Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government allocates funding from different sources for delivering effective drug treatment services across Scotland. This includes money from the Justice portfolio budget, from the local government finance settlement, the unified health board budget, the police and monies for blood borne viruses. The spending review proposes £29.5 million/£32 million/£32.8 million for the period for the drug misuse budget within the Justice portfolio alone. The vast majority of this will be allocated to health boards to provide drug treatment and rehabilitation services.

It is the responsibility of local partners “ once resources from the Scottish Government have been allocated - to ensure that adequate funding from other sources is spent on drug treatment and rehabilitation services to meet proven local needs and priorities.

The Scottish Government has asked Audit Scotland to carry out work, as a matter of urgency, to get a clearer picture of the scale and effectiveness of public expenditure on tackling drugs. Audit Scotland will publish a detailed report no later than spring 2009 which will help guide future spending decisions.

Provision of local support services is the responsibility of local agencies and the Scottish Government is working with COSLA on how equality issues will be covered in the single outcome agreements.

The Scottish Government is strongly committed to tackling violence against women and has made specific funding available for local projects for a range of violence against women projects, including domestic abuse.

In 2006-08, four projects in Aberdeen were funded under the Violence Against Women Fund, amendment in Aberdeenshire and three in Angus totalling over £568,000. In addition, almost £425,000 funding has been made available in all three areas from 2006-08 to develop support services for children and young people experiencing domestic abuse. Where appropriate project funding has been rolled up into the local government settlement.

The Scottish Government has shown its on-going commitment to tackling violence against women, including domestic abuse, through the allocation of more than £40 million over the next three years to this agenda including continued funding for children''s support services and for project funding across the violence against women agenda. Applications from local projects under the violence against women funding stream for 2008-11 are currently being considered.

We continue to work with NHS boards, local authorities and their partners, to ensure the best possible care and treatment for all.

That attention is focused around the clear recommendations within our 2007 report Mind the Gaps “ Making a Difference (Bib. number 44565) which focus on improving awareness of the needs of those with co-occurring mental health and substance misuse; improving support and service provision, and influencing positive supportive attitudes toward this care group.

The forward action will reflect these aims by promoting and encouraging joined-up local and other services with attention on prevention and recovery, while recognising also the needs of the carers and family members.

No decision has yet been taken on funding allocations to individual health boards for drug treatment and rehabilitation services. The spending review proposes £29.5 million/£32 million/£32.8 million for the period 2008-09 to 2010-11 for the drug misuse budget within the Justice portfolio alone. This represents a 14% increase in spending by 2010-11. The vast majority of resources will be allocated to health boards to provide drug treatment and rehabilitation services.

In addition, in line with the local government finance settlement, it will be the responsibility of local authorities to allocate funding for drug treatment services to a level decided by themselves on the basis of their local needs and priorities from the consolidated block grant. In the past, this level of funding has been significant, and at least comparable to the ring-fenced funding provided by government.

In addition, health boards use resources from their unified budget to supplement funds provided through the drug misuse budget. £46 million has also been allocated to health boards for 2008-11 to provide treatment and care to those people affected by hepatitis C, the vast majority of whom will be current or former drug users.

The Scottish Government, in partnership with the Scottish Drugs Forum, launched an updated National Directory of Drug Services in Scotland in June 2007 which lists all 237 specialised drug services in Scotland which includes those in the north east. The directory continues to be advertised widely across Scotland and can be accessed via the following link:

www.scottishdrugservices.com.

The government also funds Know the Score, the national drugs information campaign, which supports a website and 24 hour helpline. Both facilities provide information and advice as well as directing callers to local services.

Primary responsibility for local communications rests with local delivery partners. To assist with this, each alcohol and drug action team is allocated dedicated funding to support local communications work.

Funding is allocated to health boards for drug treatment and care services. Aberdeen City and Aberdeenshire falls within the boundaries of NHS Grampian and Angus within NHS Tayside. The following table sets out the funding that has been made available to NHS Grampian and NHS Tayside.

NHS Board	Allocation 2003-04 (£000)	Allocation 2004-05 (£000)	Allocation 2005-06 (£000)	Allocation 2006-07 (£000)
Grampian*	1,314	1,963	2,202	2,202
Tayside**	1,483	1,559	1,965	1,965

Notes:

*NHS Grampian comprises Moray, Aberdeen City and Aberdeenshire Drug Actions Teams.

** NHS Tayside comprises Perth and Kinross, Angus and Dundee City Drug Action Team.

The Scottish Government also allocates funding from other sources for delivering effective drug treatment services across Scotland. This includes money from across the Justice portfolio budget, from the local government finance settlement, the unified health board budget, and monies for other related health issues such as blood borne viruses.

The following table how many doctors and nurses were employed in Grampian, between 2002-07. All figures are headcount as at 30 September each year.

Table 1: Number of Doctors and Nurses in NHS Grampian since 2002

	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007
All medical staff including GPs	1,530	1,513	1,580	1,587	1,668	1,673
All medical staff excluding GPs	1,140	1,111	1,151	1,132	1,192	1,176
Nursing and midwifery1	6,193	6,214	6,225	6,351	6,387	6,354

Source: ISD.

Note: 1. Staff working as and when required is excluded from the nursing and midwifery figures e.g. bank and agency staff.

Health Protection Scotland (HPS) produces quarterly reports of bacteraemia (blood infection) data for MRSA and Meticillin Sensitive Staph aureus (MSSA) by clinical specialty and by size of hospital. HPS published the latest quarterly MRSA/MSSA monitoring figures for the period July to September 2007 on Tuesday, 15 January 2008. The report can be found at:

http://www.documents.hps.scot.nhs.uk/hai/sshaip/publications/mrsa-quarterly-reports/jan-2003-to-sept-2007.pdf.

The following table shows the total annual number of MRSA bacteraemias reported from NHS Grampian from 2002 to 2007:

Year	Number of MRSA Bacteraemias Reported to HPS
2002	56
2003	46
2004	62
2005	64
2006	81
2007 (for the period 1 January 2007 to 30 September 2007)	55

 

The data should be treated with some caution as it is possible for one patient to have more than one episode of MRSA bacteraemia within one admission. The above table records these as separate episodes. Although the number of MRSA bacteraemias reported to HPS have been reported from hospital laboratories the figures in the table will include infections which may have been contracted in the community or in other institutions.

The Scottish Government recognises the important role charities play in Aberdeen and Grampian and across Scotland as local partners in assisting local authorities in implementing strategies to tackle and prevent homelessness.

Funding for tackling and preventing homelessness in Aberdeen and Grampian has been absorbed into the funding settlement for local authorities. The settlement gives local authorities incentives to achieve better value for money and the freedom to spend their resources as they decide to meet local needs and circumstances.

I expect that to result in better targeted and better quality local services allowing tailored and innovative approaches from a wide range of local partners including charities working in partnership to address homelessness.

The Scottish Government has no immediate plans for a follow-up meeting to the one held six months ago.