Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government values and appreciates all the work that Who Cares? Scotland does to support and advocate for all Care Experienced people and we are committed to working with Who Cares? Scotland and other key partners to ensure that we Keep The Promise to care experienced adults and ensure that their voices are heard.

The Scottish Government is bringing forward legislation that will provide further protection to the rights of care experienced, children, young people and adults. This includes:

• A commitment to Scotland being the first UK nation to incorporate the UNCRC into domestic law, ensuring we are a country that respects, protects and fulfils children's rights.
• The Children's Care and Justice (Scotland) Bill, which is presently going through Parliament, and if agreed will bring an end to the placement of 16 and 17 years olds in young offenders institutions, and increase the age of referral to the Children's Hearing System to 18.
• A commitment to a Promise Bill by the end of this Parliamentary session, to make any further legislative changes required to Keep The Promise for children, young people and adults.
  

The financial pressures across public services, not just health care, are by far, the most challenging since devolution as a result of rising inflation, and the ongoing impact of Covid and Brexit.

It is therefore necessary to make very challenging decisions, including reprofiling budgets, across Government in order to meet our statutory requirement to deliver a balanced budget.

Our published delivery plan, linked here Care in the Digital Age: Delivery Plan 2023-24 – gov.scot (www.gov.scot), reflects our planned deliverables against the current budget which includes the agreed savings of £11.6m.

With regard to the reasons behind the rationale for budget reprofiling, the exceptionally challenging financial conditions as outlined in the letter from DFM and Cabinet Secretary for Finance to the Convenor, regarding “Update on 2023 – 2024 In Year Budget Changes” on the 21 November 2023 advise these.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-23097 on 4 December 2023. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers .

The Scottish Government are not seeking to increase the number of plans for individual health conditions and are therefore not developing a national strategy to tackle chronic kidney disease. Rather, we are focussed on how we can best support Health Boards to deliver high quality, value-based, person-centred care for all people, irrespective of condition.

As part of the recently concluded information gathering exercise on the provision of stoma care and stoma specialist nurse coverage across Scotland's 14 territorial health boards, all boards supplied information on the stoma services that they provide, particularly with regard to care for stoma patients once they return home after their surgery. This information will be a key element of the consideration by the Scottish Executive Nurse Directors (SEND) of the results of the exercise.

As part of the recently concluded information gathering exercise on the provision of stoma care and stoma specialist nurse coverage across Scotland's 14 territorial health boards, all boards confirmed that their stoma patients had access to specialist nurse support, whether that be through stoma specialist nurses or other specialisms such as colorectal specialist nurses.

The results of this exercise will be presented to the Scottish Executive Nurse Directors (SEND) to identify any shortfalls and inconsistencies in the level of stoma specialist nursing care provided across the country and the actions that may be needed to address them.

The Scottish Government has recently concluded an information gathering exercise on the provision of stoma care and stoma specialist nurse coverage across Scotland's 14 territorial health boards. The results of this exercise will be presented to the Scottish Executive Nurse Directors (SEND) to identify any shortfalls and inconsistencies in the level of care provided across the country and the actions that may be needed to address them.

This is a matter for the relevant commissioning body. The information requested is not held centrally.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6T-01624 on 7 November 2023.

All answers to parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at Meeting of the Parliament: 07/11/2023 | Scottish Parliament Website