Chamber and committees

The tender period for the Principal Contract has concluded successfully. Two valid and high quality bids have been received.

We can confirm the project costs will be fully met from the Scottish Government capital budget. Formal letters indicating an intention to award have been issued today and, subject to the mandatory standstill period, the contract will be awarded to the successful contractor in mid-April.

On abolition in 2007, the tolls on the Forth Road Bridge (FRB) for cars and light goods vehicles were £1 per crossing. North bound only.

This meant an annual cost of tolls of £230 per annum (based on a five-day working week over a 46-week working year, assuming six weeks holiday per annum). Frequent user discount vouchers were available on the FRB. If these were used then the reduced rate of £0.90 was applied and the annual cost would have been £207 per annum based on the same conditions above.

Information on the calendar year 2009 is not currently available. The most up to date information available is for financial the year 2007-08. Data on the financial year 2008-09 will be available from 23 February 2010.

The question has two separate parts:

1. Patients treated for Alcohol related illnesses.

2. Patients treated for alcohol related injuries.

1. Patients with alcohol related illnesses are treated in a variety of inpatient and outpatient settings. The information available centrally covers only alcohol related hospital admissions. Information on the number of patients discharged from Fife hospitals with an alcohol related diagnosis in 2007-08 is presented in table 1. These figures include only those admissions due to illnesses directly attributable to alcohol (such as alcoholic liver disease) and do not include the much larger number of admissions resulting from illnesses indirectly attributable to alcohol (such as unintentional injuries, cancers and high blood pressure).

Table 1: General acute inpatient discharges, patients discharged with an alcohol-related diagnosis, in any position, from hospitals in Fife Health Board of treatment:

2007-08:

Financial Year	Fife
2007-08	1,562

Source: Information Services Division Scotland (ISD).

2. Patients with alcohol related injuries are treated in a variety of inpatient and outpatient settings such as accident and emergency departments. Information is not available centrally on the number of alcohol related injuries treated in outpatient and accident and emergency settings. Furthermore, it is not possible from centrally held information to establish that an individual injury was caused by alcohol.

ISD recently carried out work to estimate the number of hospital admissions due to alcohol related injuries using alcohol attributable fractions. The results are presented here:

http://www.scotpho.org.uk/nmsruntime/saveasdialog.asp?lID=5318&sID=4562.

The report presents figures at Scotland level only and information is not available separately at NHS board level.

The Scottish Government is developing the carers strategy for Scotland in partnership with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA). As NHS health boards are accountable to ministers, it is not appropriate or necessary for them to have equivalent formal status. Clearly, however, they are vital contributors to the work on the strategy and some boards, including NHS Fife, are represented on one or other of the two steering groups helping to inform the development of the carers and young carers strategy. All health boards have been invited to a learning event in February to share practice on their carer information strategies and to input to the development of the carers and young carers strategy.

Responsibility for the operation and maintenance of the Forth and the Tay Road Bridges, including any installation and removal of toll plazas and associated works, are matters for the Forth Estuary Transport Authority and the Tay Road Bridge Joint Board respectively.

The Scottish Government is working closely with relevant police and other public authorities to ensure there is adequate preparation for the event. Information on policing costs is not routinely released ahead of an event such as this because of the potential security implications in doing so.

Given the nature of the event and the terms of the Statement of Funding Policy between HM Treasury and the devolved administrations, we would expect the UK Government to meet the associated costs and we have sought their confirmation that this will be the case.

To date, the Scottish Government has committed to invest over £13 million in the CashBack for Communities programme which includes diversionary and participatory projects for young people across Scotland.

£3 million of this investment was allocated to YouthLink Scotland. Funding distributed through the YouthLink Scotland local youth project grant scheme is recorded by local authority.

The following organisations in Fife received funds in rounds 1 and 2:

Round 1

Barnardo''s Levenmouth Links - £2,216.00.

Kirkcaldy YMCA - £19,595.00.

Levenmouth YMCA - £26,000.00.

Arts and Theatres Fife - £740.00.

Levenmouth Youth Initiative - £8,008.00.

Glenrothes YMCA-YWCA - £10,963.00.

Round 2

Savoy Youth Centre - £15,435.00.

Levenmouth YMCA - £10,000.00.

The Initiative - £11,163.00.

Fife Council Benarty Centre - £3,665.00.

Kirkcaldy Area Youth Strategy Group - £9,287.00.

Clued Up Project - £10,800.00.

YWCA Kirkcaldy - £4,265.00.

Big Shout Partnership - £14,915.00.

Kirkcaldy YMCA - £9,981.00.

Strike a Chord (Music Project) - £19,725.00.

A further £1 million has been allocated to YouthLink Scotland for a second grant programme which is currently open for applications. Fife has been allocated £70,579 from the fund.

In addition, The Scottish Football Asociation (SFA) are using £8,800 of their CashBack grants in central Fife to deliver Midnight Football and Street Football at twelve venues in 2009. In 2008 they invested £8.500. The SFA have also allocated £17,625 to the secondary school-based Soccer One programme, which is being delivered to 15 schools in Fife in 2008-09.

Scottish Rugby is investing £11,582 of CashBack funding in a range of diversionary school and club rugby activities in central Fife.

Basketballscotland is working to promote basketball participation across Scotland through the deployment of four regional coordinators funded by CashBack.

CashBack has also allocated Kennoway Sports Association £100,000 for the development of a new sports pavilion at Cotlands Park.

The second cultural strand of CashBack was announced in March 2009. The Creative Identities project is an 18-month programme of creative learning activities for young people targeting young carers in particularly, but will be open to all young people. Central Fife is included in the east central programme plan, which is led by Edinburgh based Dance Base and Pilton Video. They have been allocated £216,200 to deliver projects across the region.

This question was answered in the Chamber. The answer can be viewed in the Official Report using the following link:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/business/officialReports/meetingsParliament/or-09/sor0625-01.htm

The information requested is not held centrally.

For the purposes of this answer, fragility fracture has been interpreted to mean a fracture that occurs, through minimal trauma, in bone that is pathologically impaired. The occurrence of a fragility fracture is often the first sign that an individual has osteoporosis and is at higher risk of sustaining a future fracture.

According to the Information Services Division of NHS National Services Scotland, the number of hospital discharges in Scotland relating to fractures in which osteoporosis was also recorded was

8,686 in 2006;

8,586 in 2007, and

8,412 in 2008.

The vast majority of these fractures will relate to osteoporosis, although a small proportion will relate to malignant disease and other bone pathologies. Some may also relate to trauma.