Chamber and committees

For 2004-05 grant aided expenditure (GAE) of approximately £1.8 billion has been allocated to local authorities to carry out their social work functions; these include the provision of foster care. The Executive also provides funding to The Fostering Network and the British Association for Adoption and Fostering to support and promote foster care in Scotland. Further funding for foster care was allocated in the Spending Review and I look forward to making an announcement shortly about how this money will encourage more people to be involved in fostering.

As at 31 March 2004 there were 186 children aged under 12 in residential accommodation of which one was in secure accommodation, 87 were in residential schools and 98 were in residential units.

I am currently considering this matter in light of the representations which havebeen made to ministers.

We need to strike the right balance in what we propose the increased levels should be. In doing so, we need to consider the differing interests of the different users of the court system.

Sportscotland is committed to achieving equality of opportunity in employment and eliminating discrimination in all its forms including discrimination on the grounds of sex, marital status, race, colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin, age, disability, sexuality, religious belief, political belief, trade union activity, responsibility for dependants, employment status or HIV status. This policy is applied in relation to its current and future workforce.

A total of 89 applications were received. It was disappointing that only six (7%) of these were from women. Each of the applications was carefully considered by sportscotland and the recruitment agency used for this appointment, Thomson Partners, against the criteria set out in the person specification included in the application pack issued to all applicants. These criteria included experience of directing and managing sizeable organisations; strong capability at a strategic level; evidence of the development of effective partnerships; a strong affinity with sport, and strong intellectual and interpersonal skills. This resulted in eight applicants being shortlisted for interview, of which none was a woman.

Over the last two years we have provided over £1 million of funding to support Keep Scotland Beautiful campaigns on anti-littering and flytipping. In addition, under the Anti-Social Behaviour Act we are giving powers to police officers to allow them to issue fixed penalty fines for littering and to give them powers to direct relevant bodies to clear litter.

The cost of the installation of the 385, various sized television sets and plasma screens, across the Parliament building complex, amounts to £20,925 excluding VAT.

Parliament will also pay £135,716 per annum to Telewest for the provision and maintenance of the multi-channel TV service to these monitors, including the rental of the required set top boxes. This Telewest service provides each set top box monitor with access to 12 parliamentary channels and 37 external TV and radio channels. Seven additional TV channels were initially offered by Telewest aspart of its package of external channels – Bid Up TV, Screenshop, BestDirect, Simply Shopping, the Racing Channel, QVC and the Travel Shop.These channels Parliament declined to carry. No money was saved nor was anymoney spent in excluding these channels.

The funding of advocacy services is a matter for the NHS and their local planning partners. Current details of funding are contained in A Map of Independent Advocacy Across Scotland 2003-04 (Bib. number 33240) which has been prepared by the Advocacy Safeguards Agency.

The Mental Health (Care and Treatment) (Scotland) Act 2003 whichcomes into effect in April 2005 includes a right for anyone with a mental disorderto access independent advocacy services. Local authorities, NHS boards and theirvoluntary partners have together developed Joint Local Implementation Plans to ensure the services and processes are in place to implement the new act.

£3 million of the £26.7 million funds made available to local authorities for 2003-06 to support implementation of the new act was provided to support the development of independent advocacy services.

Information is only available centrally for people treated in hospitals, and will therefore exclude foreign nationals whose treatment was entirely handled by the primary care sector. The information requested for hospital treatment, by year ended 31 December, is set out in the following table. Within the category of people not liable to pay, it is not possible to isolate people benefiting from reciprocal health care agreements from temporary residents who may be exempt from charges, as explained in footnote 2 to the table.

NHS Board	Patient Category	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003
All Scotland	Liable to pay[1]	391	366	344	316	269
Not liable to pay[2]	1,217	728	681	602	647
Argyll and Clyde	Liable to pay	57	49	60	57	47
Not liable to pay	92	75	67	58	61
Ayrshire and Arran	Liable to Pay	14	13	11	10	15
Not liable to pay	50	48	58	34	26
Borders	Liable to pay	6	6	4	3	3
Not liable to pay	8	9	8	3	16
Dumfries and Galloway	Liable to pay	13	9	14	10	5
Not liable to pay	28	18	15	12	20
Fife	Liable to pay	5	13	16	15	10
Not liable to pay	13	29	22	6	14
Forth Valley	Liable to pay	15	19	15	15	11
Not liable to pay	33	21	50	23	32
Grampian	Liable to pay	13	3	4	1	3
Not liable to pay	68	13	15	8	7
Greater Glasgow	Liable to pay	48	44	34	18	16
Not liable to pay	70	43	35	71	70
Highland	Liable to pay	68	68	66	66	52
Not liable to pay	183	175	151	153	206
Lanarkshire	Liable to pay	17	13	9	6	1
Not liable to pay	16	12	13	6	2
Lothian	Liable to pay	94	88	61	73	42
Not liable to pay	154	157	121	113	86
Orkney	Liable to pay	5	2	5	10	8
Not liable to pay	14	3	2	3	6
Shetland	Liable to pay	4	2	7	2	5
Not liable to pay	23	26	26	41	34
Tayside	Liable to pay	29	31	35	26	51
Not liable to pay	53	69	59	47	54
Western Isles	Liable to pay	3	-	-	-	-
Not liable to pay	33	30	36	26	15

Notes:

1. Patients liable to pay include foreign nationals who have sought private treatment, foreign nationals on holiday who come from countries, which do not have reciprocal health agreements with the UK, and foreign nationals who are temporarily living in Scotland but do not, in the judgement of the NHS boards concerned, meet any of the categories of exemption set out in the National Health Service (Charges to Overseas Visitors) (Scotland) Regulations 1989, as amended.

2. Patients not liable to pay include foreign nationals who come within reciprocal health care arrangements with their countries of residence, and those who are temporarily living in Scotland and come within one of the categories of exemption set out in the National Health Service (Charges to Overseas Visitors) (Scotland) Regulations 1989, as amended.

NHS Quality Improvement Scotland’s (NHS QIS) health care governance and schizophrenia standards include a requirement for NHS boards to make advocacy services available to those that need them. NHS QIS carry out assessment visits to ensure local compliance with these standards.

The treatment of foreign nationals by the NHS in Scotland is governed by The National Health Service (Charges to Overseas Visitors) (Scotland) Regulations 1989 (SI 1989 No. 364), as amended by The NHS (Charges to Overseas Visitors) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 1992 (SI 1992 No. 411), The NHS (Charges to Overseas Visitors) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 1994 (SI 1994 No. 1770) and The NHS (Charges to Overseas Visitors) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 1998 (SI 1998 No. 251). There are separate Regulations for England, Wales and Northern Ireland. All of the Regulations are available at:  http://www.hmso.gov.uk/legislation/about_legislation.htm.

A Health Department Manual of Guidance for the NHS in Scotland on the application and implementation of the Scottish Regulations is available at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/library/documents-w/guide-02.htm.