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The Scottish Government published the (NIF) for Scottish education in December 2024. The 2025 NIF has been streamlined and refreshed to include a long-term strategy for improvement which will provide clarity and focus to our work on improving standards in Scottish education.

Given the impact of COVID-19 and the financial pressures on schools as a result of austerity, the NIF highlights that the short term focus (this year and for the remainder of this parliamentary term) will be improving the ABC - attendance, achievement, behaviour and the curriculum in schools - to boost standards.

The draft Scottish budget 2025-26 provides £186.5m to local authorities to help protect teacher numbers, freeze learning hours and make meaningful progress on reducing class contact time for teachers. The budget also sets out an additional £29 million of investment for Additional Support Needs (ASN). This will include an allocation for local and national programmes to support the recruitment and retention of the ASN workforce. The Scottish budget 2025-26 is subject to parliamentary approval in February.

In addition, we have included 7 key outcomes that we expect to achieve to deliver excellence and equity for all of our children and young people. In order to deliver these outcomes, the 2025 NIF sets out the joint responsibility of Ministers and local authorities for education and the requirement for national and local government to work together, with a collective responsibility to improve educational outcomes.

The 2025 Improvement Plan, which accompanies the NIF, will be published later in January. It will set out the full details of the actions that will be taken to deliver the key outcomes, the evidence to support them, and how we will measure progress against them.

The Home Energy Scotland (HES) Grant and Loan Scheme is available to homeowners in Scotland and provides a grant, interest free loan or a combination of both to support the installation of energy efficiency measures and clean heating systems.

The scheme provides up to £7,500 of grant funding for heat pumps as well as £7,500 for energy efficiency measures. In addition, the scheme offers optional interest free loan funding of up to £7,500 and a remote rural uplift of £1,500 to supplement both of these grants.

Further information on the available measures and how to apply can be found at: .

In addition, the HES advice service also acts as the gateway to a number of other Scottish Government funding schemes and provides free, bespoke, impartial advice on energy efficiency, renewable heating and fuel poverty support available. HES can be contacted on 0808 808 2282 or via their online portal .

Sara Sharif experienced unimaginable abuse during her life and was murdered by someone she trusted. It is essential children and young people are protected from harm and the Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that robust child protection measures are in place across Scotland, and continue to be followed at all times.

The Scottish Government published revised National Guidance for Child Protection in Scotland on 31 August 2023. The non-statutory guidance describes the responsibilities and expectations of everyone who works with children, young people and their families in Scotland. It aims to support improved cross-agency working and outcomes for children at risk.

The National Child Protection Guidance makes clear that, no matter the circumstances, concerns about risk to a child or young person should be reported without delay to social work or, in situations where risk is immediate, to Police Scotland. Child protection procedures are initiated when police, social work or health determine that a child may have been significantly harmed or may be at risk of significant harm. All concerns which may indicate risk of significant harm must lead to consideration of an inter-agency referral discussion (IRD). Again, this applies whether or not the child is in school. A practitioner’s failure to report child abuse could constitute a breach of their employment contract, lead to disciplinary action, or give rise to a claim for civil damages. Practitioners could also be struck off from social work, teaching, or medical registers for gross misconduct.

As outlined in the guidance, the decision to home educate a child should not, in itself, be regarded as a child protection concern. The Scottish Government is determined to ensure children and young people are fully engaged in their learning and Ministers recognise home education as a valid choice alongside sending a child to school.

Where a child is on a school roll in a local authority area, a parent must seek that local authority’s consent before withdrawing their child from the school. Whilst the authority must not unreasonably withhold consent to withdraw, local authorities can refuse to give their consent for a child to be withdrawn from the school roll in certain circumstances, including:

• where a child has been referred to social work, police or health for child protection reasons, and the matter is being investigated
• where a child is on the child protection register
• where a child has been referred to the Children’s Reporter on care and protection grounds, and the referral is being considered
• where the child is the subject of a supervision requirement.

The Scottish Government have been reviewing the home education guidance, working with stakeholders, and will publish updated guidance shortly.

Scottish Government officials are monitoring progress of the UK Government’s Children’s Wellbeing Bill and what implications this might have for child protection processes in Scotland.

The following table represents funding Sustrans has received directly from the Scottish Government or Transport Scotland, and does not reflect any monies that Sustrans may have secured from indirectly. In future years Active Travel funding will be distributed through Local Authorities for Infrastructure Investment and through Regional Transport Authorities for Behaviour Change initiatives.

The breakdown of support split by year

Scotland has a network of 468 free public libraries and 37 mobile libraries which help to provide access to library provision for schools in rural areas or where there is no public library nearby.

Additionally, the Scottish Government provides annual funding towards the Public Library Improvement Fund (PLIF) and School Library Improvement Fund (SLIF) administered by the Scottish Library and Information Council (SLIC), to enable public and school libraries to undertake a wide range of pioneering initiatives within communities.

PLIF supports national programmes like Every Child a Library Member (ECALM). The ECALM initiative aims to streamline the library joining process for children across Scotland.

SLIF has delivered funding to support the development of libraries in early years settings, primary and secondary schools, and to support the implementation of Vibrant Libraries, Thriving Schools – the national strategy for school libraries in Scotland.

Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) statistics are published annually with latest data covering the 2022-23 academic year -

Information broken down by local authority area, back to 2006-07, can be found in the supporting documents area of the publication, within the ‘Spend’ and ‘Age’ background tables.

Whilst EMA was introduced in academic year 2004-05, data prior to 2006-07 is not included in the above publication as EMA in 2004-05 and 2005-06 did not cover all 16 to 18 year olds and therefore is not comparable. Historic data can be accessed on the Scottish Government archived website:

2004-05 -

2005-06 -

Scottish Government does not collect information on the number of children and young people home educated in Scotland.

I have asked Gerard Hart, Chief Executive of Disclosure Scotland to respond. His response is as follows:

The Scottish Government does not hold this information centrally as local authorities are responsible for paying the Scottish Recommended Allowance for Foster and Kinship Carers.