Chamber and committees

Council tax benefit isadministered by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). Estimates of theamount of unclaimed council tax benefit are only available at a Great Britainlevel, and not at a Scotland or local authority level. The DWP’s latest estimateof the amount of unclaimed council tax benefit for the whole of Great Britainfor 2004-05 was in the range between £1,330 million and £1,800 million. Theestimated range simply reflects the uncertainty given the sample used.

In the first year ofoperation (2006-07) the concessionary fares scheme for older and disabled peopleexperienced no funding deficits.

The specific informationrequested is not available routinely.

Some information on thenumber of detoxification beds for drugmisusers may be contained within alcoholand drug action team corporate action plans. These can be accessed on the DrugMisuse Information Scotland website:

http://www.drugmisuse.isdscotland.org/dat/cap/dat.htm.

Specific information on thenumber of detoxification beds for drugs misusers may also be available directlyfrom NHS boards.

The number of dentists(headcount) who have provided NHS general dental services, broken down by NHSboard, is shown in the following table. It is not possible to express thesenumbers as a percentage of all dentists, as information on dentists who provideonly private treatment is not held centrally.

Number of Dentists^1,2,3 who have Provided NHS General DentalServices in the Years Ending 31 March 1999-2006

NHS Board	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006
Scotland	1,958	1,982	1,991	2,037	2,078	2,105	2,153	2,301
Argyll and Clyde	183	176	180	183	179	186	182	199
Ayrshire and Arran	141	135	133	131	134	143	147	150
Borders	42	42	43	45	43	39	39	42
Dumfries and Galloway	43	47	43	40	42	44	43	44
Fife	143	142	145	143	147	138	140	171
Forth Valley	96	98	100	105	108	104	112	119
Grampian	173	174	169	171	177	182	191	198
Greater Glasgow	409	416	416	430	438	445	474	489
Highland	82	83	82	87	85	85	92	100
Lanarkshire	202	207	205	209	217	229	234	237
Lothian	356	364	364	372	383	384	384	395
Orkney	4	6	6	7	6	9	9	11
Shetland	7	8	7	11	11	12	12	13
Tayside	172	175	180	179	184	179	183	211
Western Isles	12	12	12	7	10	9	10	14

Source: Management Information and DentalAccounting System.

Notes

1. Includes non-salaried principal dentists, GDSsalaried dentists, assistants and vocational trainees.

2. Data for years prior to the year ending 31 March2006 have been revised. Double/triple counting within the General DentalService (GDS) has been eliminated.

3. Due to improvements in the collection of information onGDS salaried dentists, figures from September 2005 include some GDS salaried dentistsnot previously recorded. There are a number of cases where a salaried post willbe recorded under a generic name and not under the name of a specific dentist.Numerous dentists may work in this post at any given time. For years prior toSeptember 2005 it was assumed that, since there was no named individualrecorded, a permanent dentist was not in post. As a result, all posts recordedwithout a named individual were previously excluded from GDS salaried dentistcounts. However, information is now available on the individuals who fill theseposts. These dentists can now be included in the GDS salaried dentist count,which has resulted in a significant increase in the number of salarieddentists.

Veterans’ issues, includingcommemorative events and paying for memorials, are a reserved matter for theWestminster Government and the responsibility of the Ministry of Defence.Consequently the Scottish Government has no dedicated budget for commemorativeevents or memorials. However, all requests for funding are considered on theirown merits and in recent years the Scottish Government has made significantcontributions to events commemorating Scottish veterans, including NationalVeterans Day and the commemoration of the 60^th anniversary of theend of the Second World War.

Veteran’s issues such ascommemorative events are a reserved matter for the Westminstergovernment and to the Ministry of Defence, including the striking and awardingof military campaign medals which is in the preserve of Her Majesty The Queen.Scottish Ministers however are open to consider formal applications for fundingfrom groups and organisations on a case-by-case basis.

