Chamber and committees

The latest national statistics are available within the ISD Scotland NHS Smoking Cessation Service Statistics (Scotland) 1st January to 31st December 2012 at:

http://www.scotpho.org.uk/publications/reports-and-papers/1022-nhs-smoking-cessation-service-statistics-scotland-1st-january-to-31st-december-2012.

The latest full annual statistics relate to 2011. Based on data for the 2011 calendar year, quit rates at one, three and 12 months were 37.6%, 15.8% and 5.5% respectively. The denominator for the percentages remains total quit attempts made in the year.

The 2012 Scottish Public Health Observatory Smoking Ready Reckoner suggests that costs to the NHS in Scotland from smoking could range from around £320 million to £510 million per annum. The ready reckoner is available at:

http://www.scotpho.org.uk/publications/reports-and-papers/868-smoking-ready-reckoner.

No assessment is made of the numbers of repeat attendances at smoking cessation services at a national level.

The increase in total new and unplanned accident and emergency attendances has mainly been at Minor Injury Units. In part this could be accounted for by the rise in Scotland’s population over this time of 2.81%. Older people over 75, who are the services greatest users, have grown at a faster rate of 6.4% over this same time period.

The Scottish Government, through the Unscheduled Care Expert Group, are working with clinicians to address this issue.

NHS Information Services Division (ISD) produces smoking cessation monitoring analysis which is used to provide evidence of the reach and success of NHS smoking cessation services at both national and NHS board level. These statistics allow progress towards the current smoking cessation HEAT target achievement to be monitored.

The latest annual national statistics are available within ISD’s NHS Smoking Cessation Service Statistics (Scotland) 1st January to 31st December 2012 at:

http://www.scotpho.org.uk/publications/reports-and-papers/1022-nhs-smoking-cessation-service-statistics-scotland-1st-january-to-31st-december-2012.

ScotPHO/ISD also recently published a Local Tobacco Online Profiles tool which contains information relating to quit rates at 1, 3 and 12 months along with quit rates in the most deprived areas.

The profiles are available at:

https://scotpho.nhsnss.scot.nhs.uk/scotpho/profileSelectAction.do.

Our latest Tobacco Control Strategy, Creating a Tobacco-Free Generation, includes a commitment to commission a review of smoking cessation services. NHS Health Scotland is leading this and work is well underway. The review will inform recommendations to improve the effectiveness of service provision and service outcomes.

The Scottish Government has met regularly with NHS Health Scotland, as part of the Smoking Cessation Services Review national advisory group, to approve the project proposal and research specification and to receive progress updates.

Scotland’s universities have an unrivalled record of success in attracting funding from a range of sources, reflecting the excellence and global reputation of our universities, and that will continue in an independent Scotland.

Our continuing commitment to supporting university research is widely recognised in the sector. We fully understand and recognise the importance of stability in long term funding for world class researchers and will be bringing forward our detailed proposals on enhancing research funding and reach as we move towards the referendum.

The Scottish Government believes that everyone has the right to be safe and feel safe in their communities. The Scottish Government also firmly believes that prevention is better than cure and is working to tackle the underlying causes of crime.

That is why we continue to invest directly in centres of expertise such as Crimestoppers, Scottish Neighbourhood Watch and the Scottish Community Safety Network.

Local authorities are also responsible for identifying local needs and priorities and directing their resources appropriately.

For public contracts below the OJEU threshold, unsuccessful suppliers will be notified via an unsuccessful letter. A supplier is entitled to ask for the reasons why their tender was unsuccessful. All feedback will be based on the objective criteria that was used to evaluate the tender response, and should cover the positive aspects and suggest areas for improvement of the unsuccessful bid. Suppliers will then have the opportunity to address these issues and improve their competitiveness in any future bids.

For public contracts above the OJEU threshold (excluding exempt contracts such as Part B service contracts), unsuccessful suppliers will be issued with a standstill notice in accordance with the EU Procurement Directives. The standstill notice will contain the contract award criteria, the score obtained by the tenderer and the successful tenderer, the name of the successful tenderer, a summary of the reasons why the tenderer was unsuccessful and the characteristics and relative advantages of the successful tender. If tenderers make a written request, additional de-brief information must be provided within 15 days. A debrief may also be provided face-to-face or via telephone as part of this process.

For exempt contracts above the OJEU threshold, unsuccessful suppliers will be notified via an unsuccessful letter. It remains procurement best practice to provide these unsuccessful suppliers with feedback on their tender submission in order to enable them to improve their competitiveness in any future bids.

Further guidance is available on the Procurement Journey and the Supplier Journey which set out procurement best practice guidance for the public sector and procedures for Suppliers, which are published on the Scottish Government’s website:

www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Government/Procurement/buyer-information/spdlowlevel

www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Government/Procurement/Selling/SupplierJourney

Through the enterprise agencies and other intermediary bodies, the Scottish Government delivers a range of programmes to help companies engage in research and development. These include large collaborative research and development grants, discretionary grants to support technical and commercial feasibility studies and research and development projects; and access to Interface, which provides a free brokerage service and innovation vouchers for businesses seeking to collaborate with Scottish academia.

In addition to providing financial support, there are also a number of advisory services for companies seeking to participate in research and development. These include a service to support inventors; the Enterprise Europe Network, which promotes collaborative opportunities for Scottish businesses to work across Europe and beyond; and promotion of existing and future European Union competitive research and development funding programmes, currently being delivered through a series of Scottish-wide road shows.