Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government continues to take whole population and targeted approaches to tackle alcohol-related harms. We have laid legislation seeking the agreement of Parliament to continue Minimum Unit Pricing, and set the price per unit at 65 pence. Members of the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee voted to approve those orders on 26 March 2024 and I am pleased that there is cross party support for this policy.

We will continue to engage with all stakeholders, including public health organisations and the alcohol industry, around potential restrictions to alcohol marketing. This will take the form of targeted engagement, with the aim of consulting on a more specific set of proposals later this year.

We have asked Public Health Scotland to investigate the reasons behind the apparent 40% reduction in the number of people accessing specialist alcohol treatment.

We are working with stakeholders to develop a National Service Specification, informed by the forthcoming UK alcohol treatment clinical guidelines. They will aim to provide clarity on the types of treatment and recovery services available.

The Perinatal and Infant Mental Health Managed Clinical Network Scotland (PIMHNS) has developed a workstream ‘Parents as Patients’ to develop guidance around joined-up working (i) between perinatal/infant mental health services and other mental health services (e.g. general adult mental health, unscheduled care, liaison mental health), and (ii) between perinatal/infant mental health services and other relevant medical care services (particularly primary care and acute hospital care). The important role of the third sector will feature in both. Initial meetings of two Short Life Working Groups (SLWG) have taken place to progress these workstreams, along with amending the existing care pathways which were published in 2021 ( https://www.nn.nhs.scot/pmhn/wp-content/uploads/sites/11/2021/06/Care-Pathways-full.pdf ) .

Both SLWGs will focus on the themes of:

• Interfaces – to cover both care between specialist and general or universal services. This would also include principles of joint working and good practice.
• Education and training – to address knowledge of parent infant relationships and infant mental health needs as well as child protection issues and risks in relation to childbearing.

The final guidance and updated care pathways are due to be published in the final quarter of the financial year.

The Scottish Government has repeatedly made it clear to the UK Government that the best way to ensure that there is a quick, fair and equal solution for all affected sub-postmasters is for a UK-wide Bill. It is not too late for the UK Government to change their position, and we will continue to press for a UK-wide solution as the Post Office (Horizon System) Offences Bill progresses through the Westminster Parliament.

If the scope of the UK Bill is not extended we will do everything in our power to work as quickly as possible to introduce Scottish legislation that delivers justice for all those affected. Any such legislation can however only be passed after the UK Bill has been passed, to allow account to be taken of any amendments made during passage at Westminster. This is required to ensure full compatibility with UK legislation and the UK compensation scheme, in which the Scottish Government has no locus.

The Scottish Government have regular and consistent engagement with representatives of the care sector.

Recent engagement has explored resilience, viability, surge pressures, fair work, Healthcare Framework for Adults Living in Care Homes, workforce challenges and support, including NCS design and Workforce Charter.

A recent audit of the Multi-function Devices (MFD) highlighted that there was an issue with this particular MFD and this was taken forward by BIT, who deal with software issues in the first instance. Additionally, there were five entries recorded for this MFD in December, none in January and two in February.

The Contract Manager for the MFD contract with Agilico has confirmed that this MFD has now been replaced with a model with an identical specification and that no further issues have been recorded since.

The Scottish Government recognises that social prescribing can be an effective method of improving an individual’s physical, mental and social health. It plays an important role in helping us achieve our commitment to prevention, holistic care and Realistic Medicine. Our Primary Care Community Link Worker programme has been in place since 2014 and a 2017 commitment to create 250 Community Link Worker posts in general practice has been achieved.

Due to the wide range of activity which is described as social prescribing, there are many Scottish Government policies and resources which play a role in supporting its delivery. For example, we recognise the important role played by local organisations in supporting the health and wellbeing of their communities and we are working with the community and voluntary sector to look at how we can enhance the capacity of the sector to help those organisations address the challenges they face. The ongoing development by the ALLIANCE of the ALISS online database helps to provide information on community resources and our Green Health Partnership programme led by NatureScot helps to promote the connection between health and the natural environment.

We recognise that there may be a need for more national guidance to support Community Link Workers. We are currently considering how to take that forward in relation to the Community Link Worker programme in Primary Care. While this work will focus on Link Workers in Primary Care, we hope that there will be wider learning that may be able to be shared with the wider social prescribing community.

In the following table I have outlined the amount of grant money awarded to each board since 2007. We are unable to confirm the amount to each dental provider as it would potentially breach commercial in confidence.

We published a partial update of the Scottish Good Practice Statement on ME/CFS on the Scottish Government website in February 2023. This incorporated key recommendations from the NICE 2021 guidance on a broad range of topics such as energy management and Graded Exercise Therapy; Cognitive Behavioural Therapy; diagnosis and care of children and young people; and severity scale of illness.

The Scottish Government recognises the importance of effective and comprehensive air quality monitoring. Although there are no specific plans to provide material support for this project, we welcome research which contributes to the evidence base around the health impacts of poor air quality.

All air quality objectives at each site in the Scottish automatic monitoring network are currently being achieved, and we are continuing efforts to further reduce air pollution through a comprehensive range of actions set out in our Cleaner Air for Scotland 2 strategy, including the introduction of Low Emission Zones in our four biggest cities.

Through the Scottish Industrial Energy Transformation Fund (SIETF),we allocated £3.1 million in 2021 for Call 1, £6.8 million in 2022 for Call 2 and £6.3 million in 2023 for Call 3 to co-invest with a diverse range of Scottish manufacturers to reduce energy costs and carbon emissions through increased energy efficiency and deep decarbonisation projects.