Chamber and committees

The requested information on how many staff have joined NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde in each year since 2020 can be found on the TURAS NHS Education for Scotland workforce statistics site at: NHS Scotland workforce | Turas Data Intelligence (Turnover tab).

On the 3 September 2024, the Scottish Government pre-budget fiscal update outlined "other" savings measures of £27.7M in the Health and Social Care budget, with funding redirected to support emerging pressures within Health and Social Care, not used for wider SG spending.

The breakdown is as follows:

I met with Ms Helen Rowntree, CEO of Blood Cancer UK, on 12 September 2024 to discuss their recently published Action Plan. The Scottish Government is pleased to note that the charity’s five recommendations align closely with the ambitions laid out in its own Cancer Strategy for Scotland, published in June 2023.

The cancer strategy takes a comprehensive approach to improving patient pathways in cancer, from prevention and diagnosis through to treatment and post-treatment care. The Scottish Government looks forward to continuing its work with the third sector to deliver on the ambitious strategy.

The Scottish Government has not had discussions with the forestry sector regarding any potential future reduction in the maximum threshold for planting of a single species below 65%. The fifth edition of the UK Forestry Standard sets the maximum threshold of 65% across the UK and will be implemented in Scotland from 1st October 2024.

The NHSScotland iMatter Staff Experience Survey provides an annual assessment of staff experience. All NHSScotland staff and local authority staff from participating Health and Social Care Partnerships, are invited to respond.

All Boards receive local reports, which provide them with a measure of employee satisfaction, and they are expected to take appropriate actions based on their results. Assurance that results are being acted upon is sought via our annual Staff Governance Monitoring exercise.

The Afghan medical students are eligible for support under paragraph 12B of the Student Support (Scotland) Regulations 2022, as amended by the Education (Fees and Student Support) (Miscellaneous Amendments) (Scotland) Regulations 2024. This provision enables the students to be considered as Scottish domiciled for the purposes of funding and entitles them to apply for tuition fees and living cost support in the same manner as other Scottish domiciled students.

To date, 9 school infrastructure projects have opened through the £2bn Learning Estate Investment Programme (LEIP). Furthermore, 16 projects are currently in construction.

The LEIP aims to deliver 47 projects by the end of 2027-28.

The Scottish Government school estate statistics are collected and published annually at: School education statistics - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

The number of schools refurbished since April 2021 is (a) 88 in primary and (b) 13 in secondary. Only projects with a cost of at least £500,000 for primary and £1m for secondary have been included.

A Final Report will be published in the Autumn setting out the progress that has been made since publication of the Women’s Health Plan in 2021.

The Women’s Health Plan has brought about positive change, driving changes to policy, guidance and training in many of the ways envisaged for a Scottish Institute for Women’s Health. There is now a Women’s Health Leads Network; a specialist menopause service in every mainland health board and a ‘buddy’ support system in place for the Island health boards; there is a women’s health platform on NHS Inform; there is a menopause and menstrual health workplace policy for NHS Scotland and a Women’s Health Champion, Professor Anna Glasier OBE, has been appointed. In addition, the Scottish Government, primarily through the Chief Scientist Office, has invested in a range of women’s health related research, providing funding for grants and fellowships.

In light of the financial circumstances facing the Scottish Government, it is not possible at present to develop proposals for a Scottish Institute for Women’s Health.

The Scottish Government expects companies which are awarded public contracts to maintain high standards of business and professional conduct. Public procurement legislation, implementing the UK’s international obligations in this field, provides that companies may be excluded from bidding for contracts in certain circumstances, including where they have engaged in grave professional misconduct which renders their integrity questionable.

The exploitation of assets in illegal settlements could be regarded as constituting grave professional misconduct for the purposes of procurement law, but a decision to exclude a company from a competition must be taken on a case-by-case basis by the public body awarding the contract in question, in full consideration of all of the evidence available to them at that point in time. Decisions must be proportionate and are subject to challenge in the courts.

Scottish Ministers have no power to require that any company is excluded from all competitions.