Chamber and committees

Scottish ministers recognise the challenges for education authorities and schools in balancing the varying needs of all children, including those who are disabled. Ultimately, this is a matter for Highland Council who must comply with their legislative responsibilities including the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (as amended by the Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001).

The Scottish Government is committed to improving access to healthcare. That is why it has set NHSScotland a challenging target that no patient should wait more than 18 weeks from referral to treatment by the end of December 2011. To deliver the target the Scottish Government has made available £230 million over three years.

Excellent progress has been made in reducing waiting times across hospital services including in the specialty of ophthalmology. NHSScotland has effectively sustained delivery of the 12 week targets for both a first outpatient consultation following a GP or dentist referral and for inpatient and day case treatment a year early. The 12 week targets are milestone targets towards delivery of the 18 weeks referral to treatment target and was due to be delivered at the end of March 2010.

I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-11099 on 14 April 2008 which contains the data requested for the financial years 2004-05 to 2006-07, and the answer to question S3W-22006 on 25 March 2009 which contains the data requested for the financial year 2007-08. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament''s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/Apps2/Business/PQA/Default.aspx

The following table details the number of clinical negligence cases that settled in 2008-09 together with the sums paid out in those settlements.

Health Board	Settled Cases (No.)	Sums Paid (£)
Ayrshire and Arran	10	420,488
Borders	3	24,000
Dumfries and Galloway	3	161,653
Fife	3	4,555,328
Forth Valley	20	3,480,944
Grampian	14	4,286,163
Greater Glasgow and Clyde	50	8,835,807
Highland	8	282,769
Lanarkshire	7	1,698,250
Lothian	27	1,454,203
Orkney	1	40,000
Tayside	22	732,142
Western Isles	1	3,000
NHS 24	1	25,000
National Waiting Times Board	1	8,000
Total	171	26,007,747

 

Fluctuations in the sums paid from year to year are due to the number of high value settlements occurring in any one year. These tend to relate to birth cases where the sums paid can amount to several million pounds per case. There were three settlements in excess of £4 million in 2008-09.

The following table gives the number of off-sales licences suspended (table 1). The data on suspensions do not include the reason for suspension and it is therefore not possible to identify whether suspensions are due to a particular offence.

Table 1: Off-sales Liquor Licence Suspensions: 2003 to 2007

	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007
Angus	-	-	-	1	-
Clackmannanshire	-	2	-	-	-
Dundee City	2	-	-	-	1
East Ayrshire	-	-	-	-	1
East Dunbartonshire	-	-	-	2	-
East Lothian	-	-	-	-	2
Edinburgh, City of	3	1	1	1	3
Falkirk	-	2	-	-	-
Fife	-	-	-	5	-
Glasgow City	-	1	1	1	1
North Ayrshire	-	-	-	1	-
North Lanarkshire	1	-	4	2	3
Perth and Kinross	-	-	-	-	2
Scottish Borders	1	-	-	-	-
South Lanarkshire	-	1	1	1	-
Stirling	-	-	1	-	1
West Lothian	-	-	-	1	1
Scotland	7	7	8	15	15

Source: Data provided by local authority licensing boards to Scottish Government Justice Analytical Services.

Notes:

1. - Denotes nil.

2. The legislation under which these licences were granted does not make provision for the revocation of a licence. Legislation was recently passed which does make such a provision and came fully into force on 1 September 2009.

3. Transitional arrangements were in place from February 2008 pending the full implementation of the new legislation and data collection was suspended during this period to avoid unnecessary burden on local authorities.

Alcohol consumption is measured in terms of both daily and weekly drinking. The following tables include survey estimates based on consumption on the heaviest drinking day in the previous week and usual weekly consumption.

It is widely accepted that surveys tend to underestimate levels of alcohol consumption. Industry data on alcohol sales suggest that consumption levels may be higher than those estimated from surveys.

Table 1 “ Estimated Alcohol Consumption Level on Heaviest Drinking Day in Past Week by Sex, 2008

Alcohol units per day	Adults (%)
Men
Did not drink in last week	31
Consumed 4 units or less	25
Consumed more than 4 units	44
Women
Did not drink in last week	42
Consumed 3 units or less	21
Consumed more than 3 units	36

Source: Scottish Health Survey.

Notes:

1. The sum of the constituent parts may not add up to 100% due to rounding.

2. Government recommendations in relation to daily drinking are that men should not drink more than four units and women more than three units on a regular basis. It is also recommended that both men and women have two alcohol free days a week.

Table 2 “ Estimated Usual Weekly Alcohol Consumption Level by Sex, 2008

Alcohol Units Per Week	Adults (%)
Men
Never drank alcohol	4
Ex-drinker	6
Consumed 21 units or less	60
Consumed more than 21 units	30
Women
Never drank alcohol	7
Ex-drinker	6
Consumed 14 units or less	67
Consumed more than 14 units	20

Source: Scottish Health Survey.

Note: 1. The guidance in relation to weekly drinking levels are that men should not drink more than 21 units and women not more than 14 units per week.

