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The imposition, collection and enforcement of a victim surcharge mirrors the arrangements for fines subject to some differences set out in the

The court is required to grant time to pay a victim surcharge – the time allowed is a matter for the sentencer taking account of the circumstances of each individual, but subject to a minimum of seven days. The court cannot impose an immediate term of imprisonment, which it could do for a fine if it could not be paid immediately.

When any relevant penalty has been imposed the court shall make an enforcement order. The order sets out the penalty/payment terms and explains the effect of the enforcement order. The victim surcharge would then be collected and enforced in the same way as any other relevant penalty (including a fine) subject to the provisions of section 253J of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995 (“the 1995 Act”).

of the 1995 Act provides that where a court makes a victim surcharge and imposes a fine and/or makes a compensation order, the monies would be applied in the following order:

1.Compensation

2.Victim Surcharge

3.Fine

The Flood resilience Strategy is currently scheduled for publication by the end of this year. The report on the analysis of the Flood Resilience Strategy consultation responses is scheduled for publication on the Citizen Space website at the beginning of November. This will be accompanied by all of the responses that have given their permission to be published and a “We Asked, You Said, We Did” summary. This highlights the main points of the consultation ("We Asked”), how many responses there were and key messages coming out of the responses (“You Said”) and what we have done, or plan to do as a result of the consultation (“We Did”).

A 2019 Scottish Government-commissioned review by the Scottish Health Technologies Group recommended that where patients understand and accept the risks, HSCT should be considered as a treatment option for patients with relapsing-MS who have significant disease activity which has not responded to adequate treatment with licensed high-efficacy drugs.

The Scottish Government is committed to increasing the availability of medicines that patients in Scotland need.

As this is an operational matter for Scottish Water, and the Scottish Government does not hold the information, I have asked them to respond. Their reply is as follows:

Scottish Water is able to provide figures for 2022-23 onward, as a new system was introduced then which means that any figures before this would not be comparable, with some data representing reporting anomalies rather than leak repair times. Scottish Water has also advised that these figures do not necessarily relate to customers but are reports into their contact centre of visible leaks. Work to identify and repair some leaks can in some cases be complex in nature or require preparations such as traffic management, notice of roadworks, etc., and there can be cases where the timescales relate to administration of the record as opposed to the leak repair.

For 2022-23, 3280 (or 37.8%) burst repairs took over the 4.2 day average. For 2023-24, 2125 (23.9%) burst repairs took over the 4.2 day average.

This information is available in the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service (“SCTS”) quarterly fines data publication, found on the Official Statistics section of the SCTS website.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the Victim Surcharge Fund broken down in this way.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the Victim Surcharge Fund broken down in this way.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the Victim Surcharge Fund broken down in this way.

The Scottish Government does not collect or hold, nor has assessed data on current 3G, 4G and 5G mobile notspots or areas with coverage, alongside train routes in the Highlands and Islands region. Overall policy relating to telecommunications, including mobile communications, is reserved to the UK Government.