Chamber and committees

Population screening for any health condition is implemented on the advice of the National Screening Committee following examination of the available evidence of the effectiveness of such an intervention. No recommendations have been made regarding screening people over the age of 55 years for arthritic conditions.

The primary care medical services contract requires GP practices to advise and effectively manage patients who are predisposed to, or present with signs and symptoms of, an arthritic condition.

Most of our hospitals, at some point, need to restrict or stop admissions in order to manage emerging issues. These can range from a surge in emergency activity such as a serious accident requiring the treatment of a number of casualties, through to internal issues such as an outbreak of Norovirus that closes wards and restricts available beds.

There is no universally agreed definition of a Red Alert within NHS Scotland. What all NHS boards and hospitals have are clearly set out plans and procedures for coping with surges in activity. This allows the continued effective and appropriate management of patients during any period of pressure along with a return to normal operating conditions as soon as is practicable.

As part of the on-going review of statistical collections, the Scottish Government will review all data collections to ensure they meet the needs of the National Performance Framework and to continue to develop the evidence base around outcomes and the effectiveness of interventions. In addition we will be working with Local Government and the broader public sector to develop the evidence base required to support outcome agreements and on the reduction of the information burden associated with the removal of ring fencing around certain allocations. This work will also align with our response to the Crerar Review.

We are working to continue to increase the dental workforce and to improve dental facilities.

More dental students are graduating from the dental schools and the creation of a third dental school in Aberdeen will also increase the number of dentists available for work in Scotland. In addition, a number of projects which received funding under the Primary and Community Care Premises Modernisation Programme are due to be completed this financial year.

The dental bursary scheme has also proved popular with over 460 students currently in receipt of the dental bursary which ties students into the NHS in Scotland for a period of up to five years following graduation.

Sportscotland maintain a database of sporting facilities in Scotland that are open to the public and known to them. If a facility receives an award from sportscotland it is subject to regular monitoring to ensure that the terms of the award are met. If a facility is disposed of within the prescriptive period of the award (10 or 25 years depending on the level of the award) sportscotland will seek to recover all or part of the original award, or seek to have that value reinvested in similar facilities. The decision on whether a facility is to close is entirely a matter for the owners and operators of the facility.

The majority of dentists who provide NHS general dental services are independent contractors, i.e. private dentists. Most dentists provide a mix of both NHS and private treatment. A number of financial measures have been put in place over the last few years to recruit dentists to the NHS and to support those dentists who provide NHS treatment. Dentists providing mainly private treatment do not benefit from these allowances, or only receive a small proportion of an allowance, but can take steps to remedy this situation by providing more NHS treatment.

Good progress is being made and the Scottish Government has no plans to make a statement to the Parliament.

Selection and recruitment is well advanced in Scotland and the process closed to applications on 18 January. There were around 7,000 applications for around 1,300 posts at various Speciality Training and GP Training levels. Because candidates were able to make multiple applications, the applicant pool is around 6,000 junior doctors. This overall ratio of applications to vacancies is in line with our expectations and similar to that for the rest of the UK. Many applicants will have applied for posts elsewhere in the UK and abroad and it is expected that, as in previous years, the applicant pool in Scotland will continue to contract as selection proceeds. Details of the number of applications proceeding to short listing and vacancies per speciality are available on the MMC Scotland website at:

http://www.mmc.scot.nhs.uk/documents/MMCShortlistingStatistics-2008forMMCUpdatev2.pdf.

http://www.mmc.scot.nhs.uk/documents/FTSTANumberswithSTvacancies-AllScotland-forwebsite.pdf.

As always, some specialities are more popular than others with applications per post appearing high in comparison to the overall picture, but that is not unusual.

Applicants short-listed for interviews will be able to rank their speciality and deanery preferences in order (east, north, south east and west). Short-listing and interviewing is already well underway and offers of posts will be made in three waves from 26 March to16 April. This approach gives candidates who do not secure their first preference in the first wave continued opportunities to secure posts. NHS boards will offer formal contracts of employment from 1 May to 31 July, ensuring that successful candidates are in post in August with no disruption to service continuity.

Although the practicalities are challenging for all concerned, the process is being undertaken with the full support of all stakeholders, including the junior doctors themselves. There are no significant problems at present.

The Housing Improvement Task Force (established by the previous administration to consider issues relating to housing quality in the private sector and the house buying and selling process) recommended that legislation with the purpose of putting minimum safeguards into place for buyers could be considered - but only if it proved impossible for the various parties to reach agreement. We support voluntary moves towards standard missives for new builds, since that approach holds out most hope of satisfying all parties.

We are currently awaiting the outcome of the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) market study into home building in the UK which will hopefully cast light on the extent and seriousness of this problem. I receive little correspondence on the issue. I understand that the report is expected in the autumn. My officials are to meet OFT in April to consider the preliminary results of the study.

There are no plans to legislate in this area.

I have no plans to introduce such a policy.

Information on how many management consultants have been employed by NHSScotland is not centrally available.

Information available centrally is only for medical and dental consultants employed in NHSScotland. This information is published on the Scottish Health Statistics website under Workforce Statistics at www.isdscotland.org/workforce in the Medical and Dental section of the website. Latest available data is at 30 September 2007.