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The Scottish birth rate has been declining since 1960. This general trend is in line with the pattern in most other advanced industrial countries, although the birth rate in Scotland has declined more significantly than the rate for the UK as a whole. Actuarial predictions suggest that the Scottish birth rate will remain fairly constant over the next 20 years. As with any demographic trend, there will be a range of implications from the fall in the Scottish birth rate.

The Environment Act 1995 requires local authorities to carry out a review and assessment of air quality within their areas and take action where air quality objectives are unlikely to be met within a set timescale. These requirements are set out in more detail in The Air Quality Strategy for England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. In such cases the authority must declare an Air Quality Management Area (AQMA) and draw up an action plan that sets out the steps it intends to take in pursuit of the objectives. The objective for NO₂ is an annual mean of 40mg/m³ to be achieved by the end of 2005. To date two AQMAs have been declared in Scotland (Aberdeen and Edinburgh) with Glasgow expected to follow shortly. All three are based on traffic-related NO₂ emissions.

The adjustments to the transport programme, which are to fund other Executive priorities, are set out in the following table. The SPT adjustment will bring provision in line with payments due under the franchise and is not expected to affect operations and services. Small reductions in the roads programme and on the Integrated Transport Fund will not have a significant impact on the delivery of our transport priorities. The additional funding in 2003-04 will be used to fund a pilot scheme for Child Pedestrian Training and to assist with modernisation of the road haulage industry.

Programme	2002-03 (£ million)	2003-04 (£ million)
Motorways and Trunk Roads	- 5	- 10
Strathclyde Passenger Transport	- 5	- 5
Integrated Transport Fund	-	- 5
Other Transport Programmes	-	+ 4
Net Change	- 10	- 16

Our aim has been to ensure that the KickStart programme is not "top down" in its approach and that it meets the diverse needs of voluntary and community groups around the country. This meant that we consulted widely, including with the Social Inclusion Partnerships (SIPs). The views of SIPs have strongly influenced the design of the programme and various changes have been made. For example, as a result of SIP views, KickStart will now run for an extra year, until March 2003, and with an increased allocation of £625,000.Most of the SIP clusters are in the process of recruiting their development workers and aim to have them in post between October and November.

The Scottish Executive is working in conjunction with HEBS and ASH Scotland to explore the best means of raising awareness about the impact of passive smoking. A long-term media campaign, linked to other action at community and industry levels, is being devised. This is being informed by the results of a survey of customer attitudes to smoking in public houses and restaurants. The campaign will be multi-faceted, focusing on issues associated with smoking in the workplace and in the home as well as in places of entertainment such as pubs, restaurants, and clubs. The first phase of the campaign is expected to be launched later this year. HEBS and ASH Scotland are also collaborating to produce guidelines for local authorities on the development of tobacco policies in the workplace.

The following table sets out actual expenditure by local authorities on improvement and repairs grants for private sector houses for 1999-2000. Figures are not available for expenditure in 2000-01 or for the local authorities estimated expenditure in 2001-02. Real terms figures can be calculated by applying the Treasury deflators (currently 2.5%) in the normal way.

Local authority	Expenditure (£000)
Aberdeen City	1,907
Aberdeenshire	388
Angus	506
Argyll and Bute	1,779
Clackmannanshire	267
Dumfries & Galloway	621
Dundee City	1,646
East Ayrshire	235
East Dunbartonshire	150
East Lothian	604
East Renfrewshire	151
Edinburgh, City of	2,848
Eilean Siar	3,461
Falkirk	495
Fife	419
Glasgow City	6,932
Highland	4,314
Inverclyde	489
Midlothian	53
Moray	557
North Ayrshire	767
North Lanarkshire	1,689
Orkney Islands	1,408
Perth and Kinross	1,083
Renfrewshire	1,879
Scottish Borders	947
Shetland Islands	320
South Ayrshire	310
South Lanarkshire	3,500
Stirling	776
West Dunbartonshire	247
West Lothian	429
Scotland	41,177

The cost of a changeover would depend on the timing, the overall approach and individual management decisions.

Policy responsibility for the National Lottery is reserved. Responsibility for distributing proceeds from the lottery rests with the Distributing Bodies.

The Scottish Executive does not receive any money from local authorities as a result of the housing capital receipts set-aside rules.

The information is not available from the statistics prepared by the General Register Office for Scotland. However, the table gives the number of fatalities caused by fires where the source of ignition was known to be smokers' materials, excluding matches and cigarette lighters.

Year	Number of fatalities in Scotland
1997	32
1998	36
19991	33

Notes:1. 1999 figure is provisional.