Seòmar agus comataidhean

The Scottish Government recognises the crucial role that innovation plays in enabling the sustainable development of Scottish aquaculture. We will continue to work with our enterprise agencies, innovation centres, and other relevant stakeholders to find ways that encourage innovation that helps the industry address its most pressing challenges while creating opportunities for Scottish businesses.  

For example, the Scottish Government recently sponsored Scotland's Pavilion at Aqua Nor 2023, the world's largest aquaculture technology and trade exhibition, providing £85,000 from the Marine Fund Scotland to allow Scottish businesses to locate together, demonstrate their innovation and science capabilities and make an impact.

The Scottish Government is working to take forward the action in the Women’s Health Plan that seek to enable all patients to access mid-trimester abortion care locally or regionally. Progress has been made, with all mainland NHS Boards now offering services up to at least 20 weeks’ gestation as recommended by the 2022 Healthcare Improvement Scotland Sexual Health Standards.

The Scottish Government commissioned NHS National Services Scotland (NSS) to develop a specification to deliver a national service for abortions between 20 to 24 weeks gestation within Scotland. NSS has been discussing its specification with NHS Boards and is also exploring other delivery options for the service.

We are also working with individual NHS Boards to support clinicians who wish to receive training to deliver later stage abortions to be granted funding to do so, and to encourage NHS Boards to ensure that patients close to 20 weeks’ gestation are prioritised for appointments.

Safe access zones have been established by national legislation in Northern Ireland, and in some local authority areas in England using Public Spaces Protection Orders. The Scottish Government has given careful consideration to both approaches, and has engaged with officials from these administrations to learn from their experiences of implementation. Officials also continue to engage with UK Government counterparts as they work to bring national legislative provisions into force that will establish safe access zones in England and Wales, as well as with officials from the Republic of Ireland, where a bill to establish zones is currently making its way through the National Parliament (Oireachtas).

This consideration and engagement has informed the Abortion Services (Safe Access Zones) (Scotland) Bill; however, the Bill reflects Scotland’s particular circumstances and requirements.

In March 2023, the Scottish Government ran an endometriosis public awareness campaign in partnership with Young Scot, targeted primarily at increasing young people’s awareness of the condition.

Following the campaign a post-evaluative survey ran to measure the impact of the information on the audience. Key statistics are as follows:

• 82% of young people agreed or strongly agreed that they are more informed about the symptoms of endometriosis
• 71% of young people agreed or strongly agreed that they are more informed about how to support someone with endometriosis
• 74% of young people agreed or strongly agreed that they would know where to get support or what steps they could take if they thought they may have endometriosis
• 97% of young people who visited young.scot/Endometriosis found it useful or very useful

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that all students with a long term medical condition or additional support needs are supported as they study in further and higher education. Colleges and universities are autonomous bodies with responsibility for the management of their own student support services.

Public Health Scotland (PHS) data is provided below on numbers of patients receiving abortion treatment in a Health Board other than their Board of residence.

It is not possible to distinguish how many patients had to receive treatment in another Health Board or how many chose to do so.

Number of terminations where Board of treatment is different from Board of residence, Scotland, 2019 to 2022.

The Scottish Government has engaged extensively with stakeholders to ensure as wide a range of views as possible were taken into consideration during the development of the Abortion Services (Safe Access Zones) (Scotland) Bill. While there has been no engagement between Ministers and their counterparts across the United Kingdom, there has been regular contact at official level.

I refer the member to the answer to S6W-22110 on 30 October 2023. 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 .

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-22110 on 30 October 2023. 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 .

The Agriculture and Rural Development (ARD) Stakeholder Group last met on 23 March 2023. Following that meeting, and based on feedback from some members about the effectiveness of bringing such a large group together for time limited meetings, the purpose of the Group was reframed. During the Summer period, some members of the Group took part in smaller workshops on Just Transition and the feedback was overwhelmingly positive. The Scottish Government will now engage with members on specific, often time sensitive, topics, utilising the Group as a network of experts, being brought together as part of a targeted engagement programme to provide written and oral evidence.

The Agriculture and Rural Communities (Scotland) Bill will assist in realising the Vision for Agriculture, setting out a framework of support for agriculture, forestry and rural communities, though the four-tier support structure. Work is underway within the established Agriculture Reform Programme (ARP) on transitioning to a new support framework and on developing the detail of what will follow in secondary legislation.

The published Agricultural Reform Route Map provides information for farmers and crofters on when current schemes will transition or end, what they can expect to change from 2025, the support available now to help them prepare, how they can get involved in designing the new framework, and when more guidance, support and information will be available. The Scottish Government is calling on the agriculture sector to help us shape the detail of future of support and how it is delivered through a series of interviews, surveys, workshops, testing and trials and anyone can take part. Volunteers will be reimbursed with payment levels depending on the time and input required and people can register their interest here .

For further information on the Agriculture Reform Implementation Oversight Board (ARIOB), I refer the member to the Board's Terms of Reference which is periodically reviewed.