Chamber and committees

The reform of NHS dental services survey was responded to by over 500 dentists, the survey built on the Oral Health Improvement Plan which was developed through wide ranging public consultation in 2017. The reform of NHS dental services is presently focused on delivering payment system reform and sustaining NHS dental access for the general public.

This information is not available in the form requested.

The Scottish House Condition Survey (SHCS) explores the physical condition of Scotland’s homes as well as the experiences of householders. Data from the (SHCS) provides estimates of the number and percentage of households using LPG (bulk or bottled) as a primary heating fuel, based on a single year of data, and at a local authority level by averaging three years’ of data. The survey has not been designed to provide results by Parliamentary Region. The most recent data for 2017-19 by local authority is presented in the following table.

It should be noted that at a Scotland level over the period 2017 to 2019, 1% or 25,000 of households were estimated to use LPG as a primary heating fuel in their homes. Given this low prevalence, precise actual estimates from survey results are not available for Fife and other Local Authority areas.

It should also be noted that some households may use LPG as a secondary heating fuel, alongside other fuels. This is not included in the table below.

Table 1: Number and percentage of households using LPG (bulk or bottled) as a primary heating fuel, by local authority, SHCS 2017 to 2019

Work is currently underway in the Scottish Public Health Workforce Development Group to assess needs and agree priority actions in relation to the public health workforce. Three additional Public Health training places for trainee doctors have been created in recent years following recommendations made by the Scottish Shape of Training Transition Group. While this may seem like a modest increase, it is relative to the specialty’s training establishment i.e. there were 35 established training places prior to the creation of those three extra posts. This will continue to be reviewed as part of public health workforce planning.

Work is currently underway in the Scottish Public Health Workforce Development Group to assess needs and agree priority actions in relation to the public health workforce, taking into account previous recommendations and learning from the pandemic. The Public Health Scotland (PHS) and Scottish Directors of Public Health Localised Working Programme is currently working with three pathfinder sites to improve local access to specialist public health advice and forms a collaboration between PHS, local health boards and joint partners, including COSLA. The programme aims to achieve better outcomes for communities through leading and supporting action on inequalities and the determinants of health.

A recent review of the Scottish Health Protection Network has also identified learning from the pandemic and considered how to ensure a strengthened health protection function for Scotland going forward.

The Scottish Government fully supports Food Standards Scotland (FSS) winter campaign to raise awareness of vitamin D and to encourage people to take vitamin D supplements to maintain bone and muscle health.

The campaign will run until February 2023 and builds on the previous FSS social media campaigns and other work by FSS, Scottish Government and Public Health Scotland to raise awareness of vitamin D. A campaign toolkit is available and we continue to encourage stakeholders to share and promote the campaign messages.

The 24% reduction is when comparing the total More Homes budget in 2023-24 against the total More Homes budget in 2022-23. The profile of our more than £3.5 billion commitment over this parliament varies from year to year as do its component parts which include capital, financial transactions and anticipated receipts.

The £751.945m budget for 2023-24 for the Affordable Housing Supply Programme has reduced by 4.7% from that previously planned, a net decrease of £37.320m, and will be supplemented by donations from the Charitable Bond Programme and contributions from the Heat in Buildings Fund for the installation of zero emission heating systems in affordable homes where these systems are installed.

Our guidance asks Local Authorities to over plan in their Strategic Housing Investment Plan (SHIP) programmes against these planning assumptions by at least 25% to mitigate delays to housing programmes. There are therefore no plans to revise Resource Planning Assumptions for 2023-24. Any in year funding pressures that emerge will be managed in discussion with local partners. Planned annual budgets for the remainder of the parliament have not been reduced.

This publication’s Supporting Documents include a spreadsheet file titled ‘General Practice recorded diagnoses’. Table 4 in this spreadsheet shows GP recorded diagnoses of neurological conditions, by sex and age. For each neurological condition shown, it gives the number of GP recorded diagnoses by sex in the following age bands: 0-4, 5-9, 10-14, 15-19. This data is shown in the following table. In some cases small numbers have been suppressed to help maintain patient confidentiality. We do not have data apportioned to the exact age bands in the question.

Number of people diagnosed with ME/CFS by sex and age group

The following table details the number of full-time equivalent staff, broken down by grade, who have worked on tobacco policy within Health Improvement Division since 2017-18.

Please note the following:

• numbers do not equate to head count within Health Improvement Division.
• vacancies have not been included.
• numbers have been compiled using historic Scottish Government HR records
• during 2020/21 some staff would have focused on COVID pandemic response work

Scottish Government officials had discussions with the Existing Homes Alliance during 2022 as part of the Alliance’s work to develop a Rural Homes Just Transition Package .

Data is only available from 2015-16. Since 2015-16 a total of 1,531 pharmacist trainees have stayed in Scotland to complete their pre-registration training year.

The following table shows number of pharmacist trainees who have stayed in Scotland to complete their registration broken down for each year since 2015-16.