Between 1999-00 and 2001-02our records show that the Government received no formal applications forfunding for either war memorials or commemorations. In 2002-03 an applicationfor funding for a war memorial from the Normandy Veteran’s Association wasreceived but was declined. In 2003-04 the Executive received no formalapplications for funding.

In 2004-05 the Governmentreceived two applications for funding. The McCrae’s Battalion Trust received acontribution of £5,000 for the Great Hearts War Memorial at Contalmaison inNorthern France, and the 51st Highland Division Veterans Pilgrimage Associationreceived £1,000 towards the erection of their memorial in Normandy.

In 2005-06 the Governmentprovided funding totalling £34,168.10 to Veterans Scotland for a series ofcommemorative celebrations marking the 60^th anniversary of the endof World War II. In 2006-07 the Government contributed £9,910.93 to the DundeeCombined Ex-Services Association for the inaugural National Veterans Daycommemorations and this year has made up to £5,000 available to theAssociation.

In addition, in 2007-08 the Government’sEuropean Office agreed to a contribution of £5,000 towards the commemorativeevents to take place in Zonnebeke, Belgium in August this year to mark the contribution ofScottish soldiers during the First World War.

In addition, as part oftheir regular programme of repair and maintenance of historic monuments,Historic Scotland have carried out works and repairs during this period to the Scottish National War Memorial at Edinburgh Castle and to the Argyll andSutherland Memorial at Stirling Castle totalling approximately £70,000.

I refer the member to thequestion S3W-2049 answered on 26 July 2007. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’swebsite, the search facility for which can be found at: http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.

The Scottish Government believes that all such matters should be the responsibility of the Scottish Parliament and Scottish ministers. There are no immediate plans to make representations on this issue.

Information on plannedadmissions for in-patient and day case treatment that have been cancelled forthe years ending 31 March 2003 to 2006 by NHS board is shown in the followingtable. Data for the year ending 31 March 2007 is not yet complete.

Table 1: Cancellation ofPlanned Admissions for In-Patient or Day Case Treatment;

By Health Board Area: Years ending 31 March 2003-2007

In-patients	2003	2004	2005	2006
Scotland	9,380	7,959	6,898	7,111
Ayrshire and Arran	197	170	366	478
Borders1	148	119	159	70
Fife	373	543	498	594
Greater Glasgow and Clyde1	3,829	2,274	1,639	1,486
Highland	440	541	522	536
Lanarkshire	322	542	539	138
Grampian	1,036	1,116	1,013	1,000
Orkney	7	6	3	17
Lothian	1,347	1,441	1,164	1,609
Tayside	850	711	652	545
Forth Valley	277	459	321	620
Western Isles	14	36	22	12
Dumfries and Galloway1	534	-	-	-
Shetland	6	1	-	6

 

Day cases	2003	2004	2005	2006
Scotland	7,341	7,383	8,081	7,513
Ayrshire and Arran	79	73	130	179
Borders1	180	142	180	67
Fife	576	645	747	675
Greater Glasgow and Clyde1	2,433	2,087	1,861	1,679
Highland	448	743	1,053	1,103
Lanarkshire	979	950	1,447	365
Grampian	821	786	704	625
Orkney	8	9	19	24
Lothian	1,015	968	1,029	1,490
Tayside	450	474	539	493
Forth Valley	327	471	312	753
Western Isles	22	34	53	19
Dumfries and Galloway1	-	-	-	-
Shetland	3	1	7	41

Note:1 Information is missing/incomplete for the following locations:

Borders General Hospital; year ending 2006

SouthernGeneral Hospital; years ending 2003, 2005and 2006

VictoriaInfirmary, Glasgow; years ending 2005 and 2006

Dumfriesand Galloway Royal Infirmary; years ending 2004, 2005 and 2006.

The number of sex offendersrecorded by the Scottish Police Services Authority as being registered withScottish Police Forces in the last five years is shown in the following table.

Year	Number of Registrations
2002	1,724
2003	1,926
2004	2,244
2005	2,677
2006	3,122
2007 (1 June)	3,445