Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government welcomes Audit Scotland’s report and has asked the Collaborative Response and Assurance group, which is co-chaired by the Scottish Government and CoSLA to come together to consider these recommendations as a whole and develop a partnership approach to addressing them. The Scottish Government remains committed to reforming the Adults with Incapacity (Scotland) 2000 Act will which will play a critical role in embedding this recommendation in future.

The Scottish Government welcomes Audit Scotland’s report and has asked the Collaborative Response and Assurance group, which is co-chaired by the Scottish Government and CoSLA to come together to consider these recommendations as a whole and develop a partnership approach to addressing them. The Scottish Government has begun this work and is engaged with key partners to discuss the delivery of Powers of Attorney and Guardianship processes.

As noted in response to question S6W-42576, as part of the strategic work to implement the Health and Social Care Service Renewal Framework, the Scottish Government are considering how best to shift the balance of care by reducing referrals to hospital dental services and retain patients within their local community for a wider range of care and treatment. Officials are appraising various options as part of this work, including the potential further roll-out of enhanced skills dentists in primary care, therefore there is currently no timeline for further roll-out at this stage.

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.

The total number of Scottish participants in the ASH SmokeFree GB Youth survey was:

(a) 760 (677 aged 11-17) in 2024

(b) 856 (755 aged 11-17) in 2025

Information on the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD) is not available for this sample. Data are collected on social grade and grouped into ABC1 and C2DE categories, which are not directly comparable with SIMD. The sample is unlikely to be representative in terms of deprivation as it leans towards higher social grades. The data are not weighted to account for this, and this limitation should be considered when interpreting the results.

The aim of the booster sample is to enable monitoring of progress against key indicators 4(i) and 4(ii) of the Tobacco and Vaping Framework (i.e. smoking and vaping behaviours in children and young people), while balancing cost, analytical value, and timeliness.

Information on the methodology (including sample size) and results for 2024 and 2025 are available on the Scottish Government website (https://www.gov.scot/publications/vaping-smoking-scottish-adolescents/pages/1/;https://www.gov.scot/publications/vaping-smoking-scottish-adolescents-results-ash-smokefree-gb-youth-survey-2025/).

The Scottish Government acknowledges that households with a disabled family member often face challenges such as accessibility issues and increased poverty, which in turn can create barriers to participation. The Scottish Government’s devolved disability benefits help with the additional costs of being disabled. These vital payments can reduce barriers to equal participation in communities and increase life opportunities, including for children and young people.

The Scottish Government remains committed to increasing opportunities for children and young people to participate in sport and physical activity, no matter their background. The Active Schools programme provides access to sport before, during, and after school. It is delivered free of charge, making it is accessible, irrespective of socio-economic background. Active School’s mainstream extracurricular programmes target groups in greatest need of inclusion and operate in both mainstream and ASN schools across all 32 local authorities. In 2024-25, Active Schools delivered approximately 265,000 sessions to 280,000 participants.

The Scottish Government’s Physical Activity for Health Framework highlights the critical role of sport and physical activity for everyone, including disabled people. Grounded in the latest scientific evidence and key public health principles, the Framework emphasises the role physical activity plays in reducing non-communicable diseases and improving overall health.

The Framework also recognises the positive impact of physical activity on mental wellbeing, by reducing isolation, fostering community cohesion, and building resilience and confidence. Additionally, the Framework underscores the wider societal benefits of physical activity, such as supporting educational attainment, reducing reoffending, promoting sustainable transport, and enhancing engagement with the natural environment.

A detailed stakeholder identification and mapping exercise is currently underway as part of NHS Education Scotland’s discovery work into onboarding primary care services into MyCare.scot.

The Scottish Government welcomes Scottish Disability Sport’s (SDS) National Survey and Call to Action. We acknowledge that disabled people are less likely to be active, and we remain committed to working with SDS and wider partners to reduce barriers to participation.

Our national agency for sport, sportscotland, has invested £750,000 into SDS for 2025/26, and is working to create an inclusive sporting system through initiatives such as the Moving to Inclusion Framework, which supports governing bodies of sport to tackle inequalities in participation.

Addressing inequalities in participation of sport and physical activity requires a whole-system approach beyond sport, encompassing transport, education, social security, and health. Our Physical Activity for Health Framework sets out a vision for a more active Scotland across eight strategic areas. Implementation of this Framework will help ensure that physical activity is embedded into everyday life for all.

The Scottish Government strongly supports the Scottish Disability Sport (SDS) Call to Action to enable disabled people to engage in sport and physical activity and address the finding that 40% of disabled people in Scotland are worried about losing their benefits if they are seen to be active.

Devolved social security benefits provide financial support to disabled people to help mitigate the additional costs of being disabled. The Scottish Government is clear this support can help reduce barriers to equal participation in communities and increase life opportunities. Social Security Scotland actively encourages everyone who may be eligible to apply for these benefits to apply and work is in hand on a marketing campaign to increase take-up.

The Scottish Government recognises the importance of robust data to inform service planning and improve outcomes for people with respiratory conditions, including interstitial lung disease (ILD). In 2023, we provided funding to Public Health Scotland to undertake a scoping exercise for a national respiratory audit, however fiscal challenges delayed progress.

We remain committed to working with Public Health Scotland and clinical stakeholders to establish a sustainable audit programme that captures meaningful data across all NHS boards.