Chamber and committees

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-40646 on 1 October 0225 2025. 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 Scottish Government cannot guarantee construction but can provide multi-annual policy and funding certainty, increased spend and a planning and regulatory environment which is conducive to investment and delivery. Our Housing Emergency Action Plan seeks to deliver against this tripartite approach.

The Scottish Government remains focussed on our target of delivering 110,000 affordable homes by 2032, with at least 70% for social rent and at least 10% in our rural and island communities.

Local authorities have responsibility for setting out the investment priorities supported through the Affordable Housing Supply Programme (AHSP), ensuring the delivery of the right homes in the right places. In support of these priorities the AHSP has been increased, with the budget for 2025-2026 now £808 million.

Recognising the importance of multi-year funding for housing and the confidence this brings to the sector, the Housing Emergency Action Plan published on 2 September includes a commitment to deliver up to £4.9 billion investment over the coming four years, with homes delivered through a mixture of public and privately leveraged investment. Further details will be outlined in the forthcoming Scottish Spending Review and Scottish Budget.

Actual progress on all homes delivered through the Affordable Housing Supply Programme (AHSP) are reported via our quarterly official statistics. Official statistics for the Affordable Housing Supply Programme are available on the Scottish Government website at Housing statistics - gov.scot.

The Scottish Government recognises the importance of early diagnosis of cancer or serious illness and would expect any patient presenting with potential symptoms to be assessed as quickly as possible.

The Scottish Referral Guidelines (SRG) for Suspected Cancer support primary care clinicians to identify those with symptoms suspicious of cancer and identify those who require urgent assessment by a specialist.

A clinical review of SRGs has been completed with updated guidance published on 6 August 2025. These include a nationally agreed non-specific symptoms referral criteria for the first time to support primary care to ensure that the right people are on the right pathway at the right time.

A new primary care cancer education platform – Gateway C – was launched in 2024 in NHS Scotland, funded by the Detect Cancer Earlier (DCE) Programme and supported by NHS Education for Scotland (NES).

Gateway C provides innovative and tailored information to support earlier cancer diagnosis efforts and enable effective decision-making. This free online platform is accessible to all primary care clinicians including pharmacists, dentists, and optometrists.

Further to this, we have continued to invest in our Rapid Cancer Diagnostic Services. They provide primary care with access to a new fast-track diagnostic pathway for people with non-specific symptoms suspicious of cancer, such as weight loss and fatigue. We opened another service in NHS Forth Valley in 2025, bringing our national total to six.

We have assessed the strong evidence that the earlier the stage cancer is diagnosed the better the outcomes are for those affected, irrespective of age, cancer type, race or any other protected characteristic.

This has informed our Earlier Cancer Diagnosis vision as part of the Cancer Strategy for Scotland 2023-2033 and initial three-year Action Plan for Scotland 2023 – 2026. The vision is to reduce later stage disease by 18 percentage points in 10 years’ time (2033), making clear our ambition to reduce inequalities in access to cancer care and improving outcomes for anyone diagnosed with cancer.

The Scottish Government recognises the importance of early diagnosis of cancer or serious illness and would expect any patient presenting with potential symptoms to be assessed as quickly as possible.

The Scottish Referral Guidelines (SRG) for Suspected Cancer support primary care clinicians to identify those with symptoms suspicious of cancer and identify those who require urgent assessment by a specialist.

A clinical review of SRGs has been completed with updated guidance published on 6 August 2025.

The Scottish Government does not know at this juncture what the rolling out of Jess’s Rule will require in terms of implementation either by GPs or NHS England. We will be in a position to consider the benefits of the rule when we know more.

However, the Scottish Government understands that the RCGP learning resource which supports “Jess’s Rule” is available to GPs who are members in Scotland as well as in England. We would encourage GPs to make use of this resource.

The Scottish Government does not know at this juncture, what the rolling out of Jess’s Rule will require in terms of implementation either by GPs or NHS England or what the impact will be for patients. We will monitor the implementation by NHS England.

Local authorities are entirely separate entities from the Scottish Government and their powers are set out in statute. It is up to each local authority to manage its own day to day business. The Scottish Government does not have a role in the operations of councils, including decisions to instruct external legal counsel. The Scottish Government expects all councils to have robust internal procedures in place to manage conflicts of interest and to ensure decisions are taken in a transparent and accountable manner.

Public bodies, including local authorities, are expected to comply with all relevant procurement legislative requirements. Public bodies are responsible for deciding their actions in individual cases.

In addition to following organisation-specific guidance, the Scottish Procurement Policy Handbook provides guidance on the rules and policies that apply to the procurement activities of public bodies in Scotland. Additional and more specific guidance and e-learning is available to public bodies in various forms such as via the Procurement Journey website, Sustainable Procurement Tools and various Scottish Procurement Policy Notes.

The Scottish Government reviews its guidance on an ongoing basis to ensure necessary and helpful updates are made as appropriate.

Local authorities are autonomous corporate bodies, accountable to their electorates, and are responsible for managing their own procurement processes in line with statutory duties and national procurement legislation.

The Scottish Government does not independently review local authorities. The Accounts Commission and Audit Scotland provide independent scrutiny of local government performance. These bodies can consider concerns raised by the public or elected members and use this information to inform their audit work. Parties which have suffered, or risk suffering, loss as a result of an alleged failure to comply with the procurement legislation also have the option of bringing action under that legislation in the courts.

There are a variety of targeted capability and improvement programmes at national and sectoral level to review, support and underpin local performance against agreed national standards and policy aspirations, helping to strengthen the systems, skills and processes that support audit and governance.