Chamber and committees

As I announced in Parliament on 22 March, the Scottish Executive has agreed to hypothecate Scotland's share of the tobacco tax to the health budget and to direct £26 million to support health improvements and public health initiatives. Detailed decisions on how these resources will be allocated are still to be taken.

This important project is now being taken forward within the Scottish Care Information (SCI) programme which was announced on 21 April. Interested bidding consortia have been advised accordingly.

It is estimated that fewer than 20% of young people who have been looked after by local authorities go into further and higher education.

Improving educational achievements for this vulnerable group of young people is one of our priorities in developing a strategic framework for Children's Services. Our social justice targets also include a commitment that all young people leaving care will achieve at least standard grades in Mathematics and English by 2003.

Scotland's cancer survival record is sometimes inappropriately compared with that of European countries and the USA. Scotland's cancer registry collects data on all cancer registrations across the total population - unlike those of many of its European and USA counterparts - which can lead to unfavourable comparisons of outcomes.

The Scottish Cancer Registry/Cancer Intelligence Unit continuously scrutinise our data on survival and are involved in European and USA programmes of comparative survival analysis, working together in striving to understand the reasons for the apparent differences in survival.

I expect the latest cancer survival data to be published in the near future and I am confident that this will show improvements in Scotland's record over the last 20 to 25 years.

Cancer continues as one of the three clinical priorities for the NHS in Scotland. The Scottish Executive continues to invest in and support a wide range of activities designed to improve the diagnosis and treatment of cancer.

An additional £173 million has been allocated to the Health budget in the current financial year as a result of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's budget. I announced on 2 May that £60 million of this sum would be allocated to health boards on a formula basis and that this should be used to address specified priority areas. I have also announced on 22 March that £26 million would be earmarked for public health and health improvement measures. I am currently considering, together with ministerial colleagues, how best to utilise the remaining resources to ensure that the maximum improvement in services and health is achieved. Our decisions will be informed by a range of measures being put in place to consider the strategic development of the NHSiS, including a new Modernisation Board.

Decisions on the allocation of the further additional sums of £268 million, £687 million and £1,140 million which have been allocated to the health budget for the next three years will also be informed by this work and by wider budget consultation which is currently underway.

I refer to my answer to question S1W-5591.

The latest year for which information is provided in the OECD health database on hospital beds in other countries is 1997, and the figures show that Scotland has more hospital beds per 1,000 population than the average for those EU countries for which figures are available. The number of acute and psychiatric beds in Scotland in 1997 was 5.8 per 1,000 population compared with an average of 5.7 beds per 1,000 population in the following countries: Austria, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

The figures taken from the OECD health database should be treated with caution because of differences between countries in the definition of hospital beds and in the methods used to calculate bed numbers. The figures for Scotland are taken from Scottish Health Statistics 1999 and include all specialty groups other than geriatric long stay and learning disabilities. (These specialties have been excluded from the Scottish estimate to provide a figure that is consistent with those in the OECD database.)

The number of hospital beds does not provide a useful measure of the level, quality or effectiveness of services provided in the NHS. Changes in the pattern of care have resulted in reductions in the number of hospital beds, but this has been accompanied by a substantial rise in the number of patients treated and by improvements in standards of care. In the acute sector, bed numbers have reduced because of greater use of day surgery and shorter lengths of stay. In psychiatric specialties bed numbers have fallen because of the shift towards caring for patients in the community. These trends are also seen in the figures for other EU countries where bed numbers in acute and psychiatric specialties have been falling.

NHS Trusts are responsible for the operation of staff disciplinary procedures. We are currently aware of one hospital doctor in Scotland who is suspended from duty.

The Scottish Executive has recently worked with trusts to put in place a range of measures to improve and streamline the disciplinary process for medical staff. Trusts have been encouraged to consider alternatives to suspension. Where suspension is considered necessary, in the interests of patient safety, the new measures will shorten the time that individuals spend on suspension and therefore reduce costs. We do not hold central records of other NHS staff groups on suspension.

Lothian Primary Care NHS Trust has undertaken a review of its physiotherapy services with a view to improving services to patients and bringing private physiotherapy contracts into the NHS. Completion of this process is likely to take some time as it is dependent on the recruitment of suitably trained physiotherapists. Consequently, a phased programme of change is being undertaken to ensure that patient waiting times are not compromised.

The Scottish Executive and the Scottish Council for Postgraduate Medical and Dental Education recently carried out an annual review of the Specialist Registrar (SpR) establishment. The review determines the numbers of higher specialist training numbers available for each specialty, which in turn determines the number of doctors who will be qualified to fill consultant vacancies in the future.

It has been agreed that the number of SpRs in both medical and clinical oncology will be increased. Medical oncology will benefit from an increase of five posts from 12 to 17 and clinical oncology will rise by an additional seven posts, from 16 to 23.

Work is being undertaken, commissioned by the Scottish Cancer Group and funded by the Health Department's Clinical Resource and Audit Group, to model future trends in cancer incidence taking into account available evidence relating to new developments/interventions and emerging technological advances in managing cancer. The results of this work - which is expected later this year - will be valuable in informing future services and workforce planning for the various clinical specialties involved in the treatment and care of people with cancer.