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The Scottish Government made significant changes to the law on non-native species in 2011, introducing a new regime of species control agreements and orders under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. This enables relevant bodies (Scottish Ministers, Scottish Natural Heritage, Scottish Environment Protection Agency and Forestry Commission Scotland) to make agreements or orders setting out measures that must be taken to control or eradicate an invasive non-native animal or plant.

Last year, the Scottish Parliament’s Public Petitions Committee considered Petition PE01586 which asked the Scottish Government to create further statutory powers to force landowners to destroy invasive non-native species that grow on their private property. The Committee noted that many stakeholders were satisfied that the existing legislation provides adequate powers to address the issue and, on that basis, closed the petition.

Scottish Natural Heritage is using its statutory powers to support the control of giant hogweed within priority river catchments.

In common with other Boards across Scotland, NHS Forth Valley has experienced some challenges in providing sufficient GP cover for its out-of-hours service over the summer months. Whilst no formal discussions have taken place with NHS Forth Valley, the Board has kept the Scottish Government fully apprised of the situation and indeed has engaged positively with local ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ on this matter.

The Shaping Surgical Services Programme for Tayside has been under development by the Board for a number of years. During this time Scottish Government officials have met with Board officials to offer advice and guidance in relation to good practice in carrying out public engagement and consultation.

The proposals went out to public consultation on 3 August 2017 and are scheduled to be completed on 3 October 2017.

No decisions have been made and as the proposals constitute major service change, Ministers will ultimately have the final decision on any recommendations approved by the NHS Board.

The Heads of Terms for the Edinburgh and South East Scotland City Region Deal were signed on 20 July 2017 and we will continue to work with partners to establish the details with a view to setting these out in the final Deal document. The arrangements for the Transport Appraisal Working Group will be part of these more detailed discussions.

The time taken to deal with planning appeals is largely dependent on a number of factors including the volume of information submitted and the complexities that need to be addressed as part of the consideration.

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The average weeks taken for planning appeal decisions made in the period 21-08-2016 to 20-08-2017 was 22.61 weeks

The Principles for Just Trade state that trade should be democratic, work in the public interest and do good.

This is consistent with the Scottish Government’s Trade and Investment Strategy.

The UK Government and the European Commission that trade agreements must not adversely affect the delivery of public services, or lower standards or limit the Government’s right to regulate in the public interest.

Since the vote to leave the EU, the UK Government’s approach to withdrawal has seemed to reject the principles of devolution, and the sharing of decision making across these islands. We will continue to challenge this approach and to promote the best possible outcome for Scotland.

We will seek to represent Scotland’s interests internationally and to ensure that these interests are met in future discussions.

The Scottish Food Commission are holding a Summit on 28 September to seek stakeholders views on the content of the consultation for the Bill. The consultation is on track to be published as planned at the end of 2017.

Scottish Water has no current experience or technologies in place to separate out and treat microplastics, microbeads or micro fibres from the organic content on an operational scale and at reasonable cost.

The Scottish Government published the Marine Litter Strategy in 2014 with over 40 actions to reduce the amount of litter entering our seas, including plastic pellets or 'nurdles'. The Marine Litter Strategy Steering Group is meeting 7 September 2017 and the subject of nurdles has been added to the agenda at the request of one of the members Fidra. Fidra runs The Great Nurdle Hunt and promotes Operation Clean Sweep, an international programme designed by the plastics industry to prevent the loss of material by those who make, ship and use nurdles. Marine Scotland chairs the Steering Group and it will work with the group to agree actions to promote this programme with relevant organisations in Scotland.

Land Use Strategy Policy 7 encourages the further development of the regional land use partnership approach. It also recognises that further work is required to clarify a range of issues relating to regional partnerships and proposes that a limited life expert group be established to provide advice. We are considering possible approaches to securing expert advice on a number of issues related to any next steps for the regional land use partnership approach.