Chamber and committees

Tier 3 and Tier 4 services are those secondary and specialist mental health services - including Community Mental Health Teams, Adult Acute Psychiatry, and specialist Perinatal Mental Health care, that usually require a referral from a GP or other health care professional. All mental health scheduled and planned care services manage access in some way for example by using waiting lists – including access to Psychological Therapies teams or CAMHS services. In all cases patients are triaged and urgent cases are seen as a priority.

Improving access to Mental Health services is a priority for Scottish Government and whilst we recognise the ongoing pressures facing the NHS, long waits are unacceptable we remain committed to supporting all Boards to achieve the standard that 90% of patents start treatment within 18 weeks of referral in CAMHS and PT.

We are also working with NHS Boards and National Partners to improve Mental Health Unscheduled Care pathways to ensure that anyone requiring urgent and unplanned support is able to get the right care, in the right place, the first time regardless of when or how they access care. This is facilitated by NHS 24’s Mental Health Hub which is accessible through the 111 service and provides a 24/7 compassionate service to anyone in distress or requiring mental health and wellbeing support. Should the Hub determine that further urgent assessment or urgent referral to local services is required, they will refer the person to a mental health clinician within their relevant Board. Each Health Board is now providing access to a mental health unscheduled care clinician 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The Marine Fund Scotland (MFS) applies the Scottish Government Fair Work First criteria to grant awards. The conditions of award ensure organisations commit to the Fair Work First Criteria in a way that is relevant and appropriate for the organisation. This does not apply where the jobs relate to workers who are a 'share fisherman', who are classed as self-employed by HMRC.

With regard to fishing quota, I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-29467 on 10 September 2024. 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

Since June 2022 the Hydrogen Innovation Scheme has offered grants totalling almost £7m to a total of 31 projects, split across two streams:

• Stream 1 - funding for feasibility studies or technical demonstration of hydrogen production, distribution or storage solutions - 27 projects.
• Stream 2 – funding to support the development of test and demonstration facilities and equipment in Scotland - 4 projects.

To date 24 projects have been completed, with the remaining 7 due to conclude by late 2025. All have performed or are performing well in achieving their agreed outputs. Details of projects and their grant awards are available on the Scottish Government website at https://www.gov.scot/publications/emerging-energy-technologies-fund-hydrogen-innovation-scheme-successful-projects/.

On 16 September 2024 the Scottish Government launched a funding call that aims to provide support to the industry to help it scale up as it responds to market demand. Following due diligence call delivery partner Scottish Enterprise began making grant offers in December; details of call grant awards will be published in due course.

We welcome the important work of the Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease in raising awareness of COPD and welcome the findings in their annual report. We are committed to ensuring that people living with COPD receive the best possible care and treatment to enable them to live longer, healthier, and more independent lives.

Our Respiratory Care Action Plan and new Prescribing Guide set out our ambitions for better access to COPD care in Scotland. The Centre for Sustainable Delivery are also developing a national clinical pathway for COPD through their Respiratory Specialist Delivery Group.

We recognise there is more work to be done on respiratory care in Scotland and are continuing to focus on preventative approaches such as warm homes, clean air and our commitment to be a tobacco-free Scotland by 2034.

The Scottish Government considers available research to inform improvement work and help improve outcomes.

We recently funded research on domestic abuse and child contact that was published in 2023: Domestic Abuse and Child Contact: The Interface Between Criminal and Civil Proceedings - SCCJR.

Following this research, we have held workshops with key stakeholders to consider how to improve the interaction between the civil and criminal courts in the context of domestic abuse, including the approach taken in family proceedings where there has been domestic abuse.

We held a workshop with justice agencies on 8 May 2024 and a workshop with third sector organisations on 3 October 2024. We are currently considering next steps and will publish notes from these workshops in due course.

The key legislation in relation to contact and residence cases is section 11 of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995. In deciding whether to make a contact order the welfare of the child must be the court’s paramount consideration. The court is also required to have regard to the need to protect the child from any abuse, or the risk of any abuse, which affects or might affect the child.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-31859 on 11 December 2024. 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.

Provisions in the Community Wealth Building (CWB) Bill will be informed by operation of the internationally recognised CWB economic development model.

Community Wealth Building provides a strategic framework that can be applied to local areas and regions to bind together action in areas such as Fair Work, Sustainable Procurement and supporting the creation and sustainability of democratic and inclusive business models.

The Scottish Government has now confirmed arrangements for an implementation process with regard to the independent report, “Developing Scotland's Economy: Increasing the Role of Inclusive and Democratic Business Models.”

A new group will be formed to examine how the recommendations in this report can be delivered. Consideration of supported businesses can be included in the work of the group.

Scottish Government engages regularly with UK Government and the other devolved governments at both Ministerial and Official levels through the Inter-Ministerial Group for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, a four nations horticultural peat group and ad hoc correspondence. Through these channels, all legislative and non-legislative options for sales restrictions on peat are currently being explored.

The Scottish Government’s strategic priorities are to shift the balance of care closer to people's homes and drive a proactive approach of early intervention and prevention, which will help reduce demand for acute care.

We are increasing capacity and access to Primary Care by the end of 2026, through our reform programme, shifting the balance of care to preventative and community-based support. This will be done by improving the use of multi-disciplinary working to support better, patient-centred care pathways and improve service capacity in GP and frontline community services, including additional funding to support the Primary Care Phased Investment Programme.

We are committed to ensuring that people living in Scotland with long-term conditions, including inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), are able to access the best possible care and support, and benefit from healthcare services that are safe, effective and person-centred. Action which the Scottish Government is taking includes:

• an Endoscopy and Urology Diagnostic Recovery and Renewal Plan backed by £70 million. The plan focuses on key areas such as: Balancing Demand and Capacity; Workforce Training and Development; Infrastructure; and Innovation and Redesign.
• Funding the Modernising Patient Pathways Programme (MPPP) with a specific workstream continuing to promote improvements in IBD care which is being taken forward through the MPPP’s National Gastroenterology Speciality Delivery Group (SDG). They have developed a national IBD pathway for NHS Scotland which is due to be published imminently.
• Developing a lower gastrointestinal pathway which will provide primary care guidance about testing and diagnosis for people with IBD and Coeliac Disease in Scotland.

Scottish Government is aware the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency is considering amendments around its call centre service to align with plans for wider organisational transformation. SEPA has not raised any emerging risk, or issue with significant implications for its operation or governance with regards to changes to the 24-hour call centre.

Scottish Government is not aware of any other proposal to alter out-of-hours contact services, nor has information been provided to Ministers from any other public body.

Ministers would not routinely be informed of changes to contact services as this would be an operational matter for the body concerned, based on evaluation of the service, customer demand/experience and evolving automation of communication channels such as the use of bots and Artificial Intelligence.