Public Audit Committee

Meeting date: Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Official Report 397KB pdf

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Section 23 Reports

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“Reducing Scottish greenhouse gas emissions”

Item 4 is consideration of another section 23 report. Through its previous convener, the committee wrote to the Scottish Government to ask for additional information on the Auditor General’s report “Reducing Scottish greenhouse gas emissions”. Members have the correspondence. I invite comments on that and on how we should proceed.

Some of this is pretty profound. I always thought that, once we passed the climate change legislation, there would be a day of reckoning as regards what it would mean in practice. The eminently fair reply that we have had from Graeme Dickson confirms that. About three paragraphs down, it says:

“In the case of speed limit enforcement, the option of 100% compliance was chosen.”

Does that mean that we will see automated cameras monitoring average speeds on all roads between Edinburgh and Inverness and on roads throughout the country? It might be useful for the committee to understand what the proposals will mean in practice. As Mr Coffey might observe, perhaps these are matters for other committees, but I think that the letter raises profound questions about how the proposals might work in practice.

It might be useful if our clerks could speak informally to Audit Scotland about how the committee will monitor what will be profound changes in how people across Scotland behave when it comes to transport. The changes might be more profound than we realised.

I wonder whether there might be some value in sharing the correspondence with the Rural Affairs, Climate Change and Environment Committee, which I think has looked at these issues and has identified difficulties with the delivery of emissions reductions in transport, in particular. It could look at matters in more detail. Mr Scott’s point is more about the fact that it might prove difficult—nay, impossible—to audit the success of the Government’s plans.

The Government says in its response that it is developing its report on proposals and policies, which is due to be published this year. Do we know exactly when it is due to be published? What is the timescale for publication? The report on proposals and policies might enlighten us or provide more answers.

Do we know when the RPP is to be published?

It might have some of the answers to the questions that Mr Scott is asking, although he might still be waiting with bated breath.

Can we agree to draw the correspondence to the attention of the Rural Affairs, Climate Change and Environment Committee and to ask the Scottish Government when the report on proposals and policies will be published? That might be an opportunity for us to revisit the issues. They are not going to go away quickly.

Our previous convener talked about demand-side transport policies and asked for a bit more information, but not much has come back in the response from Graeme Dickson. I do not know whether it is worth pushing it, but perhaps we should go down that route and ask the Rural Affairs, Climate Change and Environment Committee to look at it. The previous convener certainly put a strong emphasis on demand-side transport policies.

We could suggest to the Rural Affairs, Climate Change and Environment Committee that it might want to consider it. I think that it produced a similar report recently.

First, we will draw the other committee’s attention to the report and our view that it still does not say much about taking demand-side action to reduce transport emissions. Secondly, we will ask the Scottish Government when the report on proposals and policies is expected.

Members indicated agreement.

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“Overview of the NHS in Scotland’s performance 2010/11”

Item 5 is correspondence from the Scottish Government on the Auditor General’s report “Overview of the NHS in Scotland’s performance 2010/11”. The correspondence is with members and it refers particularly to the treatment of health improvement, efficiency, access and treatment targets. I invite comments from members.

I raised the issue in committee because although the Audit Scotland report told us what targets had been achieved, it did not mention the targets that were abandoned because they had not been achieved. I now learn from Derek Feeley that every HEAT target has a defined point in time at which delivery should be achieved. I look at these things fairly carefully, and although I do not remember exact dates and times, I take Mr Feeley at his word.

There is no doubt about it: we need more clarity on HEAT targets. I mentioned two of those targets. The first was the reduction of sickness absence in the NHS to 4 per cent, which no board in Scotland has achieved although there has been a reduction over the years. The other was a 0 per cent increase in antidepressant prescribing; in fact, the increase has been more like 10 per cent and the paper says that the target has expired. I do not remember reading that—perhaps I need to look more carefully in the future.

Although the paper mentions that the targets expire, it might be worth asking for clarification of Mr Feeley’s point. Do they become standard targets? In the third paragraph of the paper, he says:

“Work has continued with NHS Boards to support them in reducing sickness absence”.

The 4 per cent target has not quite been achieved. I might be incorrect, but I take it from that that, although there is no longer a HEAT target, it has become standard practice to try to achieve that target. We might want more clarification of that. I agree with Mary Scanlon that it is bizarre that an organisation has a target with an expiry date but, when it does not achieve it, it just gives up on it.

The target suddenly disappears.

It seems bizarre.

I was not party to the initial discussions on the report, but the two targets seem to have been treated differently. The sickness absence target has become a standard, so I suppose we would expect that NHS boards are still being held to that standard. The mental health target is different because, if I understand Derek Feeley’s letter, it has been dropped and replaced by a target on the time from referral to treatment and access to psychological therapies. It does feel like a target that was going the wrong way and has just disappeared.

It will also be about two years before the target on referral to treatment is implemented. In some parts of the Highlands, people can wait for between two and four years to see a psychologist. So, although I welcome the target, its achievement is quite a long way off. I welcome it because it is one of the first mental health targets that we have had in Scotland apart from ones for children.

Mr Yousaf suggests that we should go back to Derek Feeley and ask for a bit more clarification. If the committee agrees, I am happy to do that.

Members indicated agreement.

11:15 Meeting continued in private until 11:52.