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The Scottish Executive is continuing to implement a range of measures as part of its commitment to school science within A Science Strategy for Scotland and supporting delivery of the National Priorities in Education. Over the next three years, £10 million is being distributed to education authorities in support of these initiatives. The first tranche of £5 million will be issued in April 2003. Further allocations of £3 million and £2 million will be made in 2004-05 and 2005-06. The funding will support teacher professional development and offer further resources to schools to update scientific equipment. This is in addition to the £8 million already announced during Science Year 2002.

The statutory performance indicators for the police, prepared by Audit Scotland on behalf of the Accounts Commission for Scotland, include the numbers and percentages of racially motivated crimes cleared up, as well as equivalent information on serious violent crime, housebreaking and car crime. The list of indicators is kept under review but there are no current plans to extend it to include a new indicator for all hate crimes.

Audited returns from local authorities show the amounts invested by Argyll and Bute and West Dunbartonshire Councils in their housing stock. The following table shows this investment, which is made up of usable capital receipts, capital funded from current revenue and Housing Revenue Account borrowing consent.Investment in Local Authority Housing Stock

Local Authority	1999-2000 (£ Million)	2000-01 (£ Million)	2001-02 (£ Million)	2002-03 (Estimate) (£ Million)
Argyll and Bute	4.270	3.175	3.248	3.351
West Dunbartonshire	8.405	8.234	7.995	7.207

I have asked Bob Millar, Chief Executive of Communities Scotland to respond. His response is as follows:Out-turn expenditure, new and improved units and completed units for the years 1999-2000, 2000-01 and 2001-02 for the West Dunbartonshire and Argyll and Bute local authority areas and also for the Dumbarton parliamentary constituency are detailed in the following tables.Dumbarton Constituency

	1999-2000(£ Million)	2000-01(£ Million)	2001-02(£ Million)
Expenditure	2.828	4.336	3.920
New/Improved Unit Approvals	139	99	55
Completions	49	139	108

West Dunbartonshire Council

	1999-2000(£ Million)	2000-01(£ Million)	2001-02(£ Million)
Expenditure	6.035	9.048	10.486
New/Improved Unit Approvals	284	252	55
Completions	87	214	236

Argyll and Bute Council

	1999-2000(£ Million)	2000-01(£ Million)	2001-02(£ Million)
Expenditure	5.653	4.435	4.126
New/Improved Unit Approvals	127	77	70
Completions	53	151	96"

The information requested on Public Transport Fund projects can be found in the regional leaflets associated with the Scottish Executive transport delivery report, Scotland's Transport: Delivering Improvements, which was published in March 2002 and is available at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/library3/transport/stdi-00.asp. Details of a further 23 projects which received awards from the Public Transport Fund were announced on 14 November 2002 in Scottish Executive News Release SE5394/2002.Details of the distribution to local authorities of £20 million for road and bridge repairs were announced on 25 February 2002 in Scottish Executive News Release SEET181/2002. Allocations of an additional £15 million to improve local roads were announced on 31 January 2003 in Scottish Executive News Release SEet255/2003.

West Dunbartonshire Council received a total of £190,357 in Rough Sleepers Initiative (RSI) grant in the years 1997-98 to 2001-02 to provide a range of support services for people who slept rough, or were at risk of doing so. Argyll and Bute Council received £397,360. A further £104,347 per annum has been transferred to West Dunbartonshire's Revenue Support Grant and a further £114,480 per annum to Argyll and Bute's Revenue Support Grant to ensure the continuation of these services. In May 2001 there were no people identified as sleeping rough in West Dunbartonshire in the two week period covered by the study; in the same two-week period in 2002 there were three people who identified themselves to RSI services as having slept rough. In May 2001 the total number of people identified as sleeping rough in Argyll and Bute in the two-week period covered by the study was eight. In the same two-week period in 2002 the number was four.Both councils are currently preparing Homelessness Strategies, and revising their RSI local outcome agreements. In doing so, both councils have taken into account the findings of earlier research to ensure the wider availability of services and accommodation across their areas and the fact that they now have a statutory duty to provide, at minimum, temporary accommodation, advice and assistance for anyone assessed as homeless.

Information on households with children in temporary accommodation, having being placed there by the local authority under the homelessness legislation, has been collected centrally since June 2000. Information on the position (numbers and proportions) within each local authority area is available at the end of June, September, December and March each year since 2000. This information has been published in various Scottish Executive Statistical Bulletins/Statistics Releases, as shown in the table, which are available in the Parliament's Reference Centre.

Period	Table No.	Bulletin Ref. No.	Publication Date	Bib. Number
June 2000 to March 2001	22	HSG/2001/4	27 Sep 2001	16396
June 2001	28	HSG/2001/6	18 Dec 2001	18220
September 2001	23	HSG/2002/1	26 March 2002	20348
December 01 and March 02	13	Stats Release	24 Sep 2002	24382
June 2002	4	Stats Release	17 Dec 2002	25719
September 2002	4	Stats Release	11 Feb 2003	26454

These publications may also be found on the Published Data section of the Housing Statistics Branch Reference Website (www.scotland.gov.uk/stats/housing/hsbref).Homeless households with children may be placed in temporary accommodation for a variety of different reasons. In the main, this will be an interim short-term measure on the route to permanent accommodation. The Executive is concerned to ensure that the temporary accommodation provided for homeless households with children is of a satisfactory standard and is committed to ending the use of B&B for this purpose. To this end, funding has been provided to the authorities with most children in bed and breakfast (B&B) to provide alternative forms of temporary accommodation for homeless families, of which £289,000 was allocated to Argyll and Bute. All authorities have also received funding to increase the availability of suitable temporary accommodation more generally, following the implementation of the Housing (Scotland) Act 2001.Guidance issued on the development of homelessness strategies also makes clear that these strategies should clearly identify which forms of non-permanent or intermediate accommodation are appropriate, and emphasises that the use of B&B provision for families should be eliminated. Strategies are due to be submitted by the end of March 2003.

It is for the individual partnership to determine the level of involvement of people with learning disabilities or other special interest groups. In July 1999 we produced comprehensive guidance Safer Communities in Scotland to assist Community Safety Partnerships to create the framework necessary to develop strategies and action plans. The guidance recommends that as a minimum partnerships should involve at a senior level, the local authority, police, health board and/or trust and the fire service. It also stresses that partnerships should consider the role of the private and voluntary sectors, housing associations and racial equality/community relations councils either as members of the core partnership group, or by being involved in specific working groups etc.In preparing a community safety strategy, partnerships are encouraged to undertake a community safety audit and to consult the community to enable them to be actively involved in setting priorities.

The information requested is given in the following table.Mortality Rates from Coronary Heart Disease¹ Per 100,000 Population², 1996-2001

Year	1996	1997	1998	1999	2000	2001
West Dunbartonshire	323	338	287	290	272	266
Argyll and Bute	348	356	308	295	294	286

Notes:1. International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision codes 410-414 (1996 to 1999) and Tenth Revision codes I20-I25 (2000 and 2001), ischaemic heart disease.2. The rates have been calculated using the latest available mid-year population estimates. Those for 1996 to 2000 are subject to revision to make them consistent with population results from the 2001 Census. The rates have not been age standardised.

Education maintenance allowances (EMAs) were first piloted in West Dunbartonshire from the start of academic year 2001-02. Five hundred and twenty-six West Dunbartonshire young people received EMAs during 2001-02 and in year 2002-03 there are currently 680 being paid EMA.EMAs are not available to young people in Argyll and Bute unless they attend a secondary school in West Dunbartonshire. In 2001-02, five Argyll and Bute young people received EMAs and in 2002-03 there are 10.