Table 3 “ Proportion Drinking within Daily and Weekly Recommended Alcohol Consumption Limits by Sex, 2008

Proportion Drinking Within Limits1	Adults (%)
Men
Daily limits (4 or less)	56
Weekly limits (21 or less)	70
Both daily and weekly limits	49
Women
Daily limits (3 or less)	64
Weekly limits (14 or less)	80
Both daily and weekly limits	60

Source: Scottish Health Survey.

Note: 1. Includes those who did not drink at all.

NHS boards are expected to put such plans in place, in the light of the guidance in the Better Heart Disease and Stroke Care Action Plan on developing models to support the delivery of stroke thrombolysis. In particular, the action plan asks NHS boards, through their stroke MCNs, to consider appropriate models to facilitate access to thrombolysis for stroke patients, especially in areas with limited medical cover.

Representatives of the Stroke Managed Clinical Network from each NHS board and the Regional Planning Groups met in October 2009 to discuss the action in the Plan for them, in conjunction with the Scottish Ambulance Service and the Scottish Centre for Telehealth (now part of NHS24), to consider how to deliver optimal care in the hyper-acute phase of stroke, including thrombolysis.

The NHS Quality Improvement Scotland (NHS QIS) stroke standards stipulate that thrombolysis services should aim to treat more than five stroke patients per 100,000 population and to ensure that the door to needle time is less than one hour in at least 80% of patients treated. The Scottish Stroke Care Audit is now collecting data which will allow for monitoring of performance against this standard.

Students enrolled in first degree level courses at Scottish institutions and studying planning as their main course typically study for four years (though a number may study for only three years). Planning includes; urban and rural planning, regional planning, transport planning and planning (undefined).

In academic year 2005-06 there were 115 entrants to planning courses studying at degree level at Scottish institutions. In 2006-07 there were 100 and in 2007-08 there were 125. Assuming each student studies continuously for four years and successfully completes their qualification, we would estimate that in 2009-10 there will be in the region of 115 graduates, 100 in 2010-11 and 125 in 2011-12. These figures do not include students enrolled on courses where planning is a minor component of their overall qualification.

The number and percentage of new outpatient attendances broken down by clinical specialty for financial year ending 31 March 2009 is shown in the following table.

Table: NHSScotland New Outpatient Attendances by Specialty. Financial Year Ending 31 March 2009

Specialty	Number of New Outpatient Attendances	Percentage of Total New Outpatient Attendances
Adolescent Psychiatry	1,955	0.1
Allergy	378	0.0
Anaesthetics	8,630	0.6
Cardiology	38,667	2.7
Cardiothoracic Surgery	4,132	0.3
Child Psychiatry	3,396	0.2
Chiropodists/podiatrists	3	0.0
Clinical Chemistry	31	0.0
Clinical Genetics	4,389	0.3
Clinical Oncology	12,001	0.8
Communicable Diseases	4,100	0.3
Dermatology	113,125	7.8
Diagnostic Radiology	171	0.0
Ear, Nose & Throat (ENT)	102,920	7.1
Endocrinology & Diabetes	17,435	1.2
Forensic Psychiatry	519	0.0
Gastroenterology	49,421	3.4
General Medicine	46,049	3.2
General Psychiatry	31,026	2.1
General Surgery	159,915	11.0
Genito-Urinary Medicine	35,892	2.5
Geriatric Medicine	15,118	1.0
GP Obstetrics	90	0.0
GP Other than Obstetrics	27,227	1.9
Gynaecology	101,716	7.0
Haematology	11,436	0.8
Homeopathy	1,687	0.1
Immunology	340	0.0
Learning Disability	1,096	0.1
Medical Oncology	4,142	0.3
Medical Paediatrics	28,643	2.0
Nephrology	5,428	0.4
Neurology	31,053	2.1
Neurosurgery	7,663	0.5
Obstetrics	57,065	3.9
Ophthalmology	122,598	8.4
Orthopaedics	190,609	13.1
Oral Medicine	4,195	0.3
Oral Surgery	41,520	2.9
Orthodontics	10,963	0.8
Paediatric Dentistry	6,390	0.4
Palliative Medicine	786	0.1
Plastic Surgery	23,168	1.6
Psychiatry of Old Age	14,307	1.0
Rehabilitation Medicine	3,368	0.2
Respiratory Medicine	25,306	1.7
Restorative Dentistry	9,906	0.7
Rheumatology	20,365	1.4
Surgical Paediatrics	7,738	0.5
Urology	48,054	3.3
Total	1,456,132	100.0

Source: ISD Scotland, ISD(s)1.

Figures relating to previous years are available on the ISD website at:

http://www.isdscotland.org/isd/4156.html.

Details are as follows:

Per Capita Spend 2008-09 (£)

NHS Board
Ayrshire and Arran	1,789
Borders	1,694
Dumfries and Galloway	1,828
Fife	1,605
Forth Valley	1,561
Grampian	1,459
Greater Glasgow and Clyde	1,888
Highland	1,872
Lanarkshire	1,619
Lothian	1,444
Orkney	2,203
Shetland	2,115
Tayside	1,776
Western Isles	2,683

 

The Scottish Government considers that the introduction of a minimum price per unit of alcohol would be capable of complying with Article III.4 of the General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade.