Priority Actions

9. Appendix B: Scottish Government internal review RAG Status and Comments for 16 Priority Actions

Policy

Free school lunches, breakfast and holiday food provisions Comments

Delivered universal Free School Meals to pupils in primary 4, 5 and in special schools. However, the commitment to deliver Free School Meals to primary 6 and 7 has been delayed. There are ongoing discussions in relation to the resourcing of this part of the expansion which are not yet settled RAG Status

Red

110k affordable, energy efficient homes by 2032 Construction sector challenges around materials/workforce and inflationary pressures continue to impact on the pace and cost of delivery. Additional capital grant funding still requires to be secured to ensure an achievable delivery trajectory towards the 110k target within the 2032 timescale. Amber

Local mental health and wellbeing support Due to savings exercise, there has been delay in issuing funding of £15m for 22/23 to local authorities but this is being prioritised. Plans for the doubling of the fund by the end of the parliament are yet to be developed. Amber

Whole Family Wellbeing Funding We have committed £50 million in 2022 to 2023. WFWF is split into three elements: (i) £32million to support Children’s Services Planning Partnerships; (ii) £6million to enable direct support to CSPPs from a national improvement (SG led) team to drive transformational change; (iii) £12m to support national level policy delivery which drives and supports the outcomes sought from the WFWF. Amber

Increase and automate the School clothing grant for children from low-income households Work with DWP to establish legal requirements to share data - reliant on UK Gov Ministerial steer. Delivered the commitment to increase the clothing grant to £120 in primary schools and £150 to secondary schools. This has been in place since August 2021. Green

Roll out and increase of Scottish Child Payment (SCP) by the end of this year. Colleagues noted difficulty they have faced in working with programme colleagues in DWP due to data sharing problems. Have regulation in draft for the expansion of SCP and so looking to extend to under 16s by end of 2022.

Green Jobs Fund - In the 2022/23 Financial Year, tranche 1 has a budget of £12.2 between the three Enterprise Agencies and tranche 2, under the control of Scottish Ministers, has a budget of £11.3m. Green

Green

Policy Comments

Just Transition Fund The team received 102 applications for the first round of funding (were expecting about half of this). Team is focussed on long-term impact, and so won’t necessarily be able to measure the impact of the fund in the short-term. RAG Status

Green

Scotland to be a Fair Work Nation At the moment, the team has 3 action plans – Fair Work, The Gender Pay Gap and Employment for Disabled People – and the team is working on bringing these together into one single coherent action plan. Green

10-year national strategy for economic transformation Division currently working through RSR and identifying what will be taken forward and what will be postponed. There are different leads for each of the programmes within NSET. Green

Establish a National Care Service The Programme is preparing to publish it Programme Business Case which will set out the evidence and appraisal process undertaken to identify the preferred option for reform of the social care system in Scotland. The business case also sets out the high-level costs and the delivery route map for the preferred option; namely implementing a National Care Service establishing new local care boards. Green

Young Person's Guarantee The budget this year for the YPG was reduced from £70m to £45m, and there is the possibility this will be reduced further due to the in-year budget spending exercise. The expectation is this budget will reduce to under £20m next year.

Funded Early Learning and Childcare for all one-and-two-year-olds Work streams for 22/23 that have commenced and on track are: Mapping current provision for 1- and 2-year olds across Scotland to identify evidence and good practice; building the evidence base for the policy including ELC provision for 1- and 2-year olds in comparator countries. Green

Amber

Wraparound Childcare The programme is currently being reset as a result of the RSR. The summer activities, childcare and food programme was successfully delivered in 2021. Green

No One Left Behind The team now has additional responsibilities as a result of ‘Best Start, Bright Start’, the second tackling child poverty delivery plan. Received additional funding due to the increase in their child poverty activity and they are currently working through this with delivery partners. Green

Work with Local Authorities to ensure a Community Wealth Building Plan is in place Officials are working in partnership with EDAS and CLES to develop Guide on CWB, with pilot areas being finalised. Amber