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-32151

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 20 December 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how many Hospital at Home beds are currently provided.

Data published by Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS) showed that in September 2024, Older Adult’s Hospital at Home services provided the equivalent of 510 beds, similar to the size of Royal Alexandra Hospital and larger than University Hospital Wishaw.

Between July and September this year, Hospital at Home services for Older People grew by almost 14% compared to the same period in the previous year with over 4,000 patients managed by the service.

Hospital at Home capacity is in place across a range of other pathways such as Outpatient Parenteral Antimicrobial Therapy, Respiratory and Heart Failure. Published data is not currently available.

Question reference: S6W-32150

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 20 December 2024

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a breakdown of the £2.2 billion funding that was announced for primary care services in its draft Budget 2025-26.

Further detail on the Scottish Government’s proposed £2.2 billion funding for primary care can be found in the 2025-26 Level 4 tables published along the Budget itself - Supporting documents - Scottish Budget 2025 to 2026 - gov.scot.

In addition to the direct funding increase of over £160 million (7.8%) for primary care, we plan to further invest in primary and community care services from the commitment to provide £100 million “Reform and Improvement measures funding” to alleviate waiting time and hospital occupancy pressures.

Question reference: S6W-32152

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 20 December 2024

To ask the Scottish Government when the additional 600 beds for the Hospital at Home programme will be delivered, broken down by the number for each NHS board.

Question reference: S6W-32153

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 20 December 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how many advanced nurse practitioners are currently working in general practice, broken down by NHS board area.

Advanced Nurse Practitioners (ANPs) working in General Practice are employed by either Health Boards or by GP practices.

Data on the whole-time equivalent (WTE) ANP workforce employed directly by Health Boards is published annually by the Scottish Government in the Primary care improvement plans: implementation progress summary. This data is set out in the following table.

NHS Board	Urgent Care (Advanced Practitioners): ANPs – WTE
Ayrshire and Arran	1.0
Borders	16.0
Dumfries and Galloway	8.5
Fife	20.2
Forth Valley	26.0
Grampian	17.3
Greater Glasgow and Clyde	37.6
Highland	0.0
Lanarkshire	26.0
Lothian	39.0
Orkney	0.0
Shetland	1.5
Tayside	26.5
Western Isles	4.9

Data on the ANP workforce employed by GP practices is published annually by NHS Education for Scotland (NES) in the General Practice Workforce Survey report. This reports that as of March 2024, there are 742 ANPs (596.1 WTE) employed by GP practices. This report does not include a breakdown by Health Board.

Question reference: S6W-32146

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 12 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 19 December 2024

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a breakdown of the £100 million of funding that has been allocated in its draft Budget 2025-26 under the budget line Reform and Improvement Measures.

To address delayed discharge and reduce waiting lists, £200 million has been allocated in the 2025-26 Budget. Funding will be targeted at specialties with long waits to ensure that by March 2026, no patient will wait longer than 12 months for a new outpatient appointment or inpatient / day case treatment.

The ‘Improving Outcomes and Reform’ funding includes the following budgets: Access Support, Waiting Times Improvement Plan, Board Recovery (including NTC) National Treatment Centres, Modernising Patient Pathways (CfSD),Winter Funding, Urgent Care, Unscheduled Care, Detect Cancer Early (including new Manifesto commitment), Cancer Policy, Cancer Recovery Plan, Trauma Networks and Waiting Times.

Question reference: S6O-04141

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 December 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 19 December 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on whether Dumbarton Castle is an important cultural asset.

Question reference: S6W-31483

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 19 November 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 28 November 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-30461 by Neil Gray on 22 October 2024, whether it will provide a breakdown of how the £4,474,000 allocated to the National Elective Coordination Unit will be spent.

Funding allocated to the Centre for Sustainable Delivery’s National Elective Co-ordination Unit from the additional £30m for planned care has been used to support collaborative working with Boards to maximise capacity and provide centralised, coordinated, and innovative approaches to waiting times recovery. Specifically, funding has been directed towards the following:

National Dermatology campaign. This includes patient digitally supported validation; high volume image capture; patient imaging and triage activity.
National Endoscopy campaign, including validation and activity.
Minor Operations: management of campaign, waiting lists, booking and clinics in urology and orthopaedics for most challenged health boards.
Breast see and treat activity for NHS Grampian.

Question reference: S6F-03591

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 25 November 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 28 November 2024

To ask the First Minister for what reason at least 69,000 patients reportedly waited more than an hour to be triaged in A&E departments in the first half of this year.

Question reference: S6W-30881

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 25 October 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 14 November 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how it will ensure that inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) services are appropriately resourced and staffed to meet the needs of the reported over 50,000 people in Scotland with Crohn’s disease and colitis.

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that all people in Scotland living with Inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD), including Crohn's disease and colitis, are able to access the best possible care and support, and benefit from healthcare services that are safe, effective and put people at the centre of their care.

Scottish Government workforce planning guidance requires Boards to take a demand-led approach by determining future staffing requirements in line with healthcare needs within their locality.

Speciality training numbers are reviewed and considered annually by the Scottish Shape of Training Transition Group (SSoTTG), with subsequent recommendations made to Scottish Ministers around the need to increase training establishments. The most recent uplift in Gastroenterology (as the specialty which treats IBD) took place in 2022 when 10 additional posts were created. This saw the overall number of speciality training places on Scottish Gastroenterology training programmes increase to 47.

Question reference: S6W-30700

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 16 October 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 11 November 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-26793 by Jenni Minto on 2 May 2024, whether it has any plans to record this data, and what work has been undertaken with key stakeholders to determine the best ways to improve access to spirometry testing in respiratory care.

We recognise the importance of having access to meaningful data in relation to respiratory services and we continue to aim to develop a national respiratory audit programme with Public Health Scotland to achieve this. We have not been able to progress this this financial year due to the challenging fiscal position we face, but we aim to do so in the financial year 2025 to 2026.

Spirometry is already a key recommendation in national clinical guidelines, and we expect clinicians to deliver care in line with all relevant clinical guidelines when assessing patients who present themselves at healthcare settings with respiratory symptoms.