Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government has been working closely with Stirling Council to support their preparation of the transport plan and other aspects of the various events across Stirling's 'Big Weekend'. The most recent draft of this transport plan, as prepared by Stirling Council, was received by officials on 6 June 2014.

The Armed Forces Day National Event is an event bid for and organised by Stirling Council. As such, signing-off a robust transport plan is a matter for Stirling Council rather than Scottish Ministers.

In the last five years, three of the eight Safety Camera Partnerships across Scotland have recorded incidents of vandalism to speed cameras. These are logged with the Safety Camera Programme Office on a partnership rather than a local authority basis. The number of incidents and associated costs are set out in the following table.

The eight Safety Camera Partnerships across Scotland provide the Scottish Safety Camera Programme Office with a projection of costs associated with maintenance for the following financial year. The partnerships are then allocated funding based on this projection, which may not reflect the actual cost of maintenance in that year. If the partnership does not spend its full allocation, funding can be recovered by the Scottish Government and reinvested in other safety camera activity.

The following table sets out the financial projections for maintenance costs for the eight Safety Camera Partnerships over the last five years:

The paper in the Journal of Molecular and Genetic Medicine is authored by a private individual who has no wider organisational affiliation. The paper reviews a selection of previous publications, many of which are by the same author. The paper does not publish any new findings and does not present any new evidence.

The alleged associations between vaccination and autism and type 1 diabetes have been extensively researched through population studies, and there is no evidence linking vaccination to increases in type 1 diabetes or autism. The World Health Organisation’s Global Advisory Committee on vaccine safety supports this view.

A new childhood influenza vaccination programme was introduced in October 2013, which is being rolled out over the next few years on a phased basis, offering protection to those aged 2-17 years. The new nasal vaccine being used for the childhood programme is purchased centrally by Public Health England under a UK contract for all four countries including Scotland. The contract price is confidential.

The Scottish Government spend on the new immunisation programmes in 2013-14 was around £10 million (this includes vaccine and central costs such as surveillance, lab costs etc.). This will rise to around £16 million in 2014-15. This incorporates costs of the rotavirus, shingles and childhood flu programmes.

Seasonal flu vaccines are purchased in Scotland by community pharmacies on behalf of individual GP practices and this has been the case for many years, including the last five years.

However, this winter, the Scottish Government will be purchasing centrally all injectable flu vaccines required for children. Those vaccines are for the small number of children for whom the live attenuated vaccine is not suitable. Community pharmacies will still purchase adult flu vaccines on behalf of GP practices. The Scottish Government also buys a small contingency stock of vaccines centrally each year. The cost of this is around £150,000.

The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation recommended that the live attenuated intranasal influenza vaccine Fluenz should be the vaccine of choice for the childhood flu immunisation programme. Arrangements are in place to offer alternative authorised vaccines for the small number of children who are unable to receive the Fluenz vaccine.

The new childhood vaccination programme was introduced in October 2013, and will be rolled out over the next few years on a phased basis, offering protection to those aged 2-17. Advice from Health Protection Scotland was that maximal public health benefit was anticipated through introducing the programme in the youngest age groups initially and progressively rolling the programme out to older children over coming seasons. The rationale for this choice reflects the maximal risk from influenza and its complications arising in the youngest children. It additionally takes into account the maximal anticipated impact on lowering transmission of influenza in the community by vaccination of the youngest children and as a consequence indirectly protecting other unvaccinated children and adults.

Vaccination is voluntary, and it is always our aim to ensure that people are able to make informed choices about whether or not to accept the offer of vaccination for themselves or those for whom they make decisions. The Scottish Government will raise awareness of the childhood flu vaccination programme to inform and educate parents, children, healthcare professionals and others about the programme.

I refer the member to my earlier answer to Iain Gray. We announced a range of measures to ensure a clear focus on numeracy across Scotland’s schools.

In addition to the extra £1 million funding over three years committed to the local authority numeracy hubs programme, Education Scotland are building a range of further activities and resources into the support they provide to local authorities, teachers and schools on numeracy. This includes further professional learning resources for teachers based on the survey findings.

We are also incorporating a specific numeracy strand into our ground-breaking work on Pathfinder schools and building a specific focus on numeracy into the forthcoming Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development review of Curriculum for Excellence.

Unlike successive UK Governments, an independent Scotland will provide industry with the necessary fiscal and regulatory stability and predictability for it to innovate and thrive in a globally competitive environment. With independence, Scotland would have the opportunity to put in place a regulatory and fiscal framework which supports and incentivises exploration and production and provides long term stability and certainty for the industry. More than half the value of North Sea oil remains, up to 24 billion barrels with a potential wholesale value of up to £1.5 trillion. We must not let Westminster continue to squander the remainder of this hugely valuable resource.

Scottish Government officials held informal initial discussions with representatives from the Communication Workers Union on 28 August 2013, the National Federation of Subpostmasters on 7 October 2013 and 7 March 2014, and Post Office Ltd on 17 March 2014. Discussions focussed on current issues around post and post offices and the relevant content of the Scottish Government's White Paper ‘Scotland's Future’. No minutes were agreed.