Chamber and committees

With the passage of the Housing (Cladding Remediation) (Scotland) Act 2024, work is now progressing to have pilot buildings on an SBA pathway. The first step in this work is to complete a pilot cleanse of the 107 developments on the pilot list to ensure they are within the scope of the legislation. This would be conducted by a suitable expert, likely a Fire Engineer to provide assurance the correct buildings are on a pathway.

Scottish Government are aware of 30 Pilot assessments that have been undertaken for of the pilot entries. A pilot assessment includes any assessment carried out prior to the publication of the Single Building Assessment specification on the 21 June 2024. These numbers relate to known pilot assessments only as developers, home owners or other organisations could have commissioned assessments without informing the Scottish Government and therefore the true numbers may be higher and could increase as further information becomes available.

Pilot works to mitigate or remediate risks have started for five of the pilot entries. Works in this context refers to any action taken to address known cladding-related risks, including Urgent Interim Measures.

For those within the scope of the legislation, homeowners and residents will be informed and they will continue on the SBA pathway with the aim of completing a SBA in line with the newly published specification as soon as possible after the commencement of the Act.

The Scottish Government is committed to supporting bereaved parents and tackling funeral poverty.

We have removed child burial and cremation fees for children under 18 years old and for stillborn babies, financially supporting bereaved parents.

Parents whose baby sadly dies after it was born, or is stillborn, may be eligible for Best Start Grant Pregnancy and Baby Payment. If the parent is under 18 or a dependent aged 18 or 19, they do not need to receive any benefits to be eligible.

Statutory Parental Bereavement Pay and Leave is reserved to the UK Government.

I have asked Janet Egdell, Chief Executive of National Records of Scotland to respond. Her response is as follows:

National Records of Scotland have today published: ‘Scotland’s Census 2022: Education, labour market and travel to work’.

Scotland’s Census results are designated as Accredited Official Statistics and form an integral part of the statistical system in the UK. The Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR), the independent regulatory arm of the UK Statistics Authority, awards Accredited Official Statistics designation based on the quality, good practice and comprehensiveness of official statistics.

More detail about the schedule for future reports can be found here.

The information requested on how many full-time equivalent nurses there were in 2023-24 can be found on the TURAS NHS Education for Scotland workforce statistics site at: NHS Scotland workforce | Turas Data Intelligence

Local authorities as strategic housing and planning authorities are responsible for assessing affordable housing needs in their area and setting out their investment priorities in their Strategic Housing Investment Plans (SHIPs). These plans set out planned proposals for affordable housing supply over a five year period, including homes for mid-market rent, and should be available on each local authority’s website.

The Scottish Government only holds development information relating to projects on site and does not hold information relating to projects in planning beyond projects outlined in SHIPs. It is worth noting that not all mid-market rent projects in planning would necessarily be delivered through the Affordable Housing Supply Programme (AHSP).

The following table provides a breakdown by local authority area of mid-market rent homes receiving funding through the AHSP which are currently on site. The figures include Registered Social Landlord mid-market rent and Council mid-market rent homes, and other mid-market rent homes through programmes such as Places for People Capital MMR Initiative and Rural and Island Housing Funds.

A robust governance process is one important aspect of delivering effective care and meeting the Scottish Stroke Care Standards measured in the Scottish Stroke Care Audit.

That is why NHS Board reviews conducted by the Scottish Stroke Improvement Programme explicitly ask NHS Boards to set out their governance structure and any plans to improve this.

We have also asked every NHS Board to nominate an accountable individual to take overall responsibility of stroke care, including meeting the Scottish Stroke Care Standards.

A tool for collection of empirical data relating to various stroke rehabilitation outcomes - such as time to rehabilitation assessment, creation of rehabilitation plans, commencement of rehabilitation, input from various Allied Health Professional specialities and time to commencing community rehabilitation - has been developed. Data collection with this tool is currently being trialled in two NHS Boards, with the aim of using this across Scotland once this has been assessed.

We are in the process of developing a tool to capture and publish patient experience of rehabilitation in each NHS Board.

The Scottish Stroke Care Audit already tracks the number of beds by health board as part of the Scottish Stroke Improvement Programme. This information will be added to the dashboard of the most recent annual report within the next two weeks.

We will continue to work with Public Health Scotland on the most effective methods of capturing and reporting organisational data, including staffing levels.

The revised criteria assessing NHS Boards requires more rigorous reporting on stroke service governance structures and data reporting, and these will take time to fully implement.

I expect NHS Boards to prioritise their stroke governance structures and have scheduled a roundtable meeting with the accountable individuals from all NHS Boards where the importance of service governance will be emphasised.

The Scottish Stroke Care Standards are designed to enhance service delivery and improve patient outcomes. Monitoring performance against these standards through the Scottish Stroke Care Audit allows us to identify where challenges are being faced in the delivery of stroke care and implement quality improvements where required.

We recognise the standards are challenging and continue to expect Health Boards to identify aspects of their stroke services which do not meet these standards and to work to improve their standards of care locally to meet the Scottish Stroke Care Standards.