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: S5W-20459

Asked by: Alison Harris, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 07 December 2018
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 4 January 2019

To ask the Scottish Government whether revenue funding settlements for the expansion of funded childcare to 1,140 hours take account of annual inflation.

Question reference: S5W-20450

Asked by: Alison Harris, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 07 December 2018
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 4 January 2019

To ask the Scottish Government when and where it plans to publish data on the progress of the expansion of funded childcare to 1,140 hours.

Question reference: S5W-20451

Asked by: Alison Harris, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 07 December 2018
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 4 January 2019

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide details of the support package that will be available to private and third sector early learning and childcare providers, and when this will be delivered.

Question reference: S5W-19960

Asked by: Alison Harris, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 15 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 12 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many first outpatient consultation appointments were (a) made and (b) missed in NHS Forth Valley in each year since 2014-15, and what the cost was of those appointments missed.

The following table shows the number of first outpatient appointments where the patient did not attend consultant or dental led outpatient clinic during the financial years 2014-15 to 2017-18. The costs of appointments where patients did not attend are not centrally held.

Financial Year	New Appointments	New Appointment DNAs	DNA Rates ‎for New Appointments
2014-15	78,276	8,638	11%
2015-16	81,969	7,646	9%
2016-17	80,559	6,515	8%
2017-18	78,444	5,040	6%

Source: ISD Scotland, SMR00

Question reference: S5O-02655

Asked by: Alison Harris, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 5 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to reduce the workload of teachers in Falkirk.

We continue to tackle teacher workload and bureaucracy across Scotland. Following the recommendations of the Working Group on Tackling Bureaucracy I launched a further review in 2016, looking at the demands placed on schools by local authorities. To provide further clarity and focus, Education Scotland issued benchmarks in each curriculum area. Teachers can now access: streamlined online teaching resources; a tackling bureaucracy toolkit; and definitive advice in relation to learning, teaching and assessment from the Chief Inspector of Education. It is the responsibility of individual local authorities to ensure that workload demands on teachers are minimised.

Question reference: S5W-20016

Asked by: Alison Harris, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Clare Haughey on 28 November 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of NHS Forth Valley’s performance being the worst in Scotland in relation to meeting waiting time targets for the inpatient treatment time guarantee and child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS), what measures have been put place to improve performance in these areas.

Our Waiting Times Improvement Plan, which was launched in October, will ensure that all patients have swift and safe access to the full range of services from NHS Scotland. The Plan will direct investment of more than £850 million to substantially and sustainably improve waiting times in the face of rising demand for services. Officials are working with all territorial Health Boards to ensure that they have appropriate plans in place to support the implementation of the Improvement Plan.

Specific actions in NHS Forth Valley will include the acceleration of the Elective Centre Programme to ensure an early increase in MRI capacity at the Forth Valley Royal Hospital, providing an additional 8,000 diagnostic examinations, and the investment of £17 million to deliver two theatres at Forth Valley Royal Hospital bringing an additional capacity for 1,500 joint replacements.

We also remain determined to drive improvements in CAMHS and are committed to ensuring that children and young people get access to high quality mental health services. Between 2016-17 and 2019-20, NHS Forth Valley will receive a total of £2,014,396 for capacity building and workforce development to improve access to CAMHS and psychological therapies. We have also directly engaged with NHS Forth Valley, as well as other Boards whose current performance suggests underlying problems, to discuss performance and expectations for the coming year.

We will continue to work closely with NHS Forth Valley, both directly, and via support provided by the Healthcare Improvement Scotland Mental Health Access Improvement Support Team (MHAIST), to deliver sustained improvements in access to CAMHS.

Question reference: S5W-19961

Asked by: Alison Harris, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 15 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 28 November 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what provisions will be included in the NHS Forth Valley waiting times improvement plan in relation to waiting times.

The Waiting Times Improvement Plan will ensure that all patients have swift and safe access to the full range of services from NHSScotland. The Plan will direct investment of more than £850 million to substantially and sustainably improve waiting times in the face of rising demand for services. Officials are working with all territorial Health Boards to ensure that they have appropriate plans in place to support the implementation of the Improvement Plan.

Specific actions in NHS Forth Valley will include the acceleration of the Elective Centre Programme to ensure an early increase in MRI capacity at the Forth Valley Royal Hospital providing an additional 8,000 diagnostic examinations; and the investment of £17 million to deliver two theatres at Forth Valley Royal Hospital bringing an additional capacity for 1,500 joint replacements.

Question reference: S5W-20014

Asked by: Alison Harris, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 27 November 2018

To ask the Scottish Government when NHS Forth Valley will be allocated its NRAC (NHSScotland Resource Allocation Committee) parity target funding for the first time.

The NHS Resource Allocation (NRAC) Formula sets out ‘target shares’ for the distribution of funding to the 14 NHS Territorial Boards. The Scottish Government has invested significantly in supporting boards that are behind parity and, over a seven year period, has committed an additional £1.2 billion to those Boards that are below their NRAC parity levels. This investment has brought all boards within 0.8 per cent of NRAC parity.

Given the year-to-year movements in the NRAC target allocations, and the need to ensure stability of funding across Scotland, it has not been possible to move NHS Forth Valley — or any other board that is below parity — to absolute parity, as that would result in an equivalent reduction in funding for those boards that are above parity. The approach taken by the Scottish Government has been to move Boards towards parity gradually over a number of years. This has brought NHS Forth Valley from 3.5% behind parity in 2009-10 (when the NRAC formula was introduced) to 0.8% in 2018-19.

Question reference: S5W-20015

Asked by: Alison Harris, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 27 November 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the percentage of efficiency savings made by NHS Forth Valley in non-recurring areas increasing from 7% in 2016-17 to 28% in 2018-19, what action it is taking to help the board in ensuring that efficiency savings are sustainable.

The Scottish Government has established a Sustainability and Value Programme to maximise the benefit from efficiency and productivity savings.

This Programme supports NHS Boards in identifying recurring savings which are then retained for local reinvestment. Savings plans are continually developed throughout the year, to deliver better services, better care and better value. Combined savings delivered in 2017-18 and anticipated in 2018-19 include £523,000 through energy efficiency schemes, £1.2 million through Public/Private contract arrangements and £500,000 through the implementation of the Catering Strategy Guidance.

NHS Forth Valley is fully engaged with these programmes of work. For example, NHS Forth Valley has reduced spend on medical locum costs for the first six months of 2018-19 compared to 2017-18. Also, along with NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde, NHS Forth Valley is leading a programme of work to establish a collaborative staff bank arrangement that is accessible to the other West of Scotland Boards. This bank arrangement will enable staff to take up additional shifts through NHS employment rates thereby reducing the requirement for premium agency staff and reducing overall costs.

Question reference: S5O-02611

Asked by: Alison Harris, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 21 November 2018
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 28 November 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to ensure that all major tourist attractions receive sufficient levels of promotion.