Chamber and committees

The information requested is not held centrally by the Scottish Government. The member may wish to contact NHS Grampian directly for this information.

The information requested is not collected or held centrally by the Scottish Government.

While the Scottish Government provides the overall guidance to NHS Boards for the patient travel expenses reimbursement schemes, individual Boards are responsible for developing and applying their own policies and for determining patient and escort eligibility. The cost of travel funded/refunded under the schemes is met from Boards’ budgets.

The figures are provided in the following tables.

Custodial

How many times a person has appeared in court on a charge of cruelty and unnatural treatment of children, and received a custodial sentence:

The Scottish Government provides the overarching guidance to NHS Boards for patient travel expenses reimbursement and there has been no change to that guidance in the last 5 years. The Scottish Government has committed to a review of this overarching patient travel expenses reimbursement guidance. However, a start date for the review is not confirmed at this time; it is important that the review is considered within the context of wider reform on access to health care which is already in progress.

The Scottish Government has no plans to introduce regulations to prevent breeders, trainers or owners of greyhounds in Scotland taking their dogs to race in England. While we will be proposing some amendments to the Greyhound Racing (Offences) (Scotland) Bill, we would not support an amendment that would introduce such a prohibition.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the number of staff currently employed in local authority planning services, nor in other sectors.

Research commissioned by Skills Development Scotland, published in 2021, estimated that there were approximately 1600 people employed in the planning profession in Scotland and that over the next 10-15 years the planning sector would have demand for an additional 700 entrants into the sector.

More recently, the National Planning Improvement Champion has undertaken a workforce and capacity study and published the findings at: National Planning Improvement Workforce and Capacity Report Scotland. The RTPI has also published its report scotland-sotp-final.pdf. We are currently considering the findings of these reports.

The Scottish Government recognises the financial and capacity pressures on the planning system and is continuing to take forward a package of changes to provide authorities with additional resources. Planning fees were increased in line with inflation in December 2024, June 2025 and a further increase is scheduled for April 2026.

In addition, Scotland’s National Planning Hub continues to provide additional funding and targeted practical support to help authorities respond to pressing challenges, enabling them to accelerate key activities this financial year.

We are also supporting an increase in planners coming into the profession, having recruited 17 Student Planners on our Future Planners Programme, working across the Scottish Government for 23 months whilst undertaking a funded planning postgraduate degree, and we trebled the number of bursaries in 2025-26 to help 30 planning students with course fees and living expenses.

The Scottish Government does not routinely monitor the progress of planning applications through the system.

However, we have worked closely with the housebuilding industry and planning authorities to remove barriers on stalled housing sites across Scotland. This has included addressing infrastructure issues, for example flooding and drainage, education, and transport, covering road and rail. We have taken actions that benefit multiple sites, for example sharing advice and best practice, and undertaken brokerage on specific sites.

The figures are provided in the following tables.

Custodial

How many times a person has appeared in court on a charge of the production manufacture or cultivation of drugs and possession with intent to supply, and received a custodial sentence:

The Scottish Government does not hold the information requested. The arrangements set out in the question are operational matters for Health Boards and the information sought would require to be requested from the Boards.

The figures are provided in the following tables.

Custodial

How many times a person has appeared in court on a charge of sexual crimes, and received a custodial sentence