Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government will be providing £7.5 million for the Reducing Reoffending Change Fund over the current spending review period.

I refer the member to the answer to question S4W-03873 on 15 November 2011. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

The Housing Benefit Reform Stakeholder Advisory Group was established in November 2010. Since then it has met seven times. The following organisations are members of the group:

Association of Local Authority Chief Housing Officers

Chartered Institute of Housing in Scotland

Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy

Citizens Advice Scotland

COSLA

Council for Mortgage Lenders

Housing Support Enabling Unit

Rights Advice Scotland

Scottish Association of Landlords

Scottish Council for Single Homeless

Scottish Federation of Housing Associations

Scottish Government

Scottish Landlords Association

Scottish Rural Property & Business Association

Scottish Rural Property and Business Association

Shelter Scotland

Tayside Region Tenant Organisation.

Meeting papers will be published on the Scottish Government website in due course.

The UK response to the European Council’s Recommendation on the development of a national plan for rare diseases is due by the end of 2013. Led by the Department of Health, all four administrations are developing a draft UK plan. A public consultation on the draft plan is expected to be launched before the end of this year.

The Scottish Government has set out its position on the impact on devolved services of the UK Government’s Welfare Reform Bill in the Supplementary Legislative Consent Memorandum lodged on 1 November 2011.

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/Bills/25202.aspx.

The Scottish Government want childcare services in Scotland that are high quality, affordable, and flexible, supporting parents to remain in, or enter employment. We are committed to expanding the range, capacity and flexibility of early learning and childcare provision ensuring high quality provision that meets the needs of children and families.

We have created an Early Years Change Fund to lead the way on preventative spending and will take the work forward with local authorities, the National Health Service and third sector. The Early Years Task Force which met for the first time on 8 November, will oversee the early years activity on childcare, family centres, play, early learning experiences and supporting parents.

However, our position is that we need control over our tax and benefits system if we are to achieve significant improvements to provision for parents, children and employment support in Scotland.

Change Funds should not be used as a substitute for revenue resource or to plug gaps in existing services, but to help rebalance local care, support and service provision towards anticipatory care and preventative services that will support older people to stay in their own homes.

As of 31 December 2010 there were 920 care homes for older people, of which 889 care homes had completed Annual Returns. Of these:

514 (58%) provide nursing care internally

257 (29%) use external nurses to provide nursing care (and have no internal provision)

118 (13%) do not provide nursing care.

Not all care homes for older people completed annual returns. Homes that did not complete an annual return are mainly services that are newly registered in the three months preceding the annual return date as they are not obliged to do so.

The skills mix of staffing for individual care homes is dependent on the assessed needs of its residents. There are therefore no plans to issue guidance setting out the percentage of care homes requiring the services of a registered nurse.

In addition, the Care Inspectorate has responsibilities in relation to staffing, and these are set out clearly in the answer to question S4W-03684 on 14 November 2011.

All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

Subject to local agreement on appropriate financial governance arrangements consistent with their Change Plan objectives, it is open to all partnerships to augment their Change Fund allocations by using supplementary funding from other sources, including local authorities.