Chamber and committees

The Network and Information System Regulations set out standards which NHS Scotland Health Boards must comply with. Boards must test themselves against these standards which cover managing security risk, defending systems against cyber-attack, detecting cyber security events, and minimising the impact of cyber security incidents. This is in addition to mandatory information security and data protection risk/impact assessments and routine penetration testing on all major IT systems.

The NHS Scotland Cyber Centre of Excellence (CCoE), works nationally across health boards to prioritise the security capabilities of existing technologies and deployment of new tooling. This allows real time discovery of vulnerabilities and potential issues across a national view.

The Scottish Government and partners have been supporting pilot phases of the Scottish Childminding Partnership recruitment model, led by the Scottish Childminding Association, to recruit and train new professional childminders across rural, island and urban communities.

The first phase operated in 10 rural local authorities, including: Argyll and Bute; Dumfries and Galloway; Highland; Moray; North Ayrshire (Arran and Cumbrae); Orkney; Scottish Borders; Shetland; Stirling and Cne Siar.

The second phase tested the model in urban areas, including: Edinburgh; Glasgow; Dundee and East Renfrewshire. However, a number of rural areas continued to participate, including: Dumfries and Galloway; Highlands (Sutherland, Caithness and Isle of Skye); areas within Cne Siar; Orkney; and Arran in North Ayrshire.

As announced in the 2023 Programme for Government, the Scottish Government is committed to scaling up these innovative pilots to grow the childminding workforce by 1,000. We are currently working with the Scottish Childminding Association to develop a new national programme of recruitment and retention activity which will be offered to all Local Authorities.

Mortality data up to 2022, including breakdowns of deaths caused by cancer, has been published to its usual annual timetable by National Records of Scotland at https://www.nrscotland.gov.uk/files//statistics/vital-events-ref-tables/2022/vital-events-22-ref-tabs-6.xlsx . This includes crude (unadjusted) death rates.

Public Health Scotland will publish further statistics on cancer mortality, including age-adjusted mortality rates and time series comparisons, in late 2024. This work has been delayed whilst the population figures for previous years are rebased by National Records of Scotland.

Applications which make their way through the application journey on the energyconsent.scot portal are assigned a single case number which is retained from the pre-application period, all the way through to a determination decision.

The dates at which a scoping opinion request submitted under section 12 of the Electricity Works (Environmental Impact Assessment) (Scotland) Regulations 2017 is received, and then a response provided, are not data points which are captured by the portal system. It is therefore not possible to calculate the average time taken to provide a response in the years requested.

Unauthorised access to information by the cyber threat actor was contained to information on the NHS Dumfries and Galloway network.

As part of the preparation of the SBA (Single Building Assessment process) Scottish Government has had conversations with the wider sector, including Fire Engineers and Assessors where we have discussed the need for a FRAEW (Fire Risk Appraisal of External Wall).

When assessing an existing building’s EWS (External wall system), it is noted that existing buildings cannot be expected to meet modern Building Regulation standards for risk to human life as these buildings were built during a time when less onerous Building Regulations were in force. The PAS 9980 will be used by assessors to make an informed expert decision of whether or not the EWS is a low, medium or high risk and dictate from this whether or not the current build up is tolerable, and no further remediation is required, or the risk is intolerable and therefore remediation should be undertaken.

The aim of a SBA is not to bring a building into compliance with current Building Regulations, but to ensure that the risk to building occupants is reduced to a tolerable level. The focus of the remediation is to follow the recommendations in the SBA in how to bring the relevant parts of the building to either a low, or tolerable risk level. Where large areas of the façade are being remediated, alterations will be required to comply with current (fire) building regulations including the use of acceptable materials. To note that the current ban applies to any new building warrant applications only.

Cancer remains a national priority, within the Scottish Government and across NHS Scotland, with urgent suspicion of cancer referrals continuing to be prioritised. NHS Grampian provided a 62 day performance improvement plan with an associated £973,764 funding from Scottish Government in 2023-24. Officials continue to work with NHS Grampian to ensure there is sustained focus locally to deliver these plans.

We are committed to reducing inpatient and day-case waiting lists by an estimated 100,000 patients over the next three years, backed by planned investment of an extra £100 million annually, subject to the annual Scottish Budget process, we will work closely with NHS boards and stakeholders on a number of key actions which will see patients treated as quickly as possible.

An initial investment of £30 million will now be funded as part of our on-going management of this and will target reductions to the national backlogs that built up throughout the pandemic, including orthopaedics treatments, diagnostics for cancer referrals and patients with the longest waits. This will enable NHS Scotland to maximise capacity, including theatre capacity, build greater resilience and deliver year-on-year reductions in the number of patients who have waited too long for treatment.

If an application for a building warrant is made which proposes the use of an external wall cladding system assessed in accordance with BR 135 when tested to BS 8414 as a means of compliance, then this information would be stated within the application. Local authority verifiers would consider the application on that basis.

In accordance with the Section 34 letter (Building standards - notification of application for building warrant: section 2.0 fire: letter to local authority verifiers - 31 October 2023) , local authority verifiers have to notify the Scottish Government’s Building Standards Division if any application is made that is supported by a BS 8414 test and BR 135 assessment report. To date, we have received no such notifications for any school building.

Land and Assets is one of the three main areas of focus for the Anchors workstream of the Place and Wellbeing Programme. All NHS Boards submitted Anchor Strategic Plans in October 2023 setting out how they will maximise their footprint as owners of land and assets, for the benefit of their local population. NHS Boards have also submitted baseline metrics on their anchor activity, including the proportion of successful assets transfers to date relative to the number received.

We will use this feedback, working with NHS Scotland and the community sector, to understand what further support or guidance we can put in place at a national level to enable more community organisations to use, lease or take on NHS assets for the benefit of local communities.

We will publish recommendations of the SBA Task and Finish Group to date by the end of July 2024.