 Gwelch chi, Rhywun Arddwyd. 1. Willie Coffey I ask the Scottish Government what it is doing to encourage and develop skills and computer programming. Cabinet Secretary, Rhywun Arddwyd, Rhywun Arddwyd, Cunningham. We are working with public sector partners and industry representatives to address skills issues in Scotland's digital sector with a programme of work built around the recommendations in 2014's digital skills investment plan. Examples of the collaborative work include y opening of code clan, anodd industry-led digital skills academy, designed to help to meet the immediate digital skills needs that are faced by Scottish businesses. We have also funded the digital world marketing campaign, aimed at young people and women in particular, to raise awareness about the careers and opportunities that digital skills and qualifications can create. Will the coffee? Can I thank the minister for that answer? She will be aware that across Europe it is estimated that 100 million citizens have insufficient digital skills and are excluded from the digital society. Could you ask what the Scottish Government and Scotland's colleges in particular are doing to help to support the development of vital computing skills in this industry? There is a great deal of work going on, and I have mentioned some of that in my opening response. The colleges have long acknowledged the importance of responding to the need for STEM courses, including computing skills. As a primary provider of those, colleges have a significant role to play in ensuring that those courses are prioritised. In its guidance to the sector of the Scottish funding council, it has recommended that colleges use the information from skills investment plans and regional skills assessments, and to engage with local employers to assess which courses are required to meet regional need. Just yesterday, I know that my colleague Angela Constance visited Dundee and Angus colleges code academy, which provides a good opportunity to show all of the young people and children involved with the huge variety of jobs available in our technologies industries. However, that is just one example of work being done in the colleges. To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the action that it is taking to take forward the proposals of the commission on local tax reform. The First Minister established the commission on local tax reform jointly with COSLA to examine options for the future of local taxation. Before the end of the current parliamentary term, the Scottish Government will bring forward plans for reform of local tax, which will reflect the principles of the commission's report. Can he at least declare today that this will be the last year of the unfair and regressive council tax? The Scottish Government is very proud of the effect that the council tax freezes had in mitigating the unfairness of the council tax. It is noticeable that a commission that had representatives from the SNP, Labour, Lib Dems and Greens, not a group that easily found agreement declared that the council tax was an unfair tax and that it hits those on low incomes the most. I would express some caution to anybody who calls for a rapid end to the council tax freeze or the use of council tax when it has been observed by all those people to be an unfair way of raising revenue. To ask the Scottish Government what steps have been taken to improve health in the east end of Glasgow. Improving the nation's health is a priority and we are committed to prioritising our health service and making sure that it is fit for purpose. We have already substantially increased funding for all boards with NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde's budget, increasing by 21.3 per cent since 2007. That will give the board a record budget of £2.78.9 million in 2016-17. That is an increase of £96.3 million compared to £15.16. We also need to up the pace on transferring services to the community as we push forward the integration of health and social care. That is why of course we are investing some £250 million in this area in next year's budget of which Glasgow will receive their proportionate share. The cabinet secretary will be aware of the crucial role that Lightburn hospital plays in improving health in the east end of Glasgow. She will be aware of the concerns of the local community that has been earmarked for closure by NHS Greater Glasgow. Can the minister assure me that beyond the next 10 years Lightburn hospital will have a future? As I made clear to Paul Martin at health questions last week, none of the suggestions in what is a draft discussion paper has been formally put forward for consideration. The chair of the health board made that very clear in his comments. The member will be aware when Nicola Sturgeon, as a previous cabinet secretary, previously rejected proposals to close Lightburn hospital in 2011. She did so because she had repeatedly heard, not least from local patients and clinicians, that the hospital provided high-quality services that were greatly valued by what is a significantly disadvantaged community. I would have to be convinced by any formal proposals, which have not come, but any formal proposals to close Lightburn hospital so that that position had materially changed and that what would replace it would have to be able to be demonstrated, would provide a better service. However, as I have made clear, nothing has come to me, and this is a draft paper that the board has not accepted yet in any way as concrete proposals for even the board to take forward. 2. How much surface water plantation forestry absorbs from surrounding water courses and rainfall in the Highlands per annum? We know that well-designed forests can play an important role in water management, including in some circumstances in improving flood mitigation. The 2011 national forest inventory identified a total of 203,281 hectares of plantation forestry, many comprising established conifer forests in the Highland local authority region. Information published by Forest Research shows that each hectare of matured conifer plantation forest in the Highlands has the capacity to absorb approximately 7,000 cubic metres of rainfall, and that means that the plantation forest in the Highlands will have an annual absorption rate of approximately 1.4 billion cubic metres of water. In addition to absorbing water, what amount of CO2 is sequestered by plantation forestry in the Highlands per annum? Will that lead to a survey of plantable land in our uplands? The official statistics show that, in 2013, forestry sequestered 10 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent in Scotland, and based on the calculations for an average conifer forest, it is estimated that the same area of plantation forestry in the Highlands sequester is approximately 2.13 million tonnes of CO2 equivalents per year. Claudia Beamish I ask the minister if she is able to give an update on agroforestry and the contribution to flood prevention that this can make, as well as agroforestry as an appropriate contribution to addressing climate change challenges. I am very happy. I do not have the detail with me at the moment to answer the member's question, but I am very happy to spy on that information to the member in writing afterwards. Forestry as an industry is becoming increasingly important, especially as a tool against the fight against climate change. What efforts have the Scottish Government specifically doing with the name to encourage forest plantation and replantation for CO2 mitigation purposes, and how will it deal with the predicted hoe in forestry production in about 20 years' time? To answer some of the member's questions, the Scottish Government does fund and support research into the use of woodland creation as a means to also, in addition to mitigating the climate change, to reducing our flooding. That research includes modelling our catchment, our economic and mapping studies that are designed to quantify and demonstrate how our forest can also help us to contribute to our flood risk management. Research is being trialled at the moment in a number of locations. Outputs from the trials will be disseminated to the industry. Obviously, as the member shows, the Scottish forestry sector is growing and is contributing nearly £1 billion cross-foil area to Scotland's economy every year, with more than 25,000 full-time equivalents people working in the sector. However, in 2013, forestry was the only sector in which there has been a net emissions sink. To ask the Scottish Government when it last discussed social care with the city of Edinburgh Council. Is the cabinet secretary aware that people are dying waiting for care, that there is a high turnover in care staff, that there is an unreliable and poor quality of services being provided, and that there is a lack of training with the care staff who have to provide a range of needs, whether it is from autism to dementia? And what share will the council receive of the allocation that she has made of £250 million for extra care services? Cabinet secretary, I certainly deeply regret anyone having to wait longer than necessary to receive their care package. We will continue to work with all councils, including Edinburgh, to improve provision. Just to set out some of the work that has been done with Edinburgh, the city of Edinburgh has been allocated an additional £8.19 million from the integrated care fund for 2015-16, and over £2.4 million additional investment to help to reduce delayed discharge from hospital this year. As Sarah Boyack will be aware, she will receive her share of the £250 million additional funding announced by John Swinney in his draft budget, and that will be laid out once agreement has been reached. In addition to all that, I can tell Sarah Boyack that we have offered the city of Edinburgh Council an additional support of £2 million in return for improvements to social care in Edinburgh. I am very clear that improvements need to be made, and of course there have been a number of senior personnel changes that I think will help to deliver those improvements. I think that, as a Government, we have been supporting the city of Edinburgh Council to make the improvements that they need to make, and indeed have given them additional resources to help them to do that. Does the cabinet secretary know how much NHS Lothian is proposing to contribute to the integrated joint board with the city of Edinburgh Council? In fact, the same would apply to other health boards across Scotland. If she does not, how does she know that the £250 million, or Edinburgh's share of that, will be additional or simply netted off what NHS Lothian is planning to give to the integrated joint board? Let me be very clear on the first point that all the £250 million will be routed through NHS boards to the integrated partnership. In terms of the breakdown of that £250 million and what that delivers, that is subject to detailed negotiations and discussions with COSLA at the moment, and those will reach a conclusion. However, I am very clear that we want to make sure that, as much of that resource as possible delivers on the priorities that we all want to see in terms of additional capacity, making the improvements in the sector that all of us agree need to be made. I would hope that Malcolm Chisholm would support us in those efforts. To ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking to improve prisoners' access to education. The Scottish Prison Service has established a multi-agency steering group with representation from Education Scotland, Scotland's colleges, Creative Scotland and the Scottish Qualification Authority to help to inform the core specification for a proposed new generation learning and skills contract. The core intentions of the new contractor are to provide a more creative curriculum, an expansion of higher and distance learning opportunities to improve access and stimulate interest in learning, improve screening processes to detect literacy and numeracy problems and potential learning difficulties are core features of our new approach to promoting better access and levels of engagement. I have been made aware that our Majesty's Prison and Greenock has a notable record in this field, and many of the things that you have mentioned just now may well be taking place there, but can you assure me that the chamber will be looking at what it is doing, and if there are any plans to replicate that success across the rest of the prison service? HMP Greenock does indeed have a good record in improving access to education for prisoners, as do a number of other establishments in the Scottish Prison and State initiatives, which are based around the visual and expressive arts and have proved extremely successful in helping to stimulate engagement in education across the prison estate. With HMP shots receiving more accolades than any other UK prison at the recent UK Coastal Awards, I can also inform the member that there has been significant international interest in the model that has been taken forward by the Scottish Prison Service in the delivery of education within our prisons. The Scottish Prison Service has continued to work with all of its establishments and our education providers to make sure that best practice is captured and shared across the prison estate. Currently, the education services are provided on a national contract. Do you consider that there would be some benefit at this stage in pausing and considering whether regional contracts would be an improvement and allow a continuation of a better transition from prison to community if local colleges were involved? The way in which the education contract is provided just now is to further education colleges that provide services right across the prison estate. That contract was extended until next year in order to undertake the work that I have set out in looking at developing a new generation contract for the delivery of education provision within our prison estate. That will allow us to look at how we can continue to build on the good progress that is being delivered and, of course, to ensure that we are looking at opportunities to build links between prisons and establishments locally to them in order to continue education from prison back into the community. To ask the Scottish Government what recent discussions it has had regarding the homeless hostel, the Bellgrove hotel. Minister, Margaret Burgess, homelessness services are the responsibility of local authorities and addressing the needs of the residents of the Bellgrove hotel is a matter for Glasgow City Council. The Cabinet Secretary for Community, Social Justice and Pensioners' Rights and I have both met with the leadership of Glasgow City Council to discuss the issue of the Bellgrove hotel and we have also corresponded with them on this subject. The Cabinet Secretary last met the then leader, Councillor Matheson, to discuss this in the summer. Officials have continued to engage with the council on the Scottish Government's behalf. Discussions have focused particularly on strategically reviewing Glasgow's homelessness services. The best interests of the Bellgrove's residents can only be met as part of a wider approach that helps to address issues such as rough sleeping and the provision of homelessness services for those with more complex needs in Glasgow. I thank the minister for the answer. I welcome any increased provision for homeless people, but I wonder whether the minister does not consider that we need some more regulation in this area. After all, people in housing associations are regulated, people in care homes are regulated, but people who need both housing and care in the Bellgrove hotel are not regulated. I appreciate that this is an issue that the member has raised in more than one occasion in this chamber. In the past, he has looked at whether the Bellgrove hotel should come under the care inspectorate. That was clearly not the position that the care inspectorate did not think that was the position. The Bellgrove hotel is not a typical homelessness accommodation in Scotland. In fact, it is the only one of its kind, and it involves complex issues that I do not think can be solved by more regulation. It is licensed as a house of multiple occupation, and Glasgow City Council has used the HMO licensing framework to require improvements in the condition of the hotel. I know that John Mason's concern is about the wellbeing of the residents of the Bellgrove hotel and its needs and wishes. Those issues require a focus on prevention and providing appropriate services for the residents, and we will continue to work with Glasgow City Council on its review of homelessness services to improve options and outcomes for those who are currently using the Bellgrove hotel. To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on the recommendations of the Wildlife Crime Penalties Review Group. I very much welcome the report from the Wildlife Crime Penalties Review Group that was chaired by Professor Mac Pustey. I have been considering the 10 recommendations in the report with colleagues from Justice and other relevant areas. I have already written to Professor Pustey to thank him and the group for the diligence in producing such a thoughtful and very helpful report. We will be writing to him again shortly with the formal Scottish Government response to the report's recommendations. We will also sign a copy of that response to the Rural Affairs, Climate Change and Environment Committee, and we have published on the Scottish Government web pages. This week I visited a site where badger sets under current use have been illegally disturbed by developers. What steps will the minister take to ensure that developers receive appropriate guidance so that ignorance can't be used as an excuse in cases of wanton destruction? How will the Government's response to the Wildlife Crime Penalties Review Group help to protect badgers to enforce adherence to wildlife-related planning guidance and to ensure that appropriate sentences are delivered in cases such as this? Of course, the Scottish Government will be actively considering what further work will have to be undertaken before formal steps are taken to implement any of the recommendations in the Pustey report. Should there be a requirement to consult, then that will be done. However, in terms of the detailed questions that the member has asked, I'm more than happy to write to her in private. Before we move to the next site of business, members will wish to join me and welcome to the gallery Mr Asad Qasar, NPA, the Speaker of the Pakistani Provincial Assembly of Cyber Patunkwa.