Chamber and committees

Questions and answers

Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for MSPs to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)
Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

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Question reference: S6W-42273

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 02 December 2025
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 11 December 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the recent publication of the report by Carers Scotland, State of Caring, The cost of caring in Scotland 2025, which found that 62% of parent carers with a disabled child were cutting back on essentials such as heating and food to make ends meet, what action it is taking to address poverty amongst carers, and whether the upcoming Scottish Budget will consider carer poverty, including amongst parent carers of disabled children.

Social Security Scotland provides three benefits specifically for unpaid carers, including Carer’s Allowance Supplement which provides extra support only available in Scotland. Carer’s Allowance Supplement is worth £587 in 2025/26 with eligible carers receiving the most recent payment of £293.50 from the 4th of December. From March 2026 we will make further improvements to support for unpaid carers, including new extra support for carers getting Carer Support Payment and caring for more than one person – a Carer Additional Person Payment worth £520 a year for each additional person being cared for.

Parents of disabled children can also benefit from support through Child Disability Payment, Child Winter Heating Payment, and our five family payments, including Scottish Child Payment. We are committed to uprating all forms of assistance delivered under the Social Security (Scotland) Act 2018 so that they retain their value as costs rise.

Beyond social security, parents across Scotland can benefit from a range of support under our cost-of-living guarantee, including free school meals and funded childcare hours.

Scottish Ministers are considering the Scottish budget for 2026-27, and this will be announced on 13 January 2026.

Question reference: S6W-42500

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 December 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 7 January 2026

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to improve the information that adult patients receive regarding diabetes technology treatment options.

Question reference: S6W-42501

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 December 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 7 January 2026

To ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking to reduce adult patient waiting times for access to diabetes technology.

Question reference: S6W-42425

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 08 December 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 5 January 2026

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-42190 by Neil Gray on 5 December 2025, how many NHS 24 staff it calculated were needed for staffing levels to meet the required service standards for winter 2025-26, broken down by job role.

Question reference: S6T-02794

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 08 December 2025
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 9 December 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of NHS Ayrshire and Arran suspending routine hospital visits due to a sharp increase in flu cases, whether it will provide an update on the action that it is taking to support NHS boards in relation to increasing winter pressures.

Question reference: S6W-42194

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 27 November 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 8 December 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, further to its paper, Surge and Winter Preparedness in Health and Social Care Services National Planning Priorities and Principles, which was published in November 2025, how national planning priorities and principles will address corridor care by NHS Scotland in winter 2025-26.

The National Planning Priorities and Principles require local systems to maximise system capacity and capability by improving patient flow and access, reducing delayed discharges and long waits, and minimising unmet need. This includes strengthening urgent and unscheduled care pathways and ensuring people receive the right care, in the right place at the right time.

The Scottish Government recognises this as a critical issue for patient safety and dignity. Measures include integrated planning, additional surge beds, Hospital at Home expansion to 2,000 beds, escalation frameworks an investment of £20 million to increase social care capacity and strengthen support at emergency department front doors. These measures are designed to reduce pressure on emergency departments and hospital capacity, thereby minimising the circumstances that can lead to corridor care. Health Boards are expected to use data and intelligence to support real-time decisions during periods of surge.

These actions are underpinned by the Operational Improvement Plan and overseen nationally through the Collaborative Response and Assurance Group, ensuring accountability and consistency across Scotland.

Question reference: S6W-42191

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 27 November 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 8 December 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how many additional (a) paramedics and (b) ambulance care assistants have been recruited to support the Scottish Ambulance Service in winter 2025-26, and where they will be based, broken down by (i) Scottish Ambulance Service (A) station and (B) region and (ii) NHS board area.

Question reference: S6W-42410

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 05 December 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 19 December 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking to increase the inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) specialist nursing workforce to meet the IBD standards, in light of the finding in Crohn's & Colitis UK's research that almost a third of services in Scotland are not meeting safe staffing levels.

Question reference: S6W-42190

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 27 November 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 5 December 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how many additional staff have been recruited to NHS 24 for winter 2025-26, and how it determined (a) the number required and (b) their geographical placement.

NHS 24 current staffing levels are at their highest to date, enabling the strongest level of treatment capacity on record. So far this year, NHS 24 has successfully recruited 71 Call Handlers and 51 Clinical Supervisors.

Required workforce is based on detailed call forecasting and demand modelling, using historical winter data and current trends to predict patient demand, call durations, and staffing requirements. These inputs feed into an algorithm to calculate staffing levels required to meet service standards.

Geographical placement is not a primary consideration, as NHS 24’s national telephony system routes calls in real time to available staff across Scotland.

Question reference: S6W-42195

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 27 November 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 5 December 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement on 2025-26 Winter Preparedness by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care on 13 November 2025, for what reason this statement was made at a later point in the year than the similar statement for 2024-25, which was delivered on 24 September 2024.

The statement on 13 November covered both winter preparedness and the broader work we have been undertaking on national planning. The timing reflects the Scottish Government’s strategic shift toward embedding surge and winter planning as a core year-round operational priority, rather than a discrete seasonal exercise.

It is important to recognise that the statement did not mark the start of the winter planning process, but rather was an opportunity to communicate to Parliament the work being undertaken within the context of national planning. Planning for winter pressures began immediately after last winter, informed by lessons learned from last year.