Chamber and committees

The role of the National Performance Management Committee is set out in HDL 2006(54). The committee''s terms of reference has been placed in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 52071).

Comparative information by NHS board on the performance management outcomes for staff in the Executive and Senior Management Cohorts is not released. In many cases this would lead to the identification of individuals due to the small numbers involved.

There has been no change to the number of new entrants to Foundation Training programme for 2010-11, which remains at 804.

An Advisory group and a programme board, following established governance and reporting structures, was put in place to manage the NHS inform project. In the latter stages, PRINCE 2 was deployed to monitor, direct and control the project.

The budget was managed jointly by a team manager within NHS24 and its Finance Department. Expenditure was reviewed on a monthly basis.

The original completion date was planned for the end of 2009. However, a range of service and operational pressures, including those associated with the H1N1 flu pandemic, led to the launch date being put back to August 2010.

A team manager in NHS 24 and its finance department were jointly responsible for monitoring project spend at operational level. I understand that current/projected spend is also monitored at programme board level.

In order to ensure a smooth transition to the NHSScotland Resource Allocation Committee (NRAC) targets for NHS Scotland the Scottish Government committed to phasing in the target shares calculated by the NRAC formula by way of differential growth. Under this methodology, all boards continue to enjoy growth in their allocations year-on-year, with those below their target share receiving more growth than those above until the new distribution is achieved over time. In this way no board receives a cut in funding.

This approach to phasing in funding has been the practice under both the previous SHARE and Arbuthnott formulae. Despite the constraints of the current economic and financial climate, an additional £13 million has been provided to NHS boards below target in financial year 2010-11. The level of additional funding that NHS boards will receive in 2011-12 has yet to be determined.

As the target shares of NHS boards change on an annual basis to reflect changes in the relative need of their populations, it is not possible to provide a date when all NHS boards will reach their target share.

NHS inform is a NHSScotland service, hosted by NHS24.

NHS24 provides online information for people who are symptomatic and provides access to a self help guide which assists the public to be signposted to the most appropriate level of care. In addition, NHS24 provides corporate information and information on national campaigns (e.g. Be Ready for Winter and Know Who to Turn To).

In contrast, NHS inform is a single gateway to the provision of quality assured health and social care information across a range of health and wellbeing topics.

NHS inform makes use of the existing NHS24 national telephony and technology infrastructure and benefits from being hosted by an organisation already leading in health information management and patient care.

The launch of NHS inform took place as part of NHS24''s Annual Review and therefore incurred minimal costs of less than £50.00.

Information has been drawn from NHS24 and NHS Choices (a comparable website). Other content is still under construction and is being developed in partnership with organisations such as NHS Health Scotland and NHS Education for Scotland, as well as third sector organisations. The Scottish Government Health Directorates will also contribute as necessary.