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For the current financial year, 2020-21, the average Band D council tax charge in Scotland is £1,308 - significantly less than the average band D charges in England and Wales for the same period which are £1,818 and £1,667 respectively.

Our draft budget set out that £90 million is being made available to support local authorities in 2021-22, giving them the opportunity to freeze council tax at 2020-21 levels and protect Scottish households from council tax increases equivalent to around 3%.

As Councils are not required to set the council tax rate that will apply in their local authority area in 2021-22 until 11 March, figures for the average Band D charge will be published in early April, with the equivalent charges for England and Wales also expected to be available around that time.

As I set out on 23 February 2020 ( Support for mesh victims - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) , we have continued work to establish a Case Record Review for women who have raised concerns about whether their case records accurately reflect the treatment that they have received, specifically in relation to full and partial removal of mesh. This Review will give women an opportunity to set out their concerns and have their records reviewed by clinicians to allow for discussion, explanation and mutual understanding.

I am pleased to be able to announce that the Review Panel has now finalised and I have commissioned Professor Alison Britton to lead the Review as the Moderator. Alison Britton is a Professor of Healthcare and Medical Law at Glasgow Caledonian University and previously conducted the “Investigative Review into the process of establishing, managing and supporting Independent Reviews in Scotland”, published in 2018. I am pleased that Professor Britton has agreed to take on this role.

Professor Britton will be joined by three experienced clinicians and an administrator. The clinicians joining Professor Britton on the Review Panel are:

Professor Anthony Smith,

Professor of Urogynaecology, Manchester Academic Health Sciences Centre,

Consultant Gynaecologist (retired)

Mr Ian Currie,

Consultant Obstetrician & Gynaecologist, Buckinghamshire Hospitals NHS Trust,

Vice President, Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists 2011-2016

Dr Carey Lunan MBE,

GP, NHS Lothian,

Chair of Royal College of GPs, Scotland, 2017-2020

Finally, Mrs Irene Brown, who worked with Professor Britton on the 2018 Review will join the Panel as the administrator.

The Panel members have been chosen based on their individual qualities, expertise, knowledge, authority and standing.

Professor Britton will shortly be inviting women who are eligible for the Review to take part. In the first instance, the Review will be offered to those who attended the meetings in November 2019 with the First Minister and myself. This is to ensure that the Review achieves its purpose. However we will consider whether we can offer more women a review using a similar model in the future.

The Review is entirely voluntary and does not, in any way, replace the processes that are already in place for an individual to raise a complaint or pursue legal action.

The First Minister and I take the commitment we made to women at our meetings very seriously and regret that the COVID-19 pandemic unavoidably delayed this work. I hope that this important work helps those who have concerns about their mesh removal.

Credentialing

In light of concerns that have been raised with me, in person by patients, in the media and also in the Scottish Parliament, I have written to the General Medical Council (GMC) and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) to express my support for the introduction of a GMC approved credential in mesh removal surgery.

As Specialist Centres are established across the UK, credentialing will define the skills required to perform mesh removal surgery, and set out how these skills can be acquired and assessed. By formally recognising the skills of our surgeons, credentialing will provide assurance for patients and the service, will reduce the risk of harm and will help improve public confidence.

We have reviewed the border health measures closely over the last 28 days and have assessed that there continues to be a requirement for the regulations to remain in place to reduce the risk of imported transmission and safeguard public health in Scotland. The regulations continue to be an important and proportionate part of the Scottish Government response to managing the pandemic.

The role of international travel in bringing in new cases, and the increased risk presented by variants of the virus emerging in other parts of the world, meant we took steps to strengthen regulations in response early in 2021. This included suspending the country exemption process and requiring pre-departure testing of passengers. We intend to introduce additional changes to further enhance our package of border health measures in the course of the next review period of the regulations, including managed isolation of international arrivals.

Following identification of a new variant of coronavirus in Brazil, the Scottish Government as part of a four nations response has decided to impose additional restrictions on all arrivals from countries in South America – Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay and Venezuela. These measures will also apply to several countries and territories with strong travel links to South America; namely Portugal, including Azores and Madeira, Panama, Cabo Verde (Cape Verde) and the British Overseas Territory the Falkland Islands.

The Scottish Government also supports the UK Government’s intention to use reserved immigration powers to implement a travel ban for arrivals from these countries. With the exception of British and Irish nationals, visa holders and permanent residents all arrivals from the affected countries will therefore be denied entry to the UK from 0400 on Friday 15 January. British and Irish nationals, visa holders and permanent residents are still required to isolate with their households for 10 days, and will not be able to use exemptions from isolation.

