recovery Task Force has been made by the recent approval of the National Planning Framework 4. This strengthens support for development in centres to be considered first, while limiting out-of-town retail development. In addition, we continue to roll out our Place Based Investment Programme which last year meant local authorities received £33m to invest in their town centres, 20-minute neighbourhoods, community wealth building and community-led regeneration programmes. £140m is allocated to Scotland’s local authorities over 5 years.