Call to write off debt built up amid Covid

Housing and council tax debt built up during the pandemic should be written off for those struggling to pay bills, Citizens Advice Scotland (Cas) says.

The charity says 44% of its clients who are dealing with complex debts have no money left at the end of the month after meeting living costs.

In its manifesto for all parties ahead of the Scottish

Parliament election, Cas says urgent action will be needed to tackle debt as the country exits lockdown.

It says the next Scottish Government should write off, or help to pay off, housing and council tax debts built up during the pandemic. It also calls for changes to the legal aid system and a review of fuel poverty support schemes.

Cas chief executive Derek

Mitchell said: “The next Scottish Government will face the immediate challenge of our economy reopening as various financial support schemes expire.

“This is a moment of huge risk for people, many of whom will have built up new or additional debts and arrears because of the crisis, and face reduced incomes, rising bills, and unemployment.”

Medicine and dentistry degrees can now be awarded by St Andrews University after a law change.

Scotland’s oldest university has been banned from being able to award full medical degrees since 1966 following a centurylong battle to create a separate university in Dundee.

St Andrews instead awards medics a degree in medical science, before sending them to training centres to study the clinical part of their course.

It is the only ancient university in the country not to award medical and dental degrees.

Now, the law has been changed to remove the prohibition, allowing St Andrews to confer the degrees for the first time in decades.

The Scottish Parliament unanimously passed the University of St Andrews (Degrees in Medicine and Dentistry) Bill, which brings St Andrews in line with the other medical schools in Scotland, and allows the university to award the ScotGEM Primary Medical Qualification jointly with Dundee University.