Chamber and committees

Questions and answers

Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for MSPs to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)
Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

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Question reference: S6W-11813

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 28 October 2022
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 3 November 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what (a) assessment it has made of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, and (b) potential lessons can learned for Scotland.

The Scottish Government remains committed to supporting all survivors of childhood abuse. We are currently considering the evidence, findings and recommendations which have come out of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse in England and Wales, and will do the same for the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry when it reports the outcome of its investigations in due course. The Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry continues to investigate the abuse of children in care in Scotland.

Question reference: S6O-01530

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 November 2022
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 10 November 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what actions are being taken to end the practice of children living in temporary accommodation, in light of recent homelessness statistics.

Question reference: S6W-11814

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 28 October 2022
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 2 November 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many people have been helped through the Help to Buy scheme in each year since its introduction.

Question reference: S6W-11817

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 28 October 2022
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 2 November 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to introduce a Help to Buy scheme for veterans, to support veterans and their families when buying a home.

Question reference: S6W-11393

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 06 October 2022
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 1 November 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how its next cancer strategy and earlier diagnosis vision will address any health inequalities and promote equitable access to cancer services.

As set out in our public consultation we are considering how to address health inequalities and promote equitable access to cancer services. We have outlined ‘reducing inequalities’ as one of our main aims in the consultation. With over 250 responses received we have now commissioned independent analysis of the responses and anticipate the results to be published shortly. The results will inform the cancer strategy.

In addition, we held a series of workshops with patients and key stakeholders in September 2022 to help us gain further insight into the consultation responses and hear directly about peoples’ experiences of cancer and inform the development of the cancer strategy.

Question reference: S6W-11395

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 06 October 2022
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 1 November 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to ensure that any reduced capacity in the cancer services workforce is not limiting patient choice and equitable access to treatment.

Cancer remains a priority for the Scottish Government with NHS Scotland continuing to prioritise urgent suspicion of cancer (USC) referrals and delivering high-quality care, in the safest possible way, to those who need it most. We’re continuing to invest in cancer pathways to improve waiting times, including through up-skilling nurses and have begun testing the use of Single Points of Contact in cancer pathways to support patients from the point of referral.

In addition, we have stood up a National Oncology Taskforce of NHS Board Chief Executives and Medical Directors to seek national solutions to ensure long term resilience of oncology services in Scotland.

Question reference: S6W-11392

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 06 October 2022
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 1 November 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how it will accelerate clinical research and development to encourage participation in clinical trials for people living in remote and rural areas.

The Scottish Government is committed to tackling health inequalities and providing access to the highest quality of care for all. We work across the clinical research system to ensure sponsors of clinical studies understand their ethical and legal responsibilities, including increasing equitable access to clinical trials. We recognise the benefits of innovative approaches to the future of clinical trials, including the opportunities presented by increased use of data and digital technologies, and learning from the response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Question reference: S6W-11383

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 06 October 2022
Current Status: Answered by Tom Arthur on 1 November 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how much has been reallocated from Scottish Budget underspends in each year since 1999.

Since 2007 the Scottish Government has retained, and subsequently deployed, any and all net underspends which have been available following the conclusion of the Final Outturn process at the end of each financial year. The mechanism for doing so is via the Scotland Reserve and previously the Budget Exchange Mechanism.

The amount of underspends arising from each year since 1999 was detailed in the answer to question S6W-09370 on 13 July 2022.

All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

Question reference: S6W-11394

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 06 October 2022
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 1 November 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with industry to inform the development of its new cancer strategy.

We held a public consultation for the new cancer strategy from 12th April – 7th June. Anyone who wished to submit a response was welcome to through Citizens Space, this includes members of the public, professionals working with cancer services, and organisations. The results of the consultation will be published shortly and will feed into the development of the next cancer strategy.

Early insights from the initial consultation report show that organisations in the cancer sector welcome a long-term strategy with broad overarching aims to help achieve structural changes in the delivery of cancer care.

Question reference: S6W-11384

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 06 October 2022
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 1 November 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many patients have had an emergency presentation for cancer in each year since 1999.

PHS collate data on Direct Cancer Referrals. This includes self, GP or NHS24 referral to A&E or other, where the signs and symptoms are consistent with the cancer diagnosed as per the Scottish Referral Guidelines. Data on these patients are only available from PHS from 2010 onwards as outlined in the following table.

Table 1: Number of direct cancer referrals 1,2,3 on the 31 day pathway since data-set began

Reference Date Year	Number of Referrals
2010	2693
2011	2912
2012	3001
2013	2975
2014	2810
2015	2660
2016	2596
2017	2772
2018	2927
2019	3107
2020	3002
2021	2922

_{Source: Cancer Waiting Times Datamart, Public Health Scotland (PHS)}

_{Data extracted: October 2022}

_Notes:

1. _{Cancer registration is a dynamic process: the data presented here may differ from other published data relating to the same time period.}

2. _{Cancer types for which data are recorded: breast, cervical, colorectal, head and neck, lung, lymphoma, melanoma, ovarian, upper GI, and urological.}

3. _{Direct referral to hospital includes self, GP or NHS24 referral to A&E or other.}