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As of 14 February 2021, Social Security Scotland had received 85,000 applications for Scottish Child Payment.

Management information on the number of applications approved and denied will be published on the Social Security Scotland website on 3 March to provide an update of the position as at the end of February.

More detailed information on application outcomes as at the end of March will be included in the next release of Official Statistics for Scottish Child Payment, due to be published on 11 May 2021.

All unpaid carers in Scotland 16 years and over will be offered vaccination, and they will start to receive appointments from now.

It is our intention to contact as many unpaid carers as possible to invite them for their vaccine appointment.

We will be using data from Social Security Scotland to write out to all carers on the relevant benefits. This will apply to those on Carer’s Allowance, Young Carer Grant and Child Winter Heating.

All unpaid carers in Scotland 16 years and over will be offered vaccination, and they will start to receive appointments from now. It is our intention to contact as many unpaid carers as possible to invite them for their vaccine appointment. The Scottish Government will be using data from Social Security Scotland to write out to all carers on the relevant benefits. This will apply to those on Carer’s Allowance, Young Carer Grant and Child Winter Heating.

The decision on who falls in clinically vulnerable category will be made by local GPs and based on the general guidance through the JCVI recommendation.

I refer the member to the answer to PQ S5W-35090 on 23 February 2021. 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 has not undertaken any assessment of the impact of any future reintroduction of the lynx or other large carnivore species into Scotland.

Anyone seeking to reintroduce lynx or another species into Scotland would require a licence from NatureScot. Thus far, no licence applications for the reintroduction of lynx have been submitted.

Should a licence application be made in the future, the Scottish Code for Conservation Translocations sets out the process that NatureScot would be required to follow in considering whether any translocation or reintroduction project may be appropriate. This includes the need to give consideration to benefits and risks, whether of a biological or socio-economic nature. The Code also outlines the requirements for appropriate consultation to be undertaken by the applicant.

The Scottish Government has no plans to reintroduce lynx or any other large carnivorous species into Scotland. We have not recently engaged with stakeholders on this issue.

All good policy making and legislation should be addressing the needs of our rural communities and businesses at present. The Scottish Government recognises that a cross-portfolio approach is needed to support rural matters. This wish for rural mainstreaming, was the leading recommendation from the National Council Of Rural Advisors in September 2018. In terms of action we are currently testing the impact of proofing through The Islands (Scotland) Act 2018. This has put in place Island Communities Impact Assessments (ICIAs) to enable relevant authorities to assess and take into account the impacts of their policies, strategies or services on island communities. We will continue to review the experience of this approach in the context of our wider mainstreaming agenda for rural matters.

The Scottish Government is providing up to £5.5m this financial year to a range of bodies across the Scotland Food & Drink Partnership to support delivery of the Food and Drink Recovery Plan, which seeks to mitigate the adverse effects that Covid-19 and Brexit have had on the industry. This funding is primarily channelled through Scotland Food & Drink who manage the delivery of the programme on behalf of the Partnership. The food and drink industry is also contributing to the delivery of the plan through its own funds.

Information on Scotland Food & Drink’s structure and the Scotland Food & Drink Partnership can be found at . Through the Scotland Food & Drink Partnership, the Scottish Government and its agencies work collaboratively with Scotland Food & Drink and other key food and drink industry organisations to help deliver growth for the sector.

Beyond the phased re-opening of schools (ELC, P1-3 possibly from 22/2 and to be reconsidered on 16/2), we are not in a position, at this time, to offer any dates for the re-opening of soft play centres and the sector.

We are currently revisiting our overall strategic approach to suppressing the virus which will enable us to map out our approach for the period ahead in the light of emerging variants and the roll out of the vaccine.

Our decision to reopen the soft play centres will be considered, in due course, within this new context/framework and will be contingent on the epidemiological data and wider evidence about the rollout and success of our vaccination programme .

At the Finance and Constitution Committee on 9 February I announced a further £60 million in funding for the Local Authority Discretionary Fund. Alongside the additional £30 million I announced in my Budget Statement this means we have now quadrupled the financial support available to businesses through this fund significantly increasing the capacity of Councils to direct funding towards businesses based on the specific challenges being experienced in their local economies and business communities. We are working closely with CoSLA to agree a fair and equitable distribution of this funding to local authorities. They are considering our proposal, and soon as they have agreed the allocation formally we will issue grant offer letters to individual councils.