Chamber and committees

We have laid before Parliament today an annual progress report against our Heat in Buildings Strategy, the second since its publication in 2021: https://www.gov.scot/publications/heat-in-buildings-progress-report-2023 .

We have made significant progress in key areas during the past year, including our broad package of delivery schemes, heat networks, building standards and new build regulations. The biggest challenge facing us now is in existing buildings, and therefore the report confirms our intention to consult later this year on proposals for a Heat in Buildings Bill.

The Scottish Government does not hold data on allocation of Community Link Worker posts and capacity at individual General Practice level. This data will be held by individual Health and Social Care Partnerships (HSCP) alongside their local Primary Care Improvement Plans (PCIP).

At 31 st March 2023, there were over 308 WTE primary care Community Link Workers in post across Scotland. The following PCIP publication shows a breakdown of the Whole Time Equivalent by HSCP area:

Primary Care Improvement Plans: Summary of Implementation Progress at March 2023 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

This is not a reduction in the Scottish Government's funding awarded to Creative Scotland. Over the last five years, the Scottish Government has provided over £33m to Creative Scotland to compensate for a shortfall in National Lottery funding. As a result of rising costs and pressure on budgets across government, we are unable to make up the ongoing shortfall this year.

The Cabinet Secretary for Constitution, External Affairs and Culture asked the Creative Scotland Board on 27 September to use £6.6m of their reserves to ensure all payments to regularly funded organisations are met in full. I am pleased that the Board approved this approach and will make up the £6.6m shortfall from their funding reserves, which total £17m. This will mean that the regularly funded organisations will not receive reduced funding this financial year.

Subject to the usual Parliamentary processes we will provide the National Lottery shortfall funding of £6.6m to Creative Scotland in 2024-2025.

The fee per item system of payment affords the opportunity to robustly monitor and evaluate payment reform, building on existing statistical publications. Officials are presently working with partners on the precise details of the data monitoring programme. Evaluation will be a future consideration, once the new system has bedded-in.

Government recognises that it is important that reform is supported by evidence demonstrating the reality of the position on the ground, in order to support the Scottish Government commitment to sustain NHS dental services.

Further to the response to S6W-21420, we continue to develop delivery plans including consideration of the funding and reporting procedures.

The Scottish Government, in collaboration with NHS Education for Scotland (NES), has made available a full suite of information for dental teams on the forthcoming changes including interactive webinars, short educational videos and a comprehensive FAQ document. These can be accessed on Scottish Dental and through NES Turas learning accounts.

In addition to these materials, officials will continue to meet regularly with NHS Boards to understand how dentists can be better supported, within their local area, in transitioning to the new payment system.

We understand that dentists will be eager to communicate with their patients about the changes, and we will shortly be providing materials direct to practices to help deliver this information.

We are grateful to Heart Research UK for their continued work to prevent, treat and cure heart disease in Scotland.

We recognise the scale and impact of heart disease in Scotland and have set out our strategic direction to address this in our Heart Disease Action Plan (2021).

The plan outlines a collaborative approach and acknowledges the important role of the third sector in minimising preventable heart disease and ensuring that everyone with suspected heart disease has timely and equitable access to diagnosis treatment and care.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-21921 on‎ 27 October 2023. 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

This is a matter for NHS Scotland and individual Health Boards. The information requested is not held by the Scottish Government.

You may wish to refer to the Public Health Scotland Scottish Health Service Costs reports .

The Scottish Government does not hold this information.

The teaching standards set by the General Teaching Council for Scotland require teachers to be able to identify and respond appropriately to pupils with difficulties in or barriers to learning. During initial teacher education, student teachers will gain sufficient knowledge of additional support needs for them to be able to support the child in question themselves or to seek specialised information and specialised support if necessary. Scottish Ministers have recently outlined in our Programme for Government 2023-24 our commitment to work with teachers to provide additional professional learning opportunities while seeking to build on the Additional Support for Learning Action Plan.

In 2022-23, the Scottish Government provided over £500,000 to voluntary sector organisations to support children and young people with additional support needs, including sensory loss. This includes funding to the Scottish Sensory Centre to support the training of school staff to provide effective support to Deaf children and young people.

In December 2021, we published the Autism in Schools Action plan and the majority of the actions are complete. Several of the actions, such as the funding of professional learning resources like the Autism Toolbox are intended to be ongoing, to reflect best practice and current research in this area.