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-27845

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 10 March 2020
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 18 March 2020

To ask the Scottish Government what action NHS Lothian is taking to improve access to podiatric services.

The Scottish Government is fully committed to providing the people of Scotland with the NHS services which meet their needs and maintain high standards of care, including Podiatry Services, however, it is for each NHS Board to decide how best to deliver these services based on local priorities and clinical need to meet the needs of the population. Our National Personal Footcare Guidance supports the Podiatry service in NHSScotland to meet the increasing demands and needs of people with a clinical or medical need for podiatry care and to ensure that highly qualified and experienced staff in NHS Boards are deployed to enable the Podiatry service to focus on early diagnosis and treat those with the most severe medical conditions of the lower leg and foot as it is important that NHS Boards have the ability and capacity to carry out these interventions.

The guidance can be found at: https://www.gov.scot/publications/personal-footcare-guidance/pages/4/

Question reference: S5W-27848

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 10 March 2020
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 18 March 2020

To ask the Scottish Government how much the NHS has spent on diabetic foot ulceration treatment, including amputations, in each year since 2010.

Question reference: S5W-27831

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 10 March 2020
Current Status: Answered by Joe FitzPatrick on 18 March 2020

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of its publication, A healthier future: Scotland's diet and healthy weight delivery plan, which was published in July 2018, what oversight and governance is in place to report on progress implementing the actions outlined in this plan, and whether there will be an interim report.

Question reference: S5W-27844

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 10 March 2020
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 18 March 2020

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the potential cost to the NHS of longer-term podiatric treatment, what support it offers to NHS boards to assist podiatrists in improving levels of early diagnosis.

In recent years podiatry services across Scotland have been redesigned to ensure that patients with the most urgent clinical need are seen by a podiatrist and those that do require personal footcare are redirected to a more appropriate service. Our National Personal Footcare Guidance supports the Podiatry service in NHSScotland to meet the increasing demands and needs of people with a clinical or medical need for podiatry care and to ensure that highly qualified and experienced staff in NHS Boards are deployed to enable the Podiatry service to focus on early diagnosis and treat those with the most severe medical conditions of the lower leg and foot as it is important that NHS Boards have the ability and capacity to carry out these interventions.

The guidance can be found at: https://www.gov.scot/publications/personal-footcare-guidance/pages/4/ .

Question reference: S5W-27871

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 March 2020
Current Status: Answered by Joe FitzPatrick on 18 March 2020

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to counteract the increase in the child mortality rate from 9.3 to 9.7 per 100,000 for children aged one to nine.

The most recent available data from National Records of Scotland show over the last five years (2013-2018) the mortality rate for children aged 1-9 has fallen from 10.39 per 100,000 to 9.70 per 100,000 – from 54 to 51. That’s down from a rate of 15.173 (75 deaths) since 2007.

The Scottish Government remains committed to reducing preventable deaths.

The National Hub for the Prevention of Child Deaths began work in 2019. Its focus will be to oversee the Child Death Review process and to drive a reduction in child deaths. It will undertake a full analysis of the data on child and adolescent mortality as part of its work programme to inform further action and learning, based on the findings of this work.

Question reference: S5W-27733

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 04 March 2020
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 16 March 2020

To ask the Scottish Government what information it has on how many Scottish Ambulance Service callouts were alcohol-related in each of the last four years.

The Scottish Ambulance Service do not record alcohol related incidents. The following table shows the number of callouts where the crew have noted that alcohol was a factor:

Calendar Year	Number of Incidents
2016	14,385
2017	15,420
2018	31,009
2019	28,451

The following caveats apply to the above table:

The software for recording clinical data changed around Oct 2017
The data prior to 2017 is based on crews recording that alcohol was a factor in the incident. Post Oct 2017 crews could record this, along with alcohol having been a factor, in cases such as overdose, convulsions and drowning.

Question reference: S5W-27772

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Thursday, 05 March 2020
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 13 March 2020

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-27462 by Michael Matheson on 26 February 2020, for what reason it considered that a similar system for the Forth Road Bridge would not be suitable or effective.

Question reference: S5O-04274

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 March 2020
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 18 March 2020

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions the justice secretary has had with ministerial colleagues regarding how many of the 800 additional mental health workers committed to in its Mental Health Strategy will be deployed within police and prison services in Edinburgh.

Question reference: S5W-27417

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Thursday, 13 February 2020
Current Status: Answered by Clare Haughey on 11 March 2020

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-24311 by Clare Haughey on 30 July 2019, whether it will provide an update on how much of the £250 million allocated to mental health in the 2018-19 Programme for Government has been invested in community mental wellbeing services for five- to 24-year-olds.

The Children and Young People’s Mental Health and Wellbeing Programme Board is overseeing the delivery of new community mental health and wellbeing supports and services for children and young people aged from 5-24 and their families.

The Programme Board has developed and signed off a framework which sets out a clear broad approach to this support and is designed to assist local collaborative partnerships. This framework has been circulated to Community Planning Partnerships who are being asked to take a collaborative local approach.

A set of principles around delivery of this have been jointly agreed between Scottish Government and COSLA. We are working closely with a range of partners including local authorities, Community Planning Partnerships and Children’s Services Planning Partnerships on the implementation of supports and services as laid out in the framework.

An initial first tranche of funding of £2 million has been made available to support planning and development.

Further funding of up to £15 million will be provided in 2020-21 to enable the roll out of supports and services following the initial planning period.

Question reference: S5W-27565

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 21 February 2020
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 9 March 2020

To ask the Scottish Government for what reason social care provision is reportedly only provided to people with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) following a diagnosis of dementia, and what its position is on offering such provision to all people with MCI.

Local authorities have a duty under the Social Work (Scotland) Act 1968 to carry out social care support assessments. Any person who feels their quality of life would benefit from social care support can request a social care support assessment. This includes any person with mild cognitive impairment or with dementia. This request can be made by the person themselves, members of their family, carers, friends or from their medical practitioners.