Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government recognises the impact long delays in call answering times at NHS 24 could have on A&E attendances. NHS 24 is focussed on ensuring that patients receive the correct advice immediately without a requirement to be placed in a queue, in line with what extensive patient engagement has told the Service. Although this means patients may sometimes have to wait longer for their call to be answered, over 95% of calls are closed first time with patients getting appropriate support and advice without any requirement to be placed in a queue for a call back. This not only helps callers with a reduced journey time through NHS 24 but also hastens any onward referral to local services within NHS Boards reducing pressure across the system.

There are significant pressures residing across all areas of the system, including the NHS 24 111 service and, as a result, we have increased funding for the service by over £20m. This is supporting additional recruitment of call handlers and clinicians, including the addition of two new call centres in Dundee and Glasgow to help facilitate the increase in demand generated by the redesign of urgent care programme.

Furthermore, our new Urgent and Unscheduled Care Collaborative programme, supported by £50 million, will support the implementation of a range of measures to reduce A&E waiting times and improve patient experience, including alternatives to hospital-based treatment.

Scottish Government's Chief Scientist Office (CSO), through NHS Research Scotland, supports clinical research infrastructure that allows Health Boards, researchers, clinicians and industry to improve the quality, efficiency, coordination and impact of clinical research, supporting a broad range of clinical research studies. CSO's approach to funding does not focus on directly commissioning or funding specific research areas, instead providing broad-based support through investments in key infrastructure and wide-remit research grant and fellowship schemes.

Statistics relating to the progress of the Affordable Housing Supply Programme are published quarterly on the Scottish Government website. These figures relate to the number of approvals, site starts, and completions of homes, and can be accessed using the following link: https://www.gov.scot/publications/housing-statistics-for-scotland-new-house-building/.

The published statistics for the Affordable Housing Supply Programme include the latest figures on affordable housing delivery to the end of March 2022, with the next set of quarterly affordable housing statistics covering the period April to June 2022 expected to be published in October.

The Scottish Government is supporting communities who are impacted by water scarcity with an emergency scheme which is providing free bottled water. It is also funding a non means tested grant of up to £800 per household to fund improvements. Households whose Private Water Supply has run dry or who wish to secure grant for improvements should contact their Local Authorities to request assistance.

The Scottish Government is also undertaking five pilot projects to understand the complexities involved in the extension of existing water networks to allow households affected by water scarcity to connect. Results from these pilots are expected in the next few weeks and will inform future investment decisions

Near patient International Normalised Ratio (INR) testing is currently not routinely available on the NHS. However, INR testing is available through primary care settings for those who require it. Individual NHS Boards are responsible for providing services that work best with the needs of their populations.

The Rural Communities Ideas into Action (RCIA) fund was part of a Community Led Local Development (CLLD) test of change pilot developed and delivered in 2021-22 by Scottish Government. The fund made available a total of £3.3 million of CLLD funding to rural and island communities across Scotland.

The learning from this pilot and, previous CLLD funding through the former LEADER fund, has informed development of a new Scottish Government CLLD fund which will deliver £11.6 million in two tranches over 2022-23.

I can confirm that the tranche one phase is progressing and will see £7.6 million allocated to Local Action Groups (LAG) representing rural and island communities who will be responsible for project funding decisions.

Details of tranche two for the delivery of the remaining £4 million within the current financial year are being finalised.

I have asked Teresa Medhurst, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS), to respond. Her response is as follows:

The Scottish Court Custody and Prisoner Escort Service Contract (SCCPES) provides the requirements of the service provider to ensure safe and secure transfer of prisoners between court appearances and mainland prisons.

1. The escort provider has clear processes and Standard Operating Procedures that have been agreed with SPS including:-

• the management of all transfers, regardless of location, including the use of public transport where the use of their vehicle fleet is not possible and other transport is required, such as Ferries, Boats and use of Aircraft.
• agreement of the protocols with Scottish airports for the facilitation of the movement of prisoners through the terminal buildings to facilitate the flight to and from all Scottish Islands where a flight is necessary, timeous and has been deemed to be required.

1. The current service provider has established a robust working relationship with all Scottish airports to facilitate the movement of individuals through the airport and terminal buildings.

In the scenario where an airport is unable to facilitate the transfer, the service provider will arrange, where possible, a flight to another Scottish airport and manage the ongoing movement via road transport if necessary, taking into consideration the impact of the person being escorted and the time spent in transit.

The Scottish Government has not been requested to research a headcount reduction in the Scottish civil service.

The Scottish Government regularly reviews its workforce numbers to ensure affordability, and that the organisation is delivering for the people of Scotland as efficiently and effectively as possible.

The UK Government has not provided details on how their plans to reduce the number of civil servants by 91,000 will affect their staff working in Scotland. There are around 24,800 [1] Civil Servants who are part of the reserved Public Sector in Scotland.

The UK Government plans do not have a direct impact on civil servants who serve the Scottish Government, as the responsibility lies with Scottish Ministers and the Permanent Secretary when it comes to determining our workforce size.

[1] Source: Public Sector Employment In Scotland Statistics For 1st Quarter 2022 .

SCVO estimate that the public sector as a whole invests around £1.8 billion each year to support the work of charities and social enterprises. Of that, around £500m comes from the Scottish Government via a broad range of programmes including those supporting community empowerment, mental wellbeing, children and families and health and social care.

The Scottish Government fund Third Sector organisations for specific projects or for core funding and these organisations often also attract income from other sources. That is a matter for those individual organisations and the Scottish Government do not keep a record of which organisations source additional funding from other sources and which do not.

In ‘A Fairer, Greener Scotland: Programme for Government 2021-22’, the Scottish Government committed to begin work on establishing a register of interests for the judiciary to increase public confidence and improve transparency.

To date, preparatory work on developing proposals for a judicial register of interests has been undertaken and my officials are currently developing options and next steps with the intention of engaging with stakeholders towards the end of 2022.