Chamber and committees

The specific information requested is not collected centrally.

The information requested will be available from the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe) (Bib. Number 54628).

The available information is given in the following table.

The Emergency Workers (Scotland)Act 2005 was introduced in May 2005 and offences committed after this date can be prosecuted under this legislation. As the information in the following table is based on date of verdict or sentence, this is the probable reason for the rise in cases shown in the table from 2005-06 to 2006-07. The legislation was extended in April 2008 to provide doctors, nurses and midwives with protection from obstruction or hindrance whenever they are on duty. These cases would be prosecuted under Section 1(1), which may explain the rise in cases in Section 1(1) from 2008-09 to 2009-10.

Persons proceeded against in Scottish Courts for offences under the Emergency Workers (Scotland)Act 2005^1,2, 2005-06 to 2011-12

1. Where main offence.

2. NHS workers cannot be separately identified from other emergency workers.

3. Assaulting or impeding certain providers of emergency services. Includes constables, memberof the fire brigade, person acting for the Scottish Ambulance Service Board and (from April 2008) registered medical practitioners, nurses and midwives.

4. Assaulting or impeding certain emergency workers responding to emergency circumstances. Includes prison officers, members of Her Majesties Coastguard, members of the crew of a vessel operated by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, social workers, mental health officers and (until April 2008) registered medical practitioners, registered nurses, registered midwives.

5. Assaulting or impeding persons assisting emergency workers.

6. Assaulting or impeding health workers in hospital premises. Includes a registered medical practitioner, a registered nurse, a registered midwife, a person acting for the Scottish Ambulance Service Board.

In relation to the first part of the question, I refer the member to the answer to questions S4W-10425, S4W-10426 and S4W-10428 on 2 November 2012. 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/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

The Scottish Government has no current plans to determine how many people have been diagnosed with sleep apnoea.

The Scottish Government is determined to maximise tourist growth and draw new visitors to Scotland and adventure activity has been indentified as an area of tourism with great growth potential in the industry-led “Tourism Scotland 2020” strategy. We recognise that the promotion of snow sports and our ski centres is one way to do this and, with 2013 having been designated the Year of Natural Scotland, we have a great opportunity to promote snowsports in Scotland.

VisitScotland is a member of the Snowsports Scotland Marketing Group (SSMG) and assists the group in producing and implementing an annual marketing plan. SSMG has also recently been awarded £24,000 from the VisitScotland Growth Fund to support its ‘Getting Started’ initiative on World Snow Day to encourage participation in snowsports in Scotland.

We are working closely and collectively with the centres, our enterprise agencies, sportscotland and VisitScotland to enable this important sector of our tourism industry to benefit from a more focussed and strategic support structure. That process has included a series of meetings with the centres. I have personally met with the ski centres on three occasions since taking up the role as the Minister for Energy, Enterprise and Tourism. The first meeting took place on 24 October 2011 to provide me with the opportunity to hear first hand, what the centres’ expectations and aspirations are for the industry’s future development are.

I have also chaired a meeting on 24 May 2012, following the 2011-12 season, at the Lecht Snowsports Centre. The most recent engagement took place on 3 October 2012 when I met with representatives from the BBC, STV and the centres to explore how information on winter sports is publicised in the broadcast media, how information could be shared between the centres and broadcasters and the potential for improving information on snow conditions to allow snowsports enthusiasts to plan excursions more effectively, thereby increasing participation.

I also plan to show the Scottish Government’s support for snowsports in Scotland next month when I visit one of the ski centres to acknowledge the hard work being done to encourage snowsport participants of all levels to make the most of Scotland’s ski centres.

This information is not collected centrally.

Through the Active Schools programme and in partnership with Snowsport Scotland, school children are able to access a range of opportunities to learn to ski. This has seen a steady increase in the number of school age pupils skiing.

Audiology Services is included in the Scottish Government’s target that no patient should wait more than 18 weeks from a GP referral to start of treatment since the end of 2011.

Information on Audiology services is collected on an aggregated form. Consequently, it is not possible to provide the information requested. However, information on the median wait from referral to assessment, assessment to fitting of a hearing aid and from referral to a one stop clinic in each financial year from July 2009 (first published data) to 31 September 2012 (latest available published data), by NHS board is provided in the following table.

Nationally collected waiting times information for Audiology services is relatively new data and figures should be treated with caution. ISD continue to work with NHS boards to improve data quality.

Experienced Waiting Time from Referral to Audiology Assessment

Median Waiting Time from Assessment to Fitting of Hearing Aid from Each Financial Year from July 2009 to September 2012

Median Waiting Time (Weeks) from Referral to One-Stop Clinic

Source: ISD Scotland.

Notes:

a. Data not available until January 2012

b. Data not available for until December 2009.

c. Data not available from December 2009 to March 2010

d. Data not available from March 2010 to June 2010

e. Data for Clyde sites not available until June 2011.

f. Data not available from October 2009 to December 2009 and from February 2010 to April 2010.

g. Data not available until January 2010 and from April 2010 to May 2010

h. Data not available from July 2012 to September 2012

I. Data not available from January 2010 to September 2010

j. Data not available until April 2010. Data for adult patients only (not paediatric patients) available in June 2010

k. Data not available until July 2010

l. One-stop data first submitted in November 2011

m. One-stop data first submitted in February 2012.

.. data not available due to system issues.

x One-stop service, not provided.

SP Service provided but data not available.

SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT

For the purposes of the question, I have taken “so-called celebrities” to mean public figures.

a.) i) Departments and agencies of the Scottish Government on occasion hire public figures to chair conferences. On these occasions, the fees paid to the conference chair would be part of the overall costs of arranging the conference.

a.) ii) The Scottish Government used Elaine C Smith to record the voice for public information advice to Scots through the sustained period of severe winter weather in 2009-2010. I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-30710 on
22 January 2010.

b.) i) & ii) Non Departmental Public Bodies and Government agencies are responsible for managing their own budgets.

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/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

All Scottish Government funding to support the development of sports facilities is routed through sportscotland. I have asked the Chief Executive of sportscotland to write to the member outlining the detail of support given to develop winter sports facilities in Scotland.