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As set out in the Transport Scotland Rail Services Decarbonisation Action Plan, it is planned to electrify the route to Dundee and Aberdeen by 2035.

The decarbonisation of the lines to Dundee and Aberdeen form later phases of the rolling programme, they are at an early stage of development with a detailed implementation programme and cost estimate still to be developed.

The First Minister is hosting a summit on abortions on 27 June, and an invitation has been offered to the Scottish Trade Union Congress.

In addition to this, Scottish Government has publically stated that it will work constructively with Gillian Mackay MSP on her forthcoming Member’s Bill on buffer zones. Prior to the launch of her consultation, Ms Mackay met with trade unions to discuss her proposal. Ms Mackay also met with myself and the my working group, to discuss her proposal and seek the views of members.

We published our Respiratory Care Action Plan for Scotland in March 2021. Since its publication we have established the Scottish Respiratory Advisory Committee (SRAC) to provide governance and oversight of the Plan implementation.

The SRAC held their first meeting in October of last year, at which, the SRAC agreed three initial priority areas for the first year of implementation. These are: pulmonary rehabilitation, data and child to adult transition services. Sub-groups have been established for each of these priority areas with membership comprising of clinical experts and third sector.

Each of the sub-groups have held their first meeting with further meetings taking place ahead of the SRAC in July. We are continuing to work with the SRAC to identify further commitments in the Plan that can begin to be progressed.

We have also funded The Alliance to launch a Respiratory lived experience network, in order to ensure that the experiences of those living with respiratory conditions are taken into account when delivering the commitments in the RCAP. The Respiratory Network was launched on 14 December 2021. The Network is represented on each of the sub-groups and the Alliance is currently working with sub-group members to determine the first pieces of work it will take to the Network. The Alliance is also in the process of expanding the Network’s membership to target groups specifically affected by the sub-groups’ focuses.

The Scottish Government published its response to the Zero Emissions Social Housing Taskforce (ZEST) report on 14 th June 2022, and can be accessed at http://www.gov.scot/ISBN/9781804355176 .

The ZEST report rightly highlighted the need for clarity with regards to the second Energy Efficiency Standard for Social Housing (EESSH2) given that milestones were not fully aligned with net zero and it also confirmed that Housing Associations and Local Authorities need long-term certainty to plan investment appropriately.

The Scottish Government has therefore confirmed that the review of EESSH2 will be brought forward to commence this year for completion in 2023, in order to provide registered social landlords with as much certainty as possible as they plan to retrofit their stock.

While the review is underway the current EESSH2 2025 and 2032 milestones will be temporarily put on hold to ensure that any investment is targeted toward long-term solutions that deliver net zero and support the eradication of fuel poverty. Social landlords should continue to invest in energy efficiency measures to help reduce running costs, and in zero emissions heating systems where appropriate.

The Scottish Government’s Social Housing Net Zero Heat Fund supports projects to deploy zero emissions heat, improve energy efficiency and reduce fuel poverty. The fund will make £200 million available over the course of this parliament.

As set out in the Heat in Buildings Strategy, the Scottish Government recognises the challenges presented in decarbonising Scotland’s tenements and earlier this year convened a Short Life Working Group of experts, tasked with developing recommendations on the best approach for tenement buildings to reach a good level of energy efficiency and install a zero emissions heating supply. The recommendations made by the Group will form part of a forthcoming public consultation.

Scottish Ministers have also commissioned the Scottish Law Commission (SLC) to undertake a law reform project, considering the establishment, formation, and operation of compulsory owners’ associations in tenement properties, including the feasibility and desirability of providing powers for associations to carry out energy efficiency and heating improvement work. This was one of the key recommendations of the Scottish Parliamentary Working Group on Tenement Maintenance. The SLC expects to provide the Scottish Government with a report detailing its recommendations and providing a draft Bill for consideration by Spring 2026.

All valid paper returns from Scotland’s Census 2022 will be scanned in full and digital files created. In addition, digital data from responses for all scanned census returns, including online or paper, will be produced and retained.

High quality scanned image files for all paper census returns will be retained by National Records of Scotland (NRS) and stored in a permanent archive for historical research purposes in future. Original paper questionnaires will be securely destroyed only after all data files for both digital data and high quality scanned image files have been produced and safely transmitted for storage.

Census information is kept secure and confidential for 100 years.

Scottish Rail Holdings Ltd consulted with Transport Scotland before authorising ScotRail Trains Ltd to implement the temporary timetable providing greater certainty to passengers and minimising unplanned cancellations.

The Scottish Government is not delaying the introduction of legislation on buffer zones. We have agreed to work constructively with Ms Gillian Mackay MSP on her forthcoming Member’s Bill.

The First Minister is wholeheartedly committed to addressing the issue of protests and vigils that take place outside of abortion clinics, and will therefore be chairing a summit on abortion on 27 June. The summit will primarily focus on buffer zones, but will also look at what measures can be implemented in the short term to ensure women can access abortion without fear of intimidation or harassment.

It is not possible to accurately estimate, from nationally held data, the current number of unpaid carers of people with dementia.

Data collected by Public Health Scotland (PHS) through their social care data collection provides some information on people receiving social care support who have dementia. However, while data on whether the person receives help from an unpaid carer is requested, this was recorded as ‘Unknown’ or was left blank for 48% of records in 2020-21. As such, it was not possible to accurately estimate the number of unpaid carers of people with dementia from this data.

The Scottish Government acknowledges Alzheimer Scotland’s 2019 Fair Dementia Care report – referenced in the Chief Executive of Scottish Care’s article in the Herald - which claimed that people with dementia are paying care costs amounting to approximately £50m per annum, with approximately £49m of those care costs related to residential care charges.

Adults who have been assessed as requiring personal care do not pay for this service, regardless of their condition or means. Nursing care is also of course free at the point of delivery. The Local Authority normally pays the free personal and nursing care for self-funding care home residents assessed as needing them directly to the care home provider.

The Scottish Government has increased Free Personal and Nursing Care payments above inflation for the last two consecutive years to recognise the increasing cost of care. For 2022-23 these rates are set at £212.85 per week for personal care and £95.80 per week for nursing care.

The Scottish Government appreciates that the costs of residential care can be high. Everybody in a care home, whether publically funded or self-funded, will pay a contribution to the cost of their care. The amount that they pay will be based on their individual financial circumstances. If a person has capital over the upper capital limit they will be classed as self-funding their own care. When a person is self-funding their care the amount that they pay to the care home is a contractual matter between them and the care home provider. This agreement is protected by consumer protection laws.

We recognise that the Fair Dementia Care report also focusses on the quality of and access to appropriate healthcare. We are committed to improving outcomes for residents in care home including those with dementia and cognitive impairment. We are going to publish a Healthcare framework in June which will provide a series of recommendations that aim to transform healthcare by full integrating the health and social care system that wraps around care homes. Critical to this will be a multi-disciplinary work approach that is pro-active and coordinated. The framework is not confined to ‘clinical’ provision or ‘clinical’ models of care, as it is recognised the health and wellbeing of someone living in a care home is influenced by a wide range of factors including, friends, family and the local environment.

The framework is an important step to change as we transition towards the National Care Service.

There is no formal definition of an NDA. The Scottish Government does not keep a central record of all NDA’s currently in operation other than in the context of record-keeping of employment settlement agreements.

In an employment context, data in relation to settlement and the number of confidentiality clauses in Scottish Government and Public bodies, NHSScotland and Scottish Funding Council overseen bodies is held from 2014 and, since then, has been provided to parliament annually. Reports are published annually by the Scottish Parliament.