Chamber and committees

The GP-led walk-in services are intended to complement existing core services and provide an alternative route to care for patients. NHS Grampian is responsible for the operational management of the walk-in services in Grampian, including all decisions about the location and model of the services. The services have been designed by health boards, taking into account the needs of their populations, and reflecting local issues and circumstances.

I refer the member to the answer to question S7W-01941 on 19 August 2026. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.

The Scottish Government is committed to improving life expectancy and tackling health inequalities across the whole population.

Life expectancy at birth for males in the Dumfries and Galloway council area in 2022-2024 was 77.2 years. This is the same as the life expectancy at birth for males in Scotland. Also, premature mortality rates for males in the NHS Dumfries and Galloway health board area have been lower than the equivalent national rate for Scotland in most years since 2006.

Last year, the Scottish Government and COSLA published the Population Health Framework, which sets out a cross-government, cross-sector approach to improving

life expectancy while reducing the gap in life expectancy between the 20% most deprived areas and the national average, by 2035. The Framework sets out the actions the Scottish Government and its partners are taking forward within the first two years by: supporting healthy environments; good early years and education; good work and income; and equitable health and care.

In addition, Scottish Government’s Programme for Government places a strong emphasis on the need to shift towards prevention and early intervention. This includes action to address alcohol and drug-related harm and to encourage healthier lifestyles among men, helping to reduce the risk of heart disease, stroke, lung cancer and poor mental wellbeing. Embedding prevention across public services is fundamental to improving population health outcomes for individuals and securing the long-term sustainability of Scotland’s health and care system.

SPPA has received revised pay information from employers in respect of 202 retired teachers. The oldest outstanding case dates from December 2025, and each recalculation takes around three hours to process. Over the past two years, the average processing time for cases received has been four months.

The East Coast Arc will boost productivity and innovation in North East Fife and ultimately help contribute to our key objective of growing the Scottish economy. Information on the proposal, which was introduced in our ambitious Programme for Government, will be set out in more detail soon.

The Scottish Government published its Infrastructure Delivery Pipeline back in January, and this featured a range of capital investments in Fife. This includes the completed Dunfermline Learning Campus (Fife College element) project investment of £154.5 million and the Fife Railway Electrification project totalling £311.5 million, as well as a number of infrastructure investments via the Edinburgh and South East Scotland City Region Deal programme, the Tay Cities Region Deal programme, and the Green Freeports programme. This planned and committed investment, which will support the East Coast Arc, underpins productivity, connects communities to opportunities, and supports long-term resilience in important areas like housing, energy, transport, and digital connectivity.

Payment claims of £9,477,806.74 from bus operators in relation to the bus fare cap in the Highlands and Islands have been received to 8th September. Claims for 1,509,749 passenger journeys, that have benefited from the cap, have been received to the same date for the Highlands and Island bus fare cap scheme.

I refer the member to the answer to question S7W-03358 on 28 September 2026. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.

Local communities will continue to play an important role in helping to shape services. Engagement with patients, service users, communities, elected representatives and local partners will remain central to decision-making, supported by appropriate governance, participation and locality arrangements.

The reforms are not intended to create a one-size-fits-all system. Planning across larger populations will enable greater sharing of workforce, expertise and capacity, while continuing to support tailored approaches that reflect local circumstances, including the unique needs of rural and island communities.

Over the next three months, we will undertake an intensive programme of engagement with local government and partners to consider how health, social care and wider public services can work more effectively together, make best use of public investment and improve outcomes for people and communities. Partnership working across local government, health, social care and community planning organisations will remain essential. Detailed arrangements will be developed as part of wider public service reform.

The Scotland’s Places of Worship Fund will operate as a pilot until March 2027. The pilot will provide evidence on demand, impact and delivery arrangements to help inform any future decisions on longer-term support for Scotland’s places of worship. The Scottish Government intends to continue supporting the sector to ensure that Scottish Places of Worship are not disadvantaged by the UK Government decision to end the UK-wide provision.

Decisions regarding the future use of places of worship are matters for the relevant faith bodies.

Regarding the Scotland’s Places of Worship Fund, this is separate from Historic Environment Scotland’s existing grant programmes.

A local authority based model was used to estimate the cost and impact of the £2 fare cap. It is based on concessionary fares data scaled to non-concessionary population in each area and calibrated nationally to commercial bus revenue. It uses standard industry assumptions to assess that demand will increase by between around 20% to 40%. This equates to around 2.5 million to 3.0 million journeys in total that will benefit from the cap in the Highlands and Island but is subject to considerable uncertainty, given the original pilot nature of the scheme.