Our commitment to becoming a net-zero society by 2045 is unwavering. Scottish Ministers are fully committed to ending the practice of sending biodegradable municipal waste to landfill by 2025, in line with recommendations previously made by the Committee on Climate Change.

However, we still need capacity to dispose of residual waste while we make the transition to a circular economy in Scotland. We are working with local authorities to ensure that incineration capacity is matched to future demand, including expected progress on reducing waste and increasing recycling.

In Scotland, it is illegal to incinerate materials that have been separately collected and are capable of being recycled, and waste incineration is strictly regulated in line with EU standards under the Pollution Prevention and Control Regulations.

A recent report from Zero Waste Scotland report showed that the greenhouse gas emissions from Energy from Waste are, on average, lower than for landfill. Nevertheless, we will continue to work with EfW operators and developers to consider opportunities to further improve the efficiency of plants, and consider how waste infrastructure can be ‘future-proofed’ for Carbon Capture and Storage technology in line with recent Committee on Climate Change recommendations.

The Scottish Government is in regular contact with the GFG Alliance both at the Lochaber and Dalzell sites, as well as at Group level, mostly via officials. I chair the Lochaber Delivery Group meeting which last met on 23 February 2021.

GP practices can identify high-risk people with asthma by searching their records for patients codified as having asthma alongside other factors such as inhaled steroids, courses of oral steroids prescribed, hospital admissions, or smoking status.

The guarantee is compliant with EU state aid rules and did not require EU approval.

Emissions from energy from waste plants are strictly controlled under the Pollution Prevention and Control regulatory regime. Correctly operated, modern energy from waste facilities should have minimal impact on overall local air quality.

A multi layered and highly precautionary approach is taken to the permitting and operation of Incineration sites, and these facilities receive a continued high level of scrutiny from SEPA throughout their lifetime.

The Pollution Prevention and Control permitting process goes into significant detail on the design and performance of the proposed EfW plant, with modelling studies for air emission and human health reviewed in detail by dedicated specialists within SEPA. The relevant standards were reviewed and considerably tightened last year in alignment with the EU BREF process and these very tight standards must be complied with by December 2023.

Incineration sites are required to have a Continuous Emissions Monitoring system (CEMS) in place, which uses a dedicated separate computer system and has a standby system in place. Manual monitoring of emissions also takes place four times within the first year of Operation (subsequently twice per year) alongside multiple tests during commissioning. SEPA also undertakes its own manual samples of air emissions once per year. Soil samples are also taken at regular intervals on or near to the site to monitor long term effects and in some cases ambient air quality near to the site is also sampled. The results of all of these tests are publicly available through SEPA’s Public Register. No site is permitted to operate above the consented limits with inbuilt safeguards called interlocks forcing the site to shut down `if limits are breached.

All local authorities are required to regularly review air quality in their areas and to submit an annual report to the Scottish Government summarising their air quality work from the previous year. This report should include identification of and assessment plans for any new potential emissions sources.

Local authorities are responsible for ensuring that their staff have access to appropriate equipment in order to carry out their work. The Scottish Government has focused on supporting digital inclusion amongst learners and to date, over 67,000 devices and almost 14,000 connectivity solutions have been distributed.

The Centre for Workplace Transformation is being developed in a way that is wholly consistent with the Scottish Government’s National Performance Framework and commitments to inclusive growth and fair work. Embedding equality – including gender equality – will be at the core of the Centre’s activity.

The Scottish Government recognises that the pandemic could exacerbate existing labour market inequalities for protected groups including women. The Centre will help strengthen the range of activity already being undertaken through the Gender Pay Gap Action Plan to improve the experiences of women within the labour market.

The ongoing response to the Covid-19 pandemic has been and continues to be the focus of our activity. We have agreed with BMA Scotland that the report and its important recommendations will be released when it has been fully considered.

As detailed in the Scottish Government’s response to questions S5W-34614 and S5W-34612 on 1 February 2021 we have provided funding for around 18,000 new and enhanced opportunities to support young people in 2020-21.

We have previously stated, in response to question S5W-33395 on 2 December 2020 that given the uncertainty around the labour market, with the extension of the furlough scheme and the impact of Brexit, we are not setting targets for the Young Person's Guarantee.

The Guarantee is not a standalone programme. We are providing £70 million in 2021/22 to create more opportunities for young people, building on our significant existing investment in Education, Employability and Skills infrastructure. We are in the process of developing a measurement and evaluation framework to understand how the Guarantee is delivering a range of different opportunities to support young people, as set out in response to question S5W-34872 on 1 February 2021 .

As part of this process, we recently published the first Local Authority Labour Market Dashboard and Skills Development Scotland (SDS) published the first monthly Participation Snapshot for 16 and 17 year olds. The Snapshot provides more timely data on the participation rate of young people across Scotland and will provide information on the activities young people are participating in.

This information along with the annual Participation Measure produced by SDS and planned evaluative activity will help us to monitor the number of opportunities as well measure and target opportunities and support for young people.

All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx

Following extensive research to determine motivations to vaccinate we launched a mass communication public health marketing campaign ‘Roll up your sleeves’ to promote the roll out of the vaccine programme, on 21 st January. The Roll Up Your Sleeves campaign will run across TV, radio, outdoor, press, PR and social media channels until end March and plans are in place for future phases of the activity to support the younger audiences and encourage vaccine uptake.

The campaign will reach a very large (99.1%) of all adults (4.36m) in Scotland who will see the advertising a minimum of 20.6 times. The campaign signposts the public to a national helpline and to NHS Inform where more further detailed information on the vaccine programme is available and is updated regularly.

A vaccine door drop leaflet was sent to all households in Scotland (2.6m) in the first week of January to communicate the vaccine programme. As cohort 6 is invited forward we have a bespoke unpaid carers campaign planned to reach this audience many of whom are unaware of their eligibility for vaccination, launching 15 th March. The campaign will signpost this audience to an online portal and to the helpline where they will answer a series of triage questions to determine eligibility and be offered an appointment.

The Scottish Government is working with faith based, third sectors and community groups to reach out to more people from deprived communities to increase the vaccine uptake. We have also put in place financial and practical support to ensure all parts of our community have the knowledge and confidence to participate in this vaccination programme and to remove any barriers.

More information on Covid-19 can also be accessed via the link here: Coronavirus (COVID-19) in Scotland | NHS inform .