Chamber