Chamber and committees

Our intention is to follow up our earlier engagement with community stakeholders in Orkney and Shetland, to help build a deeper understanding of local stakeholders’ preferences for the future approach to the procurement of the Northern Isles ferry services.

Those consulted will include local and regional MSPs, MPs, local authorities, transport partnerships, key business interests and relevant community groups in the Northern Isles.

That consultation will be done by a combination of written engagement and meetings, including visits to the Northern Isles by me, and by Transport Scotland officials.

Stakeholder views will be carefully considered before final decisions are made on the best way to procure ferry services which are safe, efficient and reliable, whilst ensuring value for money to the taxpayer.

Currently, decisions on the award of sports club relief, including to golf clubs, is a matter for local authorities following current legislation and the costs of this relief are funded by the Scottish Government.

The Scottish Government has accepted the Barclay recommendation to review this and will further engage sector stakeholders to inform how best to specify any change, including through a Barclay advisory group. In particular we will ensure that local community facilities continue to be duly supported, meaning that this change will not affect the vast majority of current recipients of this relief.

As set out in an implementation plan in response to the Barclay review, published on 14 December 2017, the Scottish Government has accepted Barclay's recommendation to review sports club relief to ensure it supports affordable community-based facilities.

We will further engage sector stakeholders to inform how best to specify any change. In particular, we will ensure that local community facilities continue to be duly supported, meaning that this change will not affect the vast majority of current recipients of this relief. We intend to bring forward primary legislation to deliver this by 2020.

Practising teachers and head teachers are represented on the Scottish Government's Teacher Panel, which is chaired by the Deputy First Minister and meets on a quarterly basis to discuss key developments in Scottish education and to assess proposals for reducing workload in schools. There are no head teachers or teachers on the Scottish Education Council. The membership includes representatives from the teacher unions to ensure the voices of teachers are heard along with the main decision makers and key influencers in Scottish education. Young people are also represented.

I met the Chief Executive of Historic Environment Scotland this morning, and we discussed a range of issues including record visitor numbers to Historic Environment Scotland's properties and planned activities in the 2018 Year of Young People. I also meet the Chair and Chief Executive regularly as part of the routine sponsorship arrangements for public bodies in my portfolio. My officials also meet regularly with Historic Environment Scotland.

As part of the tendering process to deliver Fair Start Scotland, bidders were asked to set out in their response how they, and their consortium and/or supply chain members would provide accessible locations across the lot in which they bid, providing evidence to show how participants’ needs would be addressed in the proposed approach.

Bidders were also asked to describe the transport links and accessibility arrangements for their delivery sites in order that the Scottish Government could be assured around accessibility, particularly for rural and island communities.

Although there is, as yet, no formal duty to consider the concept of island proofing, the Scottish Government met the requirements of island proofing: i.e. considering the particular needs and circumstances of island communities when the Scottish Government and other relevant public authorities are exercising their functions and making decisions.

The National Advisory Committee for Chronic (NACCP) reports to Aileen Campbell MSP, Minister for Health and Sport.The current membership of the NACCP is;

Dr Gregor Smith - Deputy Chief Medical Officer [Chair]

Professor Blair Smith - National Lead Clinician

Dr Paul Cameron – National Chronic Pain Co-ordinator

Prof Tim Eden – Patient Representative

Susan Archibald – Patient Representative

Sonia Cottom, Pain Association Scotland – Third Sector Representative

Heather Wallace, Pain Concern – Third Sector Representative

Dr Mike Higgins, Medical Director, Golden Jubilee National Hospital

Dr Rachel Atherton – Scottish National Residential Pain Management Programme

Marianne Hayward – South Lanarkshire Health and Social Care Partnership

Irene Oldfather – Director, The ALLIANCE

Phil Mackie – Lead Consultant, Scottish Public Health Network

Professor Lesley Colvin – Consultant in Pain Medicine, Scottish Board of Anaesthetics

Scottish Government officials will also provide policy and administrative support to the committee.

The remit of the NACCP is:

• Guiding the improvement of chronic pain management at all levels of health and social care;

• Developing a dataset to allow for effective measurement/quantification of chronic pain services across Scotland, including the potential future development of Quality Performance Indicators (QPIs) (these measures will span primary and secondary care and give detail beyond waiting times in pain clinics);

• Raising and maintaining the profile of chronic pain;

• Advising the Scottish Government on chronic pain to inform effective national policy development.

The NACCP will next meet on 19 December 2017.

Deputy First Minister John Swinney travelled to India for a series of engagements to promote trade and investment between Scotland and India in the areas of education, skills, energy and water. On his four-day trip to Mumbai and Delhi, the Deputy First Minister was accompanied by a delegation of over 20 senior leaders from Scotland’s higher education sector. He held a series of meetings with business and industry leaders, representatives from the Indian Government and viewed a number of projects that demonstrate the ways in which Scotland’s further and higher education institutions are collaborating with Indian institutions. More details on the Deputy First Minister’s visit can be found on the Scottish Government website at: https://beta.gov.scot/news/deputy-first-minister-visits-india/ and https://beta.gov.scot/news/scotland-and-india-collaborate-on-social-enterprise/.

The total costs of this visit are still being processed and finalised and the costs are being met by the Scottish Government’s administration budget. The higher education delegation are meeting their own costs. The Scottish Government proactively publishes the travel and subsistence costs for Ministers undertaking official international engagements on its website at:

http://www.gov.scot/About/People/14944/travel/visitsoverseas/visitsoverseas

Fair Start Scotland (FSS) Providers are contractually required to report their community benefit measures and achievements.

The Service Providers regardless of their location are required to deliver community benefits through these Contracts and provide a report to the Scottish Government on their implementation and outcomes.

Information on the Community Benefits for each lot is available on the Public Contract Scotland website.

Summary information on the Community Benefits for each LOT is available on the Public Contract Scotland website and will be contained within the Scottish Government’s first Annual Procurement Report (required under Regulation 18 of the Procurement Reform (Scotland) Act 2014) covering the period 1 January 2017 to 31 March 2018.