Funding

A Business Creation Project designed to develop enterprise skills and encourage business start-up ideas amongst women based in rural areas of Scotland will launch on Monday 15 February.

Grant funding provided by the Scottish Government and European Regional Development Fund will empower shops, from 12 Scottish islands, to take the next steps in the war on waste by introducing shoppers with more reusable options.

A new £7.75 million funding package will offer support to fishermen, seafood businesses and ports and harbours threatened by the ongoing effects of coronavirus (COVID-19) and EU Exit.

The package includes:

Details of how £11.6 billion of funding from the Scottish Government will be distributed to individual local authorities in 2021-22 have been published.

The settlement provides councils with an increase in day to day revenue spending of £335.6 million, including £90 million to compensate local authorities which choose to freeze council tax and a further £259 million will be added in one-off funding to support ongoing COVID-19 pressures.

Significant new investment to drive economic recovery, bolster public services and support families underpins the Scottish Government’s spending and taxation plans for the coming year.

Presenting the Scottish Budget 2021-22, Finance Secretary Kate Forbes today announced support for jobs and skills totalling around £1.1 billion.

 More than £25 million is going to disadvantaged and remote communities around Scotland to support regeneration and employment projects.

Crofters in some of Scotland’s most remote and marginal communities will benefit from grants to improve their housing or build new homes.

The Croft House Grant scheme aims to retain and attract people to rural communities while allowing them to achieve the full potential of crofts and generate economic activity.

Funding to help more vulnerable young people across Scotland into work has been announced by Economy Secretary Fiona Hyslop.

Part of the Scottish Government’s Young Person’s Guarantee, the £986,702 investment will provide specialist pre-employment support for an additional 1,300 16 and 17-year-olds.

Two existing programmes delivered in partnership with the third sector - Our Future Now and Discovering Your Potential – will provide the support.  

A project which helps people struggling to heat their homes has become the first to receive a share of a £7 million fund to tackle fuel poverty this winter.