Chamber and committees

I assure Christine Grahame and other members that all those mitigations remain under regular review. Indeed, the advisory sub-group on education and children’s issues considered the mitigations that are currently in place in schools at its meeting just last week. That consideration included the use of schools for community purposes. We, alongside stakeholders, are considering the group’s advice at present and will provide an update as soon as possible.

The mitigations that are still in place are in place for an important reason, which is that at this stage, they are considered necessary to keep the downward pressure on cases.

The scheme will recognise people who were vaccinated in other countries, including in the rest of the UK and the common travel area, as long as they were vaccinated with a Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency approved vaccine. Work has been done in partnership with other parts of the UK to ensure that they will be recognised.

As with any aspect of the vaccination programme, I will not stand here and say that no individual will ever face any difficulties, whether in relation to the programme itself or the certification scheme. It would not be reasonable to say that, but there are processes in place to ensure that those things work well and we will continue to support them as the scheme comes into force and develops in the weeks ahead.

Throughout the pandemic, we have done everything that we can to support tenants in general, and in particular to support any who may be facing the threat of eviction.

Councils have now been allocated £10 million to give grants to tenants who have Covid-related rent arrears and are consequently at risk of eviction. That brings our total pandemic support to tenants to almost £39 million. That additional money will make a big difference, but we continue to consider all ways in which we can provide practical support.

The NHS has been planning for winter, is planning for winter and continues to plan for winter each and every day. There are record numbers of people working in our national health service across Scotland. This Government has presided over increases across almost all professional groups in our national health service and we will continue to support increased staffing over this parliamentary session as we implement the NHS recovery plan.

I concede that it is difficult to recruit right now to health and care services, just as it is difficult to recruit to haulage companies and for agricultural businesses to recruit people to pick fruit and vegetables, for example. The reason for that, which is why it is galling to have that question posed by a Conservative member, is the damage that has been done and is now being felt because of Brexit. A bit of humility on those matters from Conservative members would go a long way.

As Bob Doris and other members will be aware, the statistics on vaccination uptake are primarily collected by Public Health Scotland and reported by it and the Government according to age group rather than by employment or education. The high uptake in age groups in which there are likely to be a lot of students suggests to us that uptake among students is high, but we continue to work hard with universities and colleges on a range of measures to help to ensure that students get vaccinated and protection is maximised as the new term develops. Drop-in clinics continue to operate and individuals can arrange appointments at times and locations that suit them.

We are in regular dialogue with Universities Scotland and Colleges Scotland and we have appointed a single point of contact in each health board for higher and further education institutions. We will continue to engage with health boards to support vaccine delivery for international and home-based students.

We continue to work to make sure that uptake is high, not just across the population as a whole but in different groups in the population. The issue to do with potentially lower rates of uptake among our ethnic minority communities has been a consideration all along, which is why we have worked with particular faith groups and taken steps to situate vaccination clinics in places of worship in some parts of the country—I have cited in the chamber the example of Glasgow central mosque, in my constituency, which has been doing a fantastic job as a vaccination clinic.

It is important to stress that uptake rates across all groups in society are high—and much higher than we might have thought that they would be at the start of the programme. However, there are variations, and we will continue to do everything that we can to level them out and make sure that every group has the highest possible rate of uptake.

Equity and other considerations have been part of the planning of the vaccine certification scheme and will continue to be.

It was very good to visit Prestwick yesterday, and it was actually quite a good news day—Prestwick airport set out the next details of its spaceport bid. I was visiting Spirit AeroSystems, which has just opened a new innovation centre that is obviously a very important part of the aerospace cluster there. It was a good news day in Prestwick, which is a part of the country that is very close to my heart.

It is the Government’s intention to return the airport to the private sector, and that has always been the case. Obviously, the process of doing that has been impacted by Covid. We will set out further details of that in due course.

Finally, I make a point that I made to Anas Sarwar in relation to Ferguson’s. It was right that we kept Prestwick airport open, and it was right that we invested to protect the jobs and the economic activity there. Those are often the things that Labour calls on us to do in the abstract, but, when it comes to putting our money where our mouth is, metaphorically speaking, Labour is just full of criticism. This Government, again, is the one that, time after time, actually stands up for jobs and industry.

First, before I come on to the important issue of cervical cancer screening, I want to complete the answer on A and E, as Douglas Ross went back to that point in his last question. If Douglas Ross did not want me to state the fact that A and E staffing has increased substantially under this Government, he should not have asked me why we had not invested in A and E staffing. I am simply making the point that we are investing in staffing and capacity in our NHS.

I said clearly in my first answer that the waiting times in our accident and emergency departments are not good enough. According to the most recent weekly figures, around seven out of 10 people have been seen within four hours. That statistic is not good enough, which is why we are taking the range of actions that I set out in my initial answer to support staff and improve the situation. I hope that we will see improvements in that area over the coming weeks.

I say again that the figure is not good enough, but, to give the context, we continue to have the best performing A and E anywhere in the UK, even in these difficult circumstances. That suggests that the actions that we are taking—although they need to go further—are helping to support those who deliver that care on the front line. We will continue to do that in probably the most difficult circumstances that our NHS has faced since its establishment.

On cervical screening, the Minister for Public Health, Women’s Health and Sport has now made two statements to Parliament on the error, which goes back many years and pre-dates this Government, that led to some women being wrongly excluded from cervical screening. She has set out the audit work that has been done and the steps that have been taken to rectify the error, so that women in those circumstances are seen and we make sure that they have been provided with appropriate follow-up care. It is important that we continue to see that work through to give women the reassurances that they need.

That work is important, and I do not want in any way to underplay its significance. However, there are clearly wider issues around encouraging women to come forward for screening, whether for cervical screening or breast screening, or for any of the screening programmes.

Covid has had an impact on people coming forward for routine healthcare, including the screening programmes. We had a relatively short period during which our screening programmes had to be paused. They are now operational again, and we want the numbers coming through those screening programmes to increase even beyond where they were before the pandemic. That is why we will continue to focus on screening and the importance of early diagnosis. We can all help by getting clear, loud and consistent messages across to women and to others who are eligible for screening that they should come forward for those appointments because the programmes are open and they are extremely important.

Douglas Ross says, “No, they weren’t”. I have just given him evidence of the fact that they were. For the past 18 months, we have been in a global pandemic. We are still in that pandemic and it is creating the most extreme of circumstances for our NHS. Therefore, in common with Governments everywhere, we will continue to take action to support the NHS. We will focus on that job each and every single day.

Before I come on to the issue of ferries, I will address another point. Anybody in this country who needs an ambulance should phone for an ambulance. I am clear about that and the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care is clear about that. Obviously, if somebody needs a part of the health service that does not require an ambulance, they should phone NHS 24 or another part of the health service. It is not helpful for people in the chamber to misrepresent the position when people’s lives are at risk.

On ferries, let us not lose sight of the fact that the Scottish Government has protected shipbuilding jobs here in Scotland. Without its intervention, Ferguson’s would not still be open and operational, and there are hundreds of people who are currently employed at Ferguson’s who would not be employed there. That is the protection of shipbuilding jobs that this Government has delivered.

In addition, of course, such procurements are bound by rules and regulations that Anas Sarwar is aware of.

Ferguson’s is on a journey back to recovery. Its focus right now—as the Opposition has regularly called for it to be—[Interruption.]