Chamber and committees

Within the Scottish Government policy responsibility for Health and Care Research sits with the Chief Scientist Office (CSO)

NHS Research Scotland (NRS) is a partnership between the NHS Boards and CSO. NRS works to ensure that the NHS in Scotland provides the best environment to support clinical trials. The Scottish Government provides annual NRS Infrastructure support funding. The 2025/26 figure for this funding was £46.16 million.

The VPAG Commercial Clinical Trials Investment Programme was agreed as part of the 2024 Voluntary Scheme for Branded Medicines Pricing, Access and Growth (VPAG). It aims to strengthen the UK’s global competitiveness in life sciences and support innovation led growth. The programme is supported by approximately £400 million of funding from the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry members

The clinical trials component of VPAG is intended to enhance capacity and delivery of commercial clinical research across the UK. Approximately £40 million from this element of the VPAG investment programme is expected to be invested in Scotland over the five year scheme. CSO has worked with NRS to configure this investment to maximise the opportunities for patients to participate in commercial clinical trials. This includes the setting up of 4 Commercial Research Delivery Centres (CRDC's) - based in Aberdeen, Dundee, Edinburgh and Glasgow - to accelerate and strengthen commercial clinical research delivery.

The Scottish Government funds the Scottish Health Research Register (SHARE). This allows people, aged 11 and over, to register their interest in being contacted about relevant Clinical Trials based on the coded data in their various NHS computer records. As of 10th June 2026, SHARE had recruited 312,835 participants SHARE | RegisterforSHARE

I refer the member to the answer to question S7W-00151 on 1 June 2026. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found athttps://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.

The supply of medicines, and the associated legislation, is a matter reserved to the UK Government. The Chief Pharmaceutical Officer for Scotland is a member of the UK Medicines Shortage Response Group (MSRG). Following the discontinuation of hydrocortisone sodium phosphate 100mg/1ml solution, MSRG issued advice to prescribers to switch people to hydrocortisone sodium succinate 100mg powder for injection, where appropriate. People concerned about the additional steps required to prepare an emergency injection when using the above-noted powder formulation may wish to discuss with their clinician whether an alternative unlicensed hydrocortisone product would be appropriate for them. Work with the pharmaceutical industry to identify a longer-term solution continues.

Catering service provision across the Parliament provides a robust offer around parliamentary business. Service timings for lunch in the Garden Level Restaurant are based on levels of demand, ensuring efficient use of resources in line with parliamentary requirements.  Alternative options are available after 2.30pm at the Coffee Bar where a hot sandwich option can be ordered and in the Public Café where hot food options including soup, baked potatoes and a range of sandwiches (including hot) are on offer until 5pm.  Hot food is also available from 4pm in Queensberry House Lounge.

The Tobacco and Vapes Act 2026 provides us with powers to expand existing smoke free spaces, as well as create vape free spaces and heated tobacco free spaces.

These powers support the implementation of our Tobacco and Vaping Framework Place based actions, and we are considering how we will use the powers, ensuring action is both evidence based and proportionate.

Any action will be subject to consultation and I will update Parliament with the next steps in due course.

Scotland’s screening policy, as is the case in the other nations of the UK, is guided by the recommendations of the UK National Screening Committee (UK NSC). Before making any recommendations, the UK NSC considers the best available evidence to establish whether the harms of screening outweigh the benefits.

On 28 May, the UK NSC recommended that prostate screening should be offered to men aged 45 to 61 with both a confirmed BRCA2 gene variant and a family history of breast, ovarian, pancreatic or prostate cancer.

The Minister for Mental Wellbeing, Public Health, Sport, Alcohol and Drugs, Maree Todd, welcomes and accepts this recommendation. As an immediate priority we are working to consider how the current system for cancer surveillance across our Health Boards can be strengthened to bring us in line with the UK NSC Recommendation. In parallel, work will explore what might be needed to formalise the existing system as a national screening programme.

The UK NSC will continue to gather evidence on the impact of screening on other groups, particularly through the TRANSFORM trial. The Scottish Government will support this evidence gathering in any way it can.

The Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body recently discussed and agreed to continue to collate and publish data about the diversity of MSPs. We recognise the importance of biographical data about MSPs on the website so that the public can understand and decide who they wish to contact on an issue. This data is also important for understanding and monitoring the diversity and representative make up of Parliament in the longer term.

The Gender Sensitive Audit (GSA) report in session 6 had cross party support. Its recommendations included enhancing the collation, monitoring, and reporting of diversity data at Holyrood.

It is SPCB’s intention that a web filter enabling the public to filter members by sex and trans status will be provided on the website, reflecting the diversity of parliament from session 7. This takes account of various considerations, including equalities, data protection and privacy requirements. This work is being carried out respectfully by officials recognising the sensitivities involved.

Turning to the explanation for the temporary removal of the filter following the election, some diversity information was mistakenly made available online before it had been confirmed directly by individual MSPs. Once identified, it was removed from the Parliament’s website.

That information was not sourced from, or verified by, current MSPs and was not collected in line with the terms of recommendations set out in our GSA report of March 2023. As noted, this is being remedied as a matter of urgency, and we are sorry for the confusion and upset this has caused for many people.

Accordingly, on Monday 1 June 2026, all MSPs were invited to complete a short survey on sex and trans status. This process ensures that relevant diversity information is confirmed directly with individual MSPs before use. This is in line with the recommendations of the GSA report.

The short survey should only take MSPs a few minutes to complete and seeks their consent to publication of their personal data on the Parliament’s website. It will be used in relation to the search filter regarding individual MSP website profiles and for use for internal and external reporting on aggregate data and other relevant purposes such as SPICe enquiries.

It is the SPCB’s aim to have the survey responses returned, the technical work completed and the filter reintroduced as soon as possible.

The Scottish Government has not undertaken design work in relation to quad-tracking the railway between Hyndland East Junction and Finnieston East Junction (located at the site of the former Kelvinhaugh Junction).

My officials are in regular contact with NHS Highland regarding the opening of the Invergordon GP walk-in clinic. NHS Highland is responsible for the operational management of the pilot however the Scottish Government is providing support where required. I appreciate the hard work of the health boards to get these services up and running and my thanks go to our hard-working NHS staff for delivering these.

The Scottish Government has made significant progress with the work to introduce a statutory licensing scheme for providers of canine fertility services in Scotland, and we continue to engage with a range of stakeholders on the development of this policy. Given, however, the recent consultation by the UK Government on reforms to the 1966 Veterinary Surgeons Act (the VSA), we are taking the opportunity to engage with the UK Government on the question of whether a reformed VSA - which would apply UK-wide - is the more appropriate mechanism to regulate canine fertility businesses, rather than having separate licensing schemes applying across each region of the UK.