- Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 5 May 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what local alliances have been established, as referred to in Choose Life - A National Strategy and Action Plan to Prevent Suicide in Scotland
Answer
All 32 local areas have established local multi-agency Choose Life suicide prevention alliances as part of their Community Planning Partnership Structure.
- Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 5 May 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive how many local action plans have been established and when, as referred to in Choose Life - A National Strategy and Action Plan to Prevent Suicide in Scotland.
Answer
All 32 local action plans werereceived by the end of January 2004.
- Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 5 May 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive, with reference to Choose Life - A National Strategy and Action Plan to Prevent Suicide in Scotland, when the National Public Mental Health Resource Service was established and what its key objectives are.
Answer
The National Public Mental HealthResource was launched in December 2002 (at the same time as Choose Life) by theHealth Education Board for Scotland (HEBS). The key objectives are to collect anddisseminate up to date evidence and good practice in relation to suicide preventionand other areas of work. The resource can be found at
www.hebs.com/suicideprevention.
- Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 5 May 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive, with reference to Choose Life - A National Strategy and Action Plan to Prevent Suicide in Scotland, how many national suicide prevention summits have been held and what issues have been discussed.
Answer
The first National Support Networkmeeting on 7 November 2003 also served as a National Suicide Prevention summit.Representatives of key National agencies along with local representatives met todiscuss the first phase of the implementation of Choose Life and to consider themost effective way of developing and informing the implementation work nationally.
- Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 5 May 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what action has been taken to ensure that reducing the rate of suicide is clearly on its agenda and that of its departments, as referred to in Choose Life - A National Strategy and Action Plan to Prevent Suicide in Scotland.
Answer
I refer the member to the answergiven to S2W-7696 on 5 May 2004. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for whichcan be found at
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/search_wa.
- Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 5 May 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what links have been developed between its strategy and action plan, Choose Life - A National Strategy and Action Plan to Prevent Suicide in Scotland, and its other policies and initiatives and what objectives have been achieved as a result.
Answer
A key objective of the firstphase of the Choose Life Implementation work (up until 2006) is to ensure that suicideprevention is on the agenda of Scottish Executive Departments and reflected in relevantpolicies. This is a key task for the Head of Implementation for Choose Life (appointedin January 2004).
For example, work is progressingwith:
- Scottish Executive Education Department on anti bullying initiatives and the promotion of mental health and wellbeing in schools.
- Scottish Executive Development Department on work relating to social exclusion, community mental health and wellbeing, inequalities and money advice.
- Scottish Executive Enterprise and Lifelong Learning Department on employability, in particular for those furthest from the employment market.
- Scottish Executive Justice Department, supporting the SPS in progressing suicide prevention in prisons.
- Health Department – development of improved mental health services, particularly responding to crisis.
Suicide Prevention is one of the key aims of the National Programme for Improving Mental Health and Well-Beingin Scotland. The National Programme is a key element of the Executive’sHealth Improvement Challenge, another example of cross - Departmental working.
- Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 5 May 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive, with reference to Choose Life - A National Strategy and Action Plan to Prevent Suicide in Scotland, how many events the National Support Network has organised and what local agencies have taken part.
Answer
The first meeting of the NationalSupport Network was held on 7 November 2003 in Edinburgh. The Network draws together representatives from eachof the 32 Community Planning Partnerships. The majority of the 32 local areas wererepresented at this summit.
Key national statutory agencieswere also present, including:
- NHS Health Scotland;
- Scottish Prison Service;
- Scottish Ambulance Service;
- Scottish Police Service, and
- NHS 24
Plus key voluntary organisations,including:
- Samaritans;
- Cruse Bereavement Care;
- Depression Alliance (Scotland);
- Penumbra, and
- Scottish Association for Mental Health
The National Support Networkaims to meet on an annual basis. Over the next two months, three regional meetingsof members of the National Support Network are also being held, to focus more closelyon regional issues.
- Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 5 May 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what guidance on priority groups has been published and on what dates, as referred to in Choose Life - A National Strategy and Action Plan to Prevent Suicide in Scotland.
Answer
Guidance was issued to all localauthorities and their Community Planning Partners in June 2003 on the implementationof Choose Life.
Guidance on priority groups wasprepared for consideration at the first National Support Network meeting in November2003. Since then, further work has been undertaken on the guidance material to producea toolkit resource, for use nationally and locally. This toolkit will help provideguidance on priority groups, in particular children and young people.
In addition to this, Cruse BereavementCare are being funded by the National Programme for Improving Mental Health andWell-Being to produce a video called “Living with Suicide” and supporting resourcematerials, on coping with bereavement following a suicide. These will be launchedlater in the year.
- Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 5 May 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive when the National Implementation Support Team, as referred to in Choose Life - A National Strategy and Action Plan to Prevent Suicide in Scotland, first met; on how many occasions it has met, and what issues were on its agenda.
Answer
Following a national recruitmentprocess in 2003, the Head of Implementation for Choose Life, Caroline Farquhar,took up post in January 2004. Arrangements are in hand to recruit three additionalmembers to the National Implementation Support Team.
- Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 02 April 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Lewis Macdonald on 4 May 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what representations it has made to Her Majesty's Government in respect of how clause 76(5) of the UK Energy Bill provides for a transfer of functions in relation to "areas outside the territorial sea", in light of section 63 of the Scotland Act 1998 which enables transfer of functions "in or as regards Scotland", where "Scotland" includes the internal waters and territorial sea of the United Kingdom as are adjacent to Scotland.
Answer
The Scottish Executive maintains regular contact with Her Majesty's Government in respect of matters of mutual interest including the UK Energy Bill. The potential exercise of the powers that would be conferred by virtue of clause 85(5) of the bill - formerly clause 76(5) and which does not have a direct relationship with section 63 of the Scotland Act 1998 - is part of that contact.
