Chamber and committees

The progress against each of the commitments in the Mental Health Strategy for Scotland 2012-2015 is updated, where appropriate, on the Scottish Government's website (see following link). Where there is no update on an individual commitment, we will report the status in spring 2016, after the completion of the strategy’s timeframe.

http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Health/Services/Mental-Health/Strategy

The Chief Scientist Office has provided the Scottish Primary Care Research Network with the following funding in each year since 2007-08:

2007-08	2008-09	2009-10	2010-11	2011-12	2012-13	2013-14	2014-15	2015-16
£207,000	£251,000	£274,000	£373,000	£373,000	£377,000	£377,000	£381,000	£381,000

The Scottish Government consulted on the strategy from 5 September 2011 to 31 January 2012 and the 344 publishable responses are available online: http://www.gov.scot/Publications/2014/05/4073. We also held a consultation event on 7 December 2011 in Edinburgh at which around 150 delegates attended representing a range of interests including statutory and non-statutory organisations.

The reduction in the number of measures installed through our Home Energy Efficiency Programmes Scotland (HEEPS) schemes is primarily the result of changes made by the UK Government to the Energy Company Obligation (ECO). HEEPS funding is blended with ECO to help deliver more expensive measures such as solid wall insulation. Figures published by the Department of Energy and Climate Change indicate that, based on the share of ECO measures delivered, £184 million of ECO funding was spent in Scotland in 2013-14. However, due to changes to ECO introduced by the UK Government in December 2013, ECO spend in Scotland in 2014-15 fell to £110 million. To help mitigate against this reduction the Scottish Government increased its fuel poverty and domestic energy efficiency budget in 2014-15 and increased the levels of assistance available to households.

The number of doctors in training in NHSScotland has increased by 526.9 whole time equivalent, or 10.0 per cent, since September 2010.

Further detail on doctors in training is available on the Information Services Division Scotland website – http://www.isdscotland.org.

We are working closely with NHS Scotland health boards, the Royal College of Radiologists and National Representatives of Radiology to ensure we have the right number of radiologists in place now and in the future to deliver a safe service.

The number of consultant clinical radiologists across NHS Scotland has increased by 52.1 whole time equivalent (WTE) to a record high of 324.0 WTE – a 19.2 per cent increase since September 2010. Any fluctuation in vacancies is linked to our efforts to increase capacity by recruiting even more staff.

Detail on the establishment of clinical radiologists is available on the Information Services Division website:–

http://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Workforce/Publications/data-tables.asp

I refer the member to the answer to question S4W-29604 on 10 March 2016.

All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

Information on how many mental health professionals have been employed in A&E departments is held by each individual health board.

In accordance with current legislation, we can no longer presume a retiral age as this is discriminatory. As a result, information relating to numbers of NHSScotland staff retiring in the next ten years is not available.

It should be noted that not all staff that reach the average retirement age will retire as there is no legal requirement for them to do so.

Under this government, NHSScotland has the highest staffing levels ever, with record numbers of nurses and midwives and consultants.

Published information on NHSScotland staffing levels can be found on the workforce statistics website at:

http://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Workforce/Publications/data-tables.asp

In accordance with current legislation, we can no longer presume a retiral age as this is discriminatory. As a result, information relating to numbers of paramedics retiring within the next (i) five and (ii) ten years is not available.

It should be noted that not all NHSScotland staff that reach the average retirement age will retire as there is no legal requirement for them to do so.

Under this Government, the number of Scottish Ambulance Service (SAS) staff has increased by 423.4 WTE, or 11.1 per cent. This includes a 10.6 per cent increase in Paramedics. SAS will use increases in its funding to recruit an additional 300 ambulance staff over the next five years.