Chamber and committees

Increasing awareness amongst health care professionals of the symptoms of Lyme disease is an on-going priority for the Lyme Borreliosis Group, which is part of the Scottish Health Protection Network (SHPN). The group has produced a suite of educational resources to aid health care professionals in the early detection and treatment of Lyme disease which can be accessed here:https://www.nes.scot.nhs.uk/education-and-training/by-theme-initiative/public-health/health-protection/gastrointestinal-infection-and-zoonoses/ticks-and-lyme-disease.aspx

On 14 June 2019 the Chief Medical Officer wrote to all NHS Health Boards and GP practices highlighting the availability of these resources to staff and in February 2019, the SHPN hosted a clinician focussed, national Lyme disease educational event.

The majority of Lyme disease cases can be diagnosed and treated in primary care without the need for specialist input, however where specialist input is needed such cases would be cared for by Infectious Disease Consultants.

Our Respiratory Care Action Plan for Scotland is under development with work being taken forward with a wide range of stakeholders across the respiratory community and third sector.

The Plan will set out the main priorities to support NHS Boards in the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of respiratory conditions, including idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. Our expectation is to publish in late 2019.

We will work closely with the third sector to deliver measureable improvements in mental health outcomes for children and young people across Scotland through the implementation of the Taskforce recommendations. This work will be taken forward by a new implementation board – the Children & Young People’s Mental Health and Wellbeing Programme Board - and an invitation has been extended to the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations (SCVO) to nominate a representative to sit on the Board who they believe can adequately address the interest of all their members.

In addition, the membership of the Mental Health Strategic Delivery Board takes into account the full range of partners involved in the delivery of mental health services. This includes third sector organisations such as Penumbra, SAMH and VOX Scotland. Details on the full membership of the Board will be published in due course.

The Scottish Government, in partnership with COSLA, welcome the recommendations of the Children and Young People’s Taskforce and are grateful for the significant amount of work and thinking that has gone into their preparation. The inaugural meeting of a new Programme Board that will lead on the implementation of these recommendations, including national CAMHS and Neurodevelopmental Service standards which incorporate acceptance criteria for CAMHS and Neurodevelopmental Services, will take place in August 2019.

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that everyone in Scotland has equal access and support from mental health services. Through the establishment of the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Taskforce and the Youth Commission on Mental Health, we have significantly prioritised the mental health of young people since 2017.

Following the publication of the Taskforce’s delivery plan in December the, Scottish Government announced additional investment of £4m to improve access to CAMHS and to support the development of prevention and early intervention services.

As we take forward the final recommendations of the Taskforce and the Youth Commission we will give particular priority to the needs of those groups of young people at risk of not being able to access mental health services. This work will be progressed by the new Programme Board announced on 4 th July 2019.

Our 10 year mental health strategy has been assessed for equalities impact and we will publish a refreshed equalities impact assessment in the next month, which includes updated analysis of poverty, race and age. We will make use of this analysis to inform our future Mental Health Strategy approach.

The Scottish Government is investing £54 million over 4 years (2016-2020) to support NHS Boards to improve access to services and develop the workforce. This includes £24.6 million to NHS Education for Scotland for investment to enhance supply and training of the workforce to deliver evidence-based psychological therapies. This programme of training for the CAMHS and Psychological Therapies workforce and wider service staff is being delivered in each Integrated Joint Board/NHS Board in evidenced-based interventions, supervision and coaching, along with a contribution to backfill costs to enable staff release.

Recruitment of specific mental health practitioners is a matter for employers such as NHS boards and Local Authorities. These bodies make informed decisions about recruiting existing counsellors and psychotherapists or training new mental health practitioners, according to the needs of local service providers. The Scottish Government expects employers to apply standards which are appropriate to the specialism being recruited for.

The Scottish Government is committed to ending homelessness in Scotland. This is why the five year Ending Homelessness Together Action Plan was developed and published in November 2018. The plan sets out how national and local Government, along with third sector partners, are working to prevent rough sleeping and homelessness in the first place and address this when it does happen.

Our focus on prevention in recent years, through five regionally grouped Housing Options Hubs, has contributed to a significant reduction in homelessness applications. It is vital that we build on this progress in order to achieve our ambition to end homelessness and the Action Plan sets out a wide range of measures we are undertaking to help prevent people becoming homeless. An important way of doing this is ensuring the right tenancy sustainment support is available at the right time and we will work with the Scottish Housing Regulator to progress this work.

The Scottish Government jointly launched the Local Governance Review with COSLA to consider how powers are shared across national and local government, and with communities. The Review reflects our shared commitment to Scotland’s different places and diverse communities having a direct say over decisions which affect them.

The Scottish Government is committed to stimulating investment and creating vibrant and inclusive regional economies. City and Regional Growth Deals represent significant investments in our regional economies, with local authorities leading the development of proposals that reflect their region’s economic strengths, and comprise of a programme of interventions to support transformative change.

Deals represent a partnership of investment between the Scottish Government, the UK Government and local government partners. The Scottish Government has committed over £1.7 billion over the next 10 to 20 years to Deals and associated regional investments. We have made clear that we want to ensure that all of Scotland is covered by a growth deal, and have challenged the UK government to match this.

We are also working with partners to facilitate the development of new Regional Economic Partnerships. These are collaborations between local authorities, the private sector, education and skills providers, our economic agencies and the third sector. By bringing together regional interests, aligning resources, sharing knowledge, and developing joined-up plans, these partnerships, supported by the Scottish Government and our agencies, seek to drive inclusive economic growth at a regional scale.

The Scottish Government jointly launched the Local Governance Review with COSLA to consider how powers are shared across national and local government, and with communities. The Review reflects our shared commitment to Scotland’s different places and diverse communities having a direct say over decisions which affect them. We are taking a whole system approach which looks across Scotland’s public services and ensures that measures to empower people and places in different spheres of governance are cohesive and mutually supportive.

Local Authorities have a statutory responsibility to provide education to all children of school age. The Scottish Government estimates how much local government needs to fund local services and then applies a needs-based formula to allocate the total available funding, which is agreed by the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities on behalf of all 32 councils.

This Government is committed to closing the poverty related attainment gap and that is why we are investing £750 million in the Attainment Scotland Fund over the course of this parliament. We know that empowered teachers, given the right resources and appropriate support, are making a massive difference in our classrooms and are transforming lives.

Pupil Equity Funding was introduced in 2017 as a new way of working to close the attainment gap by providing money directly to head teachers, who know their young people best. Giving head teachers and schools the power to choose where to target support and interventions and decide what will make a real difference to their pupils and communities means the life chances of our young people can be significantly improved.

The Scottish Government jointly launched the Local Governance Review with COSLA to consider how powers are shared across national and local government, and with communities. Engagement extended beyond local government to consider all public services. Summary reports of the initial findings can be found at https://www.gov.scot/democracymatters . We didn't specifically ask about the number of councils, council boundaries, or who should govern each council. Instead, we asked a short set of broad questions about the future of local democracy in Scotland. From over 350 responses from individuals, communities and public institutions, the number, size, or shape of councils, or who should govern them, didn’t appear in the analysis. A key theme which did emerge was the need to consider the right level of place for the delivery of different services – local, regional or national. On 16 May 2019, the Scottish Government and COSLA announced the initial findings and set out next steps. A further round of widespread engagement will take place later in 2019 in order to help create a new system of community-led decision-making that can become integrated into Scottish society.