Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government will continue to work closely with the STUC to prepare detailed safety guidance for different sectors. The guidance will take account of our long-established commitment to fair work, which was set in the context of the current crisis in a joint statement with the STUC.

Employers should be supporting workers to follow health protection advice and have a statutory duty to ensure that workers’ health and safety is protected.

The Scottish Government will continue to monitor the information available on the number of deaths of black and minority ethnic (BAME) people as a consequence of COVID-19.

On 4 May, National Records of Scotland released a technical note describing the ethnicity data, and its limitations, held on COVID-19 deaths

https://www.nrscotland.gov.uk/files/statistics/covid19/ethnicity-deceased-covid-19-may20.pdf

• Ethnicity data is missing for nine per cent (203 records) of the 2,272 COVID-19 deaths recorded up to Sunday 26th April.
• 2,046 deaths (90%) were of people whose ethnic group was registered as White
• Registered deaths where a Black, Asian or minority ethnic group (BAME) was provided accounted for 1% of deaths (23 people).

NRS are currently testing whether ethnicity data from the 2011 Census can be used to improve the quality of the death registration data. If this is successful, NRS will carry out analysis which will aim to answer the question of whether there is a variation in the relative risk of mortality related to COVID-19 by ethnicity.

On 20 May, Public Health Scotland (PHS) published preliminary analysis which appears to show that there is not a higher level of Covid-19 cases than would be expected, given the size of our black, Asian and minority ethnic population. However, the data is very limited and additional analysis will need done as more data becomes available.

Public Health Scotland have been working with the Scottish Government to agree the Information Governance Framework to support the transfer of data into PHS. This is now achieved and the data arrived on 12 June 2020. Once analysis has been completed a publication date will be pre-announced by PHS on their website in the forthcoming publications section.

The delays occurred simply due to the amount of time it took to get multiple and subsequent iterations of both the data sharing agreements and data privacy impact assessments cleared by both the Scottish Government and Public Health Scotland (or Information Services Division, ISD, as it was at the time).

The health and wellbeing of individuals, communities and the economy is the priority of the Scottish Government. All employers in Scotland should follow the existing Scottish guidance, support workers to follow health protection advice and have a statutory duty to ensure that workers’ health and safety is protected. This includes undertaking risk assessments of their work activity, assessing the risk from Covid-19 spread in the workplace, and putting in place appropriate mitigating measures.

There is a wide range of guidance available from both the Scottish Government and Health and Safety Executive. Advice can also be obtained from local authorities on steps that can be taken to comply with legislation and to keep employees safe. Additionally, Healthy Working Lives (part of Public Health Scotland) provides advice and support to both employers and employees on improving health, safety and welfare in the workplace. The Scottish Government will continue to work closely with the trade unions and other partners to prepare detailed safety guidance for different sectors. The guidance will take account of our long-established commitment to fair work, which was set out in the context of the current crisis in a joint statement with the STUC.

If an employee believes that their working conditions are unsafe, they have rights under employment legislation.

As stated in the answer to question S5W-29035, risk of deductive disclosure leading to a breach of patient confidentiality means that data about the number of people at the hotel or nearby who tested at that time will not be released. However, any case that tested positive, whether related to this event or not, has always been included in our daily COVID-19 updates.

You may also wish to note that research from the University of Glasgow published on 8 June on viral lineages of the disease concluded that the actions taken to manage the Nike outbreak were successful in containing spread from that incident. This led to the eradication of this particular viral lineage, with no evidence of any wider outbreak associated with it in Scotland since that time.

The Scottish Government has produced Business and Physical Distancing Guidance, which is clear that employers should take every possible step to facilitate their employees working from home, including providing suitable IT and equipment to enable remote working.

There is a wide range of additional guidance available from both the Scottish Government and Health and Safety Executive. Advice can also be obtained from local authorities on steps that can be taken to comply with legislation and to keep employees safe.

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-29722 on 17 June 2020 . All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx

We are setting up a working group with representation from trades unions, employers, regulators and workforce representatives to develop workplace guidance for contact/call centres. In developing guidance for this sector, as we have done for other sectors whose guidance we have already published, we will take account of our long-established commitment to fair work, which was set in the context of the current crisis in a joint statement with the STUC. Working together – employers, workers, unions and the regulatory bodies – we can create safe workplaces for all.

As set out in a paper from 10 March 2020, the Scottish Government was clear that if a point of sustained community transmission for COVID-19 was reached, we would rely less on contact tracing and focus instead on providing the best care to those who had developed the disease, on delaying and reducing the spread and protecting those who are most vulnerable: https://www.gov.scot/publications/coronavirus-how-contact-tracing-works/

On the advice of senior clinicians and public health experts, Scotland's testing capacity was initially prioritised where it would have the greatest effect; for the seriously ill and to allow key workers to return to work. Testing capacity has increased significantly and testing is now available to anyone age 5 and over with symptoms.

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-29648 on 12 June 2020 which is available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/ormain.aspx