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As set out in the announcement, £62 million for 2021-22 has been allocated for building capacity in care at home community-based services. This is recurring funding intended help to fulfil unmet need, and deal with the current surge in demand and complexity of individual needs, also helping to ease pressures on unpaid carers.

The Scottish Government and NHS National Services Scotland have published a draft NHS Scotland Climate Emergency and Sustainability Strategy for consultation. It sets out an aim for NHS Scotland to become a net-zero health service by 2040. Since 1990, local Health Boards have reduced the greenhouse gas emissions from their buildings by 63.9%.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-04012 on 11 November 2021. 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 detrimental effects on physical and mental health and wellbeing are well known and documented. Reducing that harm, and ensuring that people receive the right care, in the right place, at the right time, is the key ethos behind the improvement programme. Data on the number of, and reason for delay, is collected monthly by Public Health Scotland and will be used, along with other data to measure progress and improvement.

The Scottish Government published its new air quality strategy ‘Cleaner Air for Scotland 2 – Towards a Better Place for Everyone’ in July this year. The strategy sets out a wide variety of actions. One action is to work with businesses, and others that might be affected, on proposals to control the sale of the most polluting domestic fuels, which include wet wood. In order to take this forward we have set up a specialist domestic (household) emissions working group, with representation from industry and key stakeholders. These proposals are still at an early stage, further consideration will be required and additional information will be made available in due course.

In taking forward this work, we will be mindful of the potential impact on businesses and domestic users. Any new measures would require to be implemented over a period of time, such as a transitional period during which businesses could adapt to the new requirements without disproportionate costs.

The ideals and principles of the Interface Care and Discharge without Delay programs extends across all care groups, including Mental Health.

In addition to this work, in March 2021 we issued a £20 million Community Living Change Fund to be used during 2021–2024. This funding will be used to redesign services for people with complex needs including intellectual disabilities and autism, and for people who have enduring mental health problems, avoiding the need for out of area placements and reducing delayed discharges from hospital.

Due to the importance of the autumn/winter vaccines, some health boards are utilising Community Nursing Teams.

This will particularly be for those patients who are on their current caseloads and are housebound. Community Nurses are also supporting vaccinations in care homes, not only to those on caseload but to help support delivery to this priority group. Community Nurses are also undertaking additional shifts in vaccination clinic settings.

The additional funding of £62 million to expand care at home capacity has been approved for distribution to local authorities by the Settlement and Distribution Group meeting on 18th October and will be passed in full to IJBs . The distribution methodology for the funding is GAE for All Adult Social Work for 2021-22 and thereafter.

The distributions for 2021-22 will be made as redeterminations of the General Revenue Grant in March 2022. A letter with the full breakdown of allocation by Local Authority will be issued shortly.

Scottish Government is committed to decarbonising all of Scotland's building stock, including transitioning Scotland’s many valuable heritage assets to low and zero emissions heating in a way that respects and protects the special characteristics of these buildings and places. Our Heat in Buildings Strategy recognises that for traditional and heritage buildings, bespoke approaches, including skilled design and construction, may be required. We are working with stakeholders, including Historic Environment Scotland, to develop more solutions to transition Scotland’s historic buildings to zero emissions heating while respecting and preserving the special characteristics of our buildings and places, and where needed continue to build our evidence base and the guidance available for the heat transition in these buildings and areas, including in our approach to regulation.

To ensure property owners have access to suitably qualified installers, we have developed, with industry, installer skill requirements for our Heat in Buildings Strategy which includes skill requirements for any work carried out on pre-1919 buildings where installers will be required to have a 'SQA Level 3 award in Energy Efficiency Measures for Older and Traditional Buildings'.

A range of guidance is available from Historic Environment Scotland to help with potential options for the installation of micro-renewables technologies, energy efficiency measures and climate change adaptations in listed buildings, traditional homes and buildings in conservation areas. This support can be accessed through the Historic Environment Scotland website at: www.historicenvironment.scot . Of particular interest may be:

Owning a Traditional Property: https://www.historicenvironment.scot/advice-and-support/your-property/owning-a-traditional-property/

Making changes to your Property: https://www.historicenvironment.scot/advice-and-support/your-property/making-changes-to-your-property/

Saving Energy in Traditional Buildings: https://www.historicenvironment.scot/advice-and-support/your-property/saving-energy-in-traditional-buildings/

Domestic loans and grants are available through the Home Energy Scotland service which acts as the gateway to all Scottish Government-funded domestic energy efficiency schemes. Home Energy Scotland advisors can offer free and impartial energy efficiency advice, and advice on how to keep homes warmer and more affordable to heat, and are contactable Freephone on 0808 808 2282. Their website containing details of all Scottish Government energy efficiency schemes available for home owners can be found at: https://energysavingtrust.org.uk/scotland/home-energy-Scotland .

Additionally, property owners may be eligible for support through heritage-related grant schemes or relevant funds which can be found : https://www.heritagefundingdirectoryuk.org/ .

The annual drug-related death statistics published by National Records of Scotland ( Drug Related Deaths in Scotland | National Records of Scotland (nrscotland.gov.uk) ) does not contain information about the life circumstances of people who have unfortunately died from a drug-related death.

The National Drug-Related Deaths Database (NDRDD) published by Public Health Scotland was established to collect wider and more detailed information regarding the nature and circumstances of people who had a drug-related death. This report does not currently include detail on whether individuals were care leavers or care experienced. However, Public Health Scotland are working with Research Data Scotland to explore the feasibility of widening out data linkage to non-health datasets and care-experience has been identified as an important area to explore.

( https://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Drugs-and-Alcohol-Misuse/Publications/2018-06-12/2018-06-12-NDRDD-Report.pdf ).