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My officials are continuing to review the current Home Education guidance. Officials met and corresponded with local authorities and representatives of home education organisations during 2019. Their views are currently being considered and an updated version of the guidance will be prepared for consultation in 2020.

I wrote to Johann Lamont MSP, Convener of the Public Petitions Committee on 19 October 2019 and confirmed that my officials will inform the Committee when a revised version of the Home Education Guidance is published for consultation.

The purpose of the tender is to attract the Most Economically Advantageous Tender, based on an evaluation criteria of 65% price and 35% quality. This was explained in the Invitation to Tender, issued to bidders on 17 January 2019. The instructions to participants, also issued to bidders on 17 January 2019, made clear how tenders would be evaluated.

As the procurement procedure remains ongoing until the contract is formally awarded, there is a limit on what we can say due to the commercially sensitive nature of the competition.

We will publish the contract on Transport Scotland's website following the completion of the procurement process, redacted as appropriate to protect matters of commercial confidentiality.

Shetland Islands Council (SIC) is wholly responsible for the inter-island ferry services which it provides. Consequently, SIC currently remains wholly responsible for its vessels and infrastructure, and for planning for their replacement.

However, the Scottish Government understands that significant financial challenges can fall on individual local authorities such as Shetland and, in these exceptional circumstances, we have provided additional one-year funding to SIC of £5.0m in 2018-19 and £5.2m in 2019-20, or a total of £10.2m in the last two financial years, to support the operation of SIC’s internal ferry services, in addition to grant-in-aid funding through the annual financial settlement for local government.

Transport Scotland, on the behalf of the Scottish Ministers, continues to discuss long term solutions with both SIC and Orkney Islands Council (OIC). We are now considering, the final report from the officials working group which we established to examine these issues. This report included SIC’s preferred option and estimated capital costs for investment in ensuring the sustainability of the Fair Isle service. SIC expects to finalise, and submit, its more detailed Outline Business Case for the replacement of their Fair Isle vessel in the coming weeks and we will continue to engage with SIC on the financial sustainability of Shetland’s internal ferry services.

The Scottish 4G Infill (S4GI) Programme is working to deliver three sites in the Shetland Isles: Reawick, Foula and Bruray. A fundamental requirement for progressing any S4GI site to build is gaining commitment from at least one mobile network operator to use the mast. In addition, we also require agreements with landowners as well as securing planning permission.

At Raewick, agreement with a mobile network operator has been reached and we anticipate site build to commence in early 2020. However at this stage no firm timescale for the availability of 4G services can be provided.

Whilst the site at Foula yielded some initial interest from a mobile network operator, no definite commitment can be confirmed at this time. At present, no mobile network operator has shown interest in using the Bruray site.

Progress updates to the programme will be published on the Scottish Government’s website.

Since February 2018, the Scottish Government has been in frequent dialogue with stakeholders about the import provisions of the US Marine Mammal Protection Act, in order to ensure that Scotland can continue to export quality Scottish seafood to the US.

Details of specific meetings include:

• March 2018 – SFIA: Seafood Regulation Expert Group.
• July 2018 – Scottish Government internal conference call.
• May 2018 – Meeting with Scottish Government and Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation.
• October 2018 - Meeting with Officials from Canada, Chile, Norway and Scotland under the auspices of the International Memorandum of Understanding on aquaculture.
• May 2019 – Meeting with Scottish Government and Faroese Government.
• July 2019 – Conference with Scottish Government and the Department for the Environment Food and Rural Affairs.
• August 2019 - Conference call with Scottish Government and the Department for the Environment Food and Rural Affairs, Marine Management Organisation, Seafish and Joint Nature Conservation Committee.
• August 2019 – Meeting with Officials from Canada, Chile, Norway and Scotland under the auspices of the International Memorandum of Understanding on aquaculture.
• September 2019 – Meeting with Scottish Government and Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation.
• October 2019 – Meeting with Scottish Government and Genuswave.
• November 2019 – Conference call with Scottish Government and the British Trout Association.

DWP provide aggregate data to SG to estimate eligible 2s when new data becomes available. This is part of our ongoing relationship. Use of aggregate, administrative data for analytic purposes does not require creation of a new gateway. We are in regular contact with DWP on a range of data sharing issues. As outlined in my response to S5W-25751 on 6 November 2019, regular updates are requested inside our ongoing working relationship, but DWP are not currently able to provide an expected date for the supply of the latest data. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at .

The Scottish Government Letter of Guidance to the Scottish Funding Council for academic year 2017-18 sought an additional 650 places on Early Learning and Childcare (ELC) related HNC courses. The number of people completing ELC related HNC courses in the 2017-18 academic year was 1,564.

An additional 350 places at graduate level were also sought for the 2017-18 academic year. The number of people entering such courses in 2017-18 was 645.

Information for academic year 2018-19 will be available for graduate level courses in December 2019 and for HNC courses in January 2020.

The statutory duty for Scottish local authorities to make funded early learning and childcare available for all eligible 2 year olds in their area came in to force with the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014. The profile of children eligible for this offer was then extended through The Provision of Early Learning and Childcare (Specified Children) (Scotland) Order 2014, as amended in 2015, 2017 and 2019.

Discussions with the UK Government (Department for Education) began in 2016 with information being provided on the legal gateway in place in England for sharing data on eligible 2 year olds between central and local government. We understand the legislative framework for this gateway is under the Childcare Act 2006 (brought in by amendments made in the Education Act 2011). The extent of the 2006 Act is to England and Wales only and the specific powers on data sharing extend to English local authorities only, therefore it would not have been possible for the UK Government to offer this gateway to the Scottish Government under existing legislation.

The answer to S5W-23963 included an update on progress in establishing a data-sharing gateway under the Digital Economy Act 2017.

The Scottish Government publishes proactively Early Learning and Childcare Expansion Delivery Progress Reports at a national level. These reports are based on information provided in confidence by local authorities to the Improvement Service, to enable reporting to the ELC Expansion Joint Delivery Board.

Local authorities reasonably assume and expect that the data they provide in confidence will be used to inform the nature of targeted support offered; programme assurance at a national level; and the routine publication of national level data; and not the publication of individual narrative text at local authority level. The free and frank exchange of views between local government, the Improvement Service and central government is an important enabling condition of a successful ELC expansion and therefore in the public interest.

The Scottish Government’s Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment considered the impacts of the Early Learning and Childcare (ELC) expansion on private and third sector providers. In the current market, the majority of private and third sector providers’ income (around 77%) comes from fees charged to parents and carers for non-funded hours (i.e. additional childcare on top of the funded entitlement; or childcare for children not yet eligible for funded ELC).

Local authorities’ original expansion plans forecast that the share of providers’ income accounted for by funded hours would increase with the roll-out of 1140 hours, as settings allocate more capacity towards delivering funded hours. This is reflected in the latest delivery data. The increase will be, in part, due to previously paid-for (wraparound) hours now being funded, and in part due to children newly accessing funded hours at the setting.

Local authorities and private and third sector ELC providers are working in partnership to develop a local offer of funded ELC that responds to parental demand and may include different patterns of provision based on different business models. There is no requirement on private and third sector ELC providers to change their overall capacity and therefore staffing models as a result of the ELC expansion, although we recognise that providers may of course choose to do so.

We recognise also that private and third sector providers are being affected by large scale local authority ELC recruitment. We are working with sector representative bodies to support providers with recruitment, including through our campaign website: which hosts job adverts from across all ELC sectors.