Chamber and committees

From 2024-25, Scottish Government are dedicating over £2.5 million annually to support health and social care staff wellbeing. This funding provides our workforce with access to psychological interventions and therapies, self-service resources through the National Wellbeing Hub and the National Wellbeing Helpline delivered by NHS 24. Registered staff also have access to confidential mental health services through the Workforce Specialist Service (WSS).

These resources play a vital role in helping the workforce manage mental health challenges and maintain their wellbeing, thus enhancing the quality of care they can provide. We will continue collaborating with leaders across the NHS to identify and address areas of stress and to explore additional actions to support staff including physiotherapists.

The Scottish Government’s strategic priorities are to shift the balance of care closer to people's homes and drive a proactive approach of early intervention and prevention, which will help reduce demand for acute care.

We are increasing capacity and access to Primary Care by the end of 2026, through our reform programme, shifting the balance of care to preventative and community-based support. This will be done by improving the use of multi-disciplinary working to support better, patient-centred care pathways and improve service capacity in GP and frontline community services, including additional funding to support the Primary Care Phased Investment Programme.

We are committed to ensuring that people living in Scotland with long-term conditions, including inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), are able to access the best possible care and support, and benefit from healthcare services that are safe, effective and person-centred. Action which the Scottish Government is taking includes:

• an Endoscopy and Urology Diagnostic Recovery and Renewal Plan backed by £70 million. The plan focuses on key areas such as: Balancing Demand and Capacity; Workforce Training and Development; Infrastructure; and Innovation and Redesign.
• Funding the Modernising Patient Pathways Programme (MPPP) with a specific workstream continuing to promote improvements in IBD care which is being taken forward through the MPPP’s National Gastroenterology Speciality Delivery Group (SDG). They have developed a national IBD pathway for NHS Scotland which is due to be published imminently.
• Developing a lower gastrointestinal pathway which will provide primary care guidance about testing and diagnosis for people with IBD and Coeliac Disease in Scotland.

Further detail on the Scottish Government’s proposed £2.2 billion funding for primary care can be found in the 2025-26 Level 4 tables published along the Budget itself - Supporting documents - Scottish Budget 2025 to 2026 - gov.scot.

In addition to the direct funding increase of over £160 million (7.8%) for primary care, we plan to further invest in primary and community care services from the commitment to provide £100 million “Reform and Improvement measures funding” to alleviate waiting time and hospital occupancy pressures.

The ambitions set out in our Cancer Strategy 2023-2033 align with those of ‘The Collaborative and Compassionate Cancer Care - The Cancer Strategy for Children and Young People in Scotland 2021–2026’. This sets out Scottish Government’s commitment to improving services nationally for children and young people specifically. This is delivered by the Managed Service Network for Children and Young People with Cancer (MSN CYPC).

Children, young people and their guardians have the opportunity to engage and share their experiences of cancer services to inform improvements, and to support delivery of strategy ambitions, through the MSN’s National Youth Advisory and Parent and Family Forums.

Progress against all actions of the Collaborative and Compassionate Cancer Care The Cancer Strategy for Children and Young People in Scotland 2021–2026 continue to be taken forward by the Managed Service Network for Children and Young People with Cancer (MSN CYPC).

The 2023-2024 MSN CYPC Annual Report, which includes detail on progress across all actions, will be published shortly on the MSN CYPC website – www.msncypc.nhs.scot

The funding for Drugs and Alcohol in the 2025-26 draft budget is £80.9m. This includes £60m as part of our commitment to provide £250m in additional funding over 5 years to reduce drug deaths and improve the lives of people who use drugs and alcohol.

£19.1m has moved to baselined funding which Alcohol and Drug Partnerships (ADPs) have highlighted as important for sustainability and recruitment and a record total of £112 million funding for ADPs has been maintained for a third year.

We are also continuing to fund grassroots organisations through £13 million a year to the Corra Foundation and we’ll continue to invest in residential rehabilitation - with more than £10 million committed to increasing capacity and funded placements.

The National Mission annual report finance sections aim to provide greater transparency of National Mission funding, and provide a breakdown of funding. The reports for financial years 2021-22, 2022-23 and 2023-24 are available at:

National Mission on Drugs: annual report 2023-2024 - gov.scot (section 8.4)

National Mission on Drugs: annual report 2022-2023 - gov.scot (section 8.4)

National Mission on Drugs: annual report 2021-2022 - gov.scot (section 8.4)

Following the successful handover of the MV Glen Sannox in November 2024, the draft budget for 2025-26 includes the capital funds required for the completion of Glen Rosa (vessel 802). There are also capital funds included, subject to Parliamentary approval and financial and legal due diligence, for capital investment in the shipyard to modernise operations and enhance productivity, positioning the yard to secure future contracts. Operational matters, including the utilisation of the workforce, are decisions for the yard.

We are working with local systems as part of the annual planning process for 2025-26 to ensure any additional funding to expand Hospital at Home is targeted towards the areas that offer the greatest improvement to performance and patient care.

Data published by Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS) showed that in September 2024, Older Adult’s Hospital at Home services provided the equivalent of 510 beds, similar to the size of Royal Alexandra Hospital and larger than University Hospital Wishaw.

Between July and September this year, Hospital at Home services for Older People grew by almost 14% compared to the same period in the previous year with over 4,000 patients managed by the service.

Hospital at Home capacity is in place across a range of other pathways such as Outpatient Parenteral Antimicrobial Therapy, Respiratory and Heart Failure. Published data is not currently available.

Advanced Nurse Practitioners (ANPs) working in General Practice are employed by either Health Boards or by GP practices.

Data on the whole-time equivalent (WTE) ANP workforce employed directly by Health Boards is published annually by the Scottish Government in the Primary care improvement plans: implementation progress summary. This data is set out in the following table.