We have also made the decision this week to remove Aruba;Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba; and Qatar from the country exemptions list due to concerning data on coronavirus in those countries. These changes will also come into force at 0400 on Friday 15 January

The Scottish Government intended to introduce pre departure testing on Friday 15 January. The UK Government has announced overnight that they would be delaying the implementation of pre-departure testing until Monday 18 January, to allow international arrivals and international passengers time to prepare. The Scottish Government is therefore also obliged to delay implementation to allow for coordination between the UK Government’s regulations and the relevant Scottish regulations. Pre departure testing will now come into force at 0400 on Monday 18 January.

Further information on these changes is available here; Coronavirus (COVID-19): international travel and quarantine - gov.scot ( www.gov.scot )’

From 04:00 on Friday 15 January 2020, passengers travelling to Scotland from outside the Common Travel Area must have a valid negative COVID-19 test result before boarding their vessel. This will be checked by operators, and passengers with a positive test result or an invalid certificate will be refused boarding. A valid test result must be from a PCR test, or another highly reliable test with at least 99% specificity and 97% sensitivity for detecting COVID-19; it must show the test was taken within three days of beginning the journey; and the result must be presented in English, French or Spanish. Children aged 10 and under are not required to take a test, and there are a very limited range of further exemptions that will be specified in regulations.

Border Force will undertake spot checks of passengers arriving in Scotland as an additional measure to ensure compliance with this requirement, and will be able to apply a Fixed Penalty Notice of £480 if they identify travellers without a valid certificate.

This new requirement, being implemented by administrations across the UK, provides an additional level of protection to guard against importation of the virus. This is important due to the emergence of variants of the virus across the world. Pre-departure testing does not replace the requirement to quarantine on arrival – passengers must isolate for 10 days, unless they have travelled only in countries or territories on the exempt list; or they are able to claim one of the limited sectoral exemptions.

Under the current restrictions in Level 3 and 4 across the country, it is illegal to travel to or from Scotland without a reasonable excuse. People should not be travelling unless it is genuinely essential they do so.

We have reviewed the border health measures closely over the last 28 days and have assessed that there continues to be a requirement for the regulations to remain in place to reduce the risk of imported transmission and safeguard public health in Scotland. The regulations continue to be an important and proportionate part of the Scottish Government response to managing the pandemic. We continue to keep country and sectoral exemptions under review and where there is clear evidence we will not hesitate to make changes to the regulations.

The Scottish Government has assessed that pre departure testing for all international arrivals is required to minimise the risk of imported transmission and we will introduce this measure as soon as is practically possible. Pre departure testing will complement our existing international travel regulations and ensure that we safeguard against imported cases and in particular protect against new strains of coronavirus such as those identified in Denmark and South Africa.

There remain outstanding operational and practical issues to resolve but we will aim to have this measure in place to a similar timeframe as the other UK nations. I will report back to Parliament with further detail when these issues have been resolved and pre departure testing is ready to be implemented in Scotland. It remains the case that non-essential travel to or from Scotland is currently illegal and will not change with the introduction of pre departure testing.

Covid-19 continues to present unprecedented challenges for business across Scotland with many employers delaying and pausing recruitment decisions. Unfortunately, this has and will continue to have, an impact on apprenticeship provision.

Due to the continued uncertainty in the labour market and the extension of the Job Retention Scheme, to the end of April 2021, it is clear we will not now meet our target of 30,000 apprenticeship starts this year. Whilst disappointing, we have moved from a period which delivered historically low levels of unemployment and achieving our ambitious targets on youth unemployment, to a much more challenging labour market with young people already being more severely impacted by the pandemic.

The latest Office for National Statistics (ONS) UK Gross Domestic Product (GDP) monthly estimates, published 10 December 2020, show that in October 2020 GDP is now 23.4% higher than its April 2020 low. However, it still remains 7.9% below the levels seen in February 2020 before the full impacts of Covid-19. The Scottish Government has and will continue to do all we can to promote and maximise the uptake of apprenticeships highlighting the benefit that they can bring to businesses, individuals and the economy.

Apprenticeships remain at the heart of our skills system in Scotland and are integral to Scotland’s Young Person’s Guarantee. As we continue to support our young people and apprentices, we have introduced additional funding for interventions, such as Pathway Apprenticeships, increased support for Adopt an Apprentice and an additional £15 million funding for the Apprenticeship Employer Grant, to encourage employers to recruit and retain apprentices supporting the long-term future of work-based learning and the economy.

We will work closely with Skills Development Scotland to maximise the number of apprenticeships and related opportunities available.