Chamber and committees

Mental health remains an absolute priority for the Scottish Government, and we are committed to ensuring that everyone who needs support can get access to services that are appropriate to their needs. Through this approach we recognise that long-term conditions, such as kidney disease, can impact a person’s mental wellbeing. We encourage anyone struggling with their mental health and wellbeing to approach their clinical support team in the first instance, who can advise on appropriate support avenues. Information can also be found on the NHS Inform website and other online mental health and wellbeing support services.

We will shortly publish a new Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy. The Strategy will set out a long-term vision, and a set of outcomes, for the mental health and wellbeing of the population. We will subsequently publish a Delivery Plan to set out the work we will do over the coming years to make progress towards those outcomes, and set out how we will measure that progress.

This will include consideration on how the Strategy will set ambitions and actions to support people living with long term conditions. One of our key outcomes for the Strategy is to ensure people with mental health conditions, including those with co-existing health conditions, experience improved quality and length of life, free from stigma and discrimination

In order to achieve this, we will work with partners to develop actions that will see improved provision of services and support to people with long-term physical health conditions for their mental health and wellbeing.

In addition to this, the National Education Scotland and Scottish Government developed The Matrix: A Guide for Delivering Evidence-based Psychological Therapies in Scotland to support NHS Boards in planning the range, volume and quality of psychological therapies required to meet Scottish Government commitments. The Matrix is due to be refreshed in 2023 but already includes a section specifically on chronic kidney disease.

The overarching approach of the Mental Health (Care and Treatment) (Scotland) Act 2003 is one of safeguarding to ensure that the law and practice for those who require compulsory care and treatment are driven by core principles, particularly minimum restriction in individual liberty with the maximum benefit for the patient.

The 2003 Act has specific provisions for offences which include wilful neglect and ill-treatment. Any report of harm, ill-treatment or neglect by a person in a position of trust in hospital, or elsewhere, should be acted upon and passed to the relevant local authority’s health and social care services, as well as the police if criminality is suspected.

The Adult Support and Protection (Scotland) Act 2007 is intended to protect those adults who are unable to safeguard their own interests, who are at risk of harm and, because they are affected by disability, mental disorder, illness or physical or mental infirmity, are more vulnerable to harm than those who are not so affected.

The Code of Practice which accompanies the 2007 Act is clear that coercive control or undue pressure exercised over a vulnerable person may make them unable to make or action decisions that would protect them from harm. The safeguarding provisions of the 2007 Act could be applied in such cases providing they meet all of the 3 point criteria which define an adult at risk.

Scottish Ministers are finalising an agreement with Crown Estate Scotland for a percentage transfer of CES’s previous year's gross revenue to its capital account in 2023-24 and 2024-25. This will be set out in a Ministerial Direction which will be published on the Scottish Government website.

In the 2021 Heat in Buildings Strategy, the Scottish Government committed to reforming Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs) to ensure they drive the energy efficiency improvements we need and to incentivise zero direct emissions heating. The need for this work was recently reemphasised by the Climate Change Committee. The team working on the development of the proposed new energy efficiency ratings system comprises of staff at the following Scottish Government Pay Grades:

1 x C2

1 x C1

2 x B3

1 x B2

This team is overseen by a member of staff at Senior Civil Service grade SCS1. Staff are not working solely on EPC metric development and have other responsibilities.

The Scottish Government has not recently assessed the level of safeguarding in place regarding named persons defined under the Mental Health (Care and Treatment) (Scotland) Act 2003.

The Act allows the patient to have a right to choose whether to have a named person or not. The purpose of a named person is to allow someone to look after a patient’s interests when they are subject to compulsory care and treatment. However, where there are concerns that a person is not suitable to act as a named person then the Act allows for action to be taken. People, such as a patient’s mental health officer, a welfare attorney, a guardian, relatives or anyone who has an interest in the patients welfare, can apply to the Mental Health Tribunal to have a named person removed from the role if they feel that they are unsuitable.

The Scottish Mental Health Law Review made a number of recommendations regarding the operation of the named person provisions under the Act which the Scottish Government will give further consideration to as part of our response to the Review.

An Estate Strategy and Carbon Management Plan for Scottish Government core buildings is under development to support our asset planning and the future investment decisions required to improve the energy performance of our buildings and deliver the Heat in Building Strategy and Net Zero targets.

The Scottish Government is committed to delivering energy saving projects across its estate, such as reduced use of natural gas, improved insulation, more efficient boilers, and the installation of solar panels. In the last 18 months, two projects to remove gas heating, install insulation, install triple glazing and solar PV were completed at our Thainstone and Tweedbank buildings. Additionally, LED lighting was installed at Victoria Quay and SASA in Edinburgh. The EPC's for these buildings will be updated in due course.

Feasibility studies are currently being carried out for other owned buildings on our estate.

Following an open procurement exercise, in June 2022 the Building Research Establishment (BRE) was commissioned by the Scottish Government to develop potential options for new EPC metrics; model the Scottish housing stock against these new metrics, propose a system to map the new metrics to a 1-100 and A-G scale, and identify the improvement measures needed to retrofit dwellings to achieve high EPC ratings in the new metrics.

This work was concluded in March 2023 and we intend to publish BRE’s report alongside our forthcoming EPC reform consultation. The fee was £93,768.

The Scottish Government does not hold data on how much money has been raised from fixed penalties issued for the offence of littering or flytipping.

This detailed information can be obtained by contacting individual issuing authorities.

Scottish Government have recently appointed professional experts to prepare a scope for future surveys. Final security checks are currently being completed and thereafter it is anticipated that the 6 week programme to develop a scope will be completed by September 2023.

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that all people living with kidney disease are able to access the best possible care and support, and benefit from healthcare services that are safe, effective and put people at the centre of their care.

Psychosocial support is an element of person-centred care and covers the need to consider a wide range of factors that affect a person’s wellbeing. We recognise that primary care is the first and often the main point of contact for many people in their diagnosis and care journey. Our strengthening of Scotland’s primary care workforce through the recruitment of multi-disciplinary teams is making it easier for people to access frontline care local to them. We have now recruited over 3,000 professionals including community nurses and physiotherapists, with increased funding of £170m this year to support further development of multi-disciplinary teams in primary care.

We will continue working to identify how to drive up standards of care in chronic kidney disease care, using data from the Scottish Renal Registry, in order to maximise the care, treatment and quality of life for everyone living with the disease across Scotland.