Chamber and committees

Responding to incidents is an operational matter for the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service. The Scottish Government does not hold information on average response times.

The final report of the Independent Review of Qualifications and Assessment was submitted to me on 5 June 2023. It will be published on the Scottish Government website shortly. Scottish Government will now take the time to consider its recommendations carefully and in the context of wider reform and will respond in due course.

This is a matter for ScotRail. The information requested is not held centrally by the Scottish Government.

Local authorities can use Experimental Traffic Regulation Orders as set out in the Local Authorities' Traffic Orders (Procedure) (Scotland) Regulations 1999. As with all other Traffic Regulation Orders, local authorities are under no obligation to inform the Scottish Government when they use these measures and as such we do not hold an accurate record of how many have been deployed during this time period.

Details of Traffic Regulation Orders published by local authorities, including Experimental Traffic Regulation Orders, can be found on Tell Me Scotland's website at: Public Information Notices for Scotland | Tellmescotland .

Following initial discussions, a small number of NHS boards have approached the Pharmacy Service Improvement Team in Practitioner Services Directorate within Public Health Scotland over the past 2 years to obtain data from the Prescribing Information Store (PIS) of the Corporate Data Warehouse, in conjunction with prescriptions images held, and asked for assistance/analysis to support them to increase their levels of CHI capture for OST prescriptions.

Based on various discussions, analysis and findings, the following conclusions were made on the scenarios and conditions that lead to poor CHI capture:-

• EMIS Prescribing System – it was noted that the CHI number prints correctly on GP10(SS) stationery, however, on Nurse prescriptions, GP10N(SS) stationery, the CHI number is printed with spaces, e.g. 0 2 0 2 2 0 x x x x and, therefore, the CHI number is not in the correct format to be captured successfully.
  
• Prescribing locations:-
• In primary care, there are a number of GP10(SS) printed prescriptions from GP Practices with no electronic support/barcode and the CHI number may not be captured via ICR as a result of the other scenarios detailed below.
• In specialist addiction clinics, there is a wide variation across NHS Boards on how these services have been set up locally and the prescription stationery they use to prescribe, e.g. some specialist clinics operate out of primary care and use GP10(SS)/GP10N(SS) stationery and others use hospital locations and use Hospital Based Addict Prescription pads (HBPA) or printed stationery (HBPA(SS)). It was noted that a significant number of printed HBPA prescriptions also had the CHI number in the incorrect format with spaces and the CHI number was not being captured. However, this has recently been addressed in NHS Ayrshire & Arran.

There are other scenarios that result in poor to no CHI capture when prescriptions are scanned via intelligent character recognition (ICR) for remuneration to community pharmacies and these include:

• The quality of printed output, e.g., low toner/ink and the CHI number is not captured.
• Misaligned or obscured CHI number - if this is not printed in the correct position of the prescription form or is obscured by handwriting.
• The Pharmacy Practice stamp in the CHI area is obscuring part of the CHI number.
• Handwritten CHI numbers – there is a very poor ICR capture rate of handwritten CHI numbers.
• No CHI number printed or incomplete CHI number, where only a DOB has been provided.

Scottish Government and Public Health Scotland are actively considering options to resolve the issues outlined, which focus on updating current systems to improve the consistent formatting of prescriptions, consequently improving the automated capture of information.

There is no budget crisis within the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service. The Scottish Government has provided a £14.4m increase in the budget cover for SFRS in 2023-24.

In common with all public bodies in Scotland it is right that SFRS continues to review its operations to ensure it is effective and delivering value for money. Decisions on how they spend their budget is a matter for the SFRS Board.

The Scottish Government is in close contact with SFRS on the management of its budget.

The capital budget allocations to SFRS for each year since its establishment are as follows (in £ millions):

SFRS was formed in April 2013 and the Resource budget for its first year of operations in 2013-14 was £277.23 million. Adjusting that figure using the ONS annual inflation figures for CPIH (Consumer Prices Index including owner occupiers’ housing costs) means the equivalent annual budget for 2023-24 would be £340.185m.

The SFRS Capital budget for 2013-14 was £15.292m. Using the same adjustments means the equivalent annual budget for 2023-24 would be £18.765m.

The non-fiscal element of the SFRS budget has not been included for the comparison of the impact of inflation. Whilst this element is included in the total budget allocated to SFRS each year, the amount is allocated on the basis of actual cost to SFRS to cover accounting elements such as depreciation. As such, this element of the SFRS budget is not subject to inflationary pressures.

We are aware of the proposals in the Renters (Reform) Bill in England introduced last month. The Shared Policy Programme in August 2021, followed by our ‘New Deal for Tenants’ consultation in December 2021 sought views on proposals to strengthen the rights of tenants including, specifically, greater rights to have a pet.

Our proposals for reform are in development ahead of a future Housing Bill. The timing and content of that Housing Bill is currently being considered as we continue to deliver our emergency response to support tenants through the ongoing cost of living crisis.

This is a question for the Keeper of the Registers of Scotland. She advises me that that on 13 June 2023, out of the 2025 registered titles with a footprint area over 500 ha, 432 are owned exclusively by a company. These titles comprise a combined footprint area of 939,133 ha.

A further 213 titles are leased exclusively by a company and 2 are mixed tenure titles registered under the Land Registration (Scotland) 1979 Act.

This figure excludes public bodies, charities, trusts, and titles with a complex proprietorship structure consisting of a mix of natural and non-natural persons acting in various capacities.

Of the 616 unregistered areas of land over 500 ha, which have been linked to a Sasines Search Sheet in the RoS Unlocking Sasines dataset, an estimated 189 are owned by a company. Together, these areas comprise an indicative area of 667,178 ha.