We published an updated evidence paper on the Covid-19 status certification scheme on Friday 19 November 2021.

The full contract notices are published on Public Contracts Scotland. See https://www.publiccontractsscotland.gov.uk/search/show/search_view.aspx?ID=NOV432052 and https://www.publiccontractsscotland.gov.uk/search/show/search_view.aspx?ID=NOV432062 . I also refer the member to the answer to question S6W-03620 on 17 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 Scottish Government’s recovery plan for sexual health and blood borne virus services, Reset and Rebuild, includes an action to widen access to PrEP to a much broader range of people, including those who do not access sexual health services. The plan acknowledges that this will require novel models of care and access to PrEP in settings that people who do not currently access it will find acceptable.

In the plan, the Scottish Government has committed to working with stakeholders to support and develop a number of research projects to understand the impacts of COVID-19 on service users and providers, including piloting an evaluation of new care pathways, such as a community based PrEP service.

The recovery plan also makes available an additional £0.5 million of funding, on top of the existing funding provided to third sector delivery organisations, to support specific recovery actions, particularly those focussed on testing, HIV and Hepatitis C elimination.

Finally, the Scottish Government has established an HIV Transmission Elimination Proposal Oversight Group, which will support delivery of a proposal for how Scotland can eliminate HIV transmission by 2030. The action to widen access to PrEP will form a key part of the final proposal, which is expected to be delivered by Autumn 2022.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-04586 on 6 December 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 .

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-04586 on 6 December 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 Scottish Government is committed to improving Mental Health services and the Programme for Government commits to ensuring that in future, at least 10% of frontline NHS spend goes towards mental health, with 1% going towards child and adolescent mental health services.

NHS Boards draw funding for mental health services from the overall funds allocated to them by the Scottish Government in the Scottish budget. Local budget decisions should reflect the national mental health priority and NHS Boards are expected to work with Integration Authorities and other partners to plan and deliver person centred, safe and effective mental health services which meet the needs of their populations.

NHS Scotland expenditure on mental health, including children and adolescents, is reported in the Scottish Health Service Costs , published annually by ISD Scotland.

Expenditure in each year since 2016 to 2020, the latest available, in NHS Ayrshire and Arran and NHS Greater Glasgow identified as relating to mental health services delivered in hospitals or in the community aimed specifically at children and adolescents is shown in the table below. Funding towards reducing waiting times is not separately identified.

Scottish Enterprise continue to be closely engaged with Peel Ports and are collaborating with them, along with North Ayrshire Council, under a Memorandum of Understanding to advance and secure the delivery at Hunterston of regional and national investment objectives defined in the Scottish Government Inward Investment Strategy and Ayrshire Economic Strategy. Work is progressing across a range of sectors including the Circular Economy to develop a refined position identifying market gaps, industry demand and alignment with the assets of Hunterston PARC. In addition, the Scottish Government is in regular communication with the Clyde Marine Planning Partnership of which Peel Ports is a member.

Due to Covid-19 there have been no visits by senior Scottish Government representatives to the Hunterston industrial site in an official capacity since 1 January 2021. However, the Scottish Government has always taken a keen interest in this development and looks forward to visiting it at some point in 2022.

The information requested is not held centrally. The data the Scottish Government receive from Police Scotland for the publication of Official Statistics on recorded crime is a simple count of the numbers of crimes and offences, for each local authority, which the police have recorded. This can be broken down by quarter or, since April 2019, by month. Given this, information is not held on crimes recorded for specific weekends. Additionally, as the Scottish Government do not receive further information on the circumstances of individual crimes, it is not possible to identify if an assault is directly related to bonfire night activities. It should also be noted that as Bonfire Night does not always occur on a weekend, reviewing weekend based-activities across years is unlikely to give a like-for-like comparison.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the number of reported incidents that may be homophobic in nature. Data is available on the number of police recorded hate crimes that include an aggravation for sexual orientation, the vast majority of which were found to be for prejudice towards the gay and lesbian community in 2018-19.

The Scottish Government published a study on the characteristics of police recorded Hate Crime in February 2021. The table below shows the number of sexual orientation aggravated hate crimes recorded by Police Scotland from 2014-15 to 2019-20, for (a) North Ayrshire, (b) Inverclyde and (c) Scotland. The number of hate crimes with a sexual orientation aggravation presented below is higher than the figures provided in the aforementioned study. This is because the table also includes hate crimes that have multiple aggravations (one of which is sexual orientation).

The study also looked in more detail at the prejudice shown by perpetrators. In the vast majority (94%) of sexual orientation aggravated hate crimes in 2018-19 the perpetrator showed prejudice towards the gay and lesbian community. In over two-thirds (69%) of crimes the words used or actions taken by the perpetrator showed a prejudice towards the gay community, with a further quarter (25%) showing prejudice towards the lesbian community. In 2018-19, the study showed that 39% of sexual orientation aggravated hate crimes had a Police Officer as a victim. Due to the sampling design, information at local authority level is unable to be calculated.

A second study into the characteristics of police recorded hate crime is due to be published in 2022. This will provide the same type of detailed disaggregated data and information on police recorded hate crimes for the year 2020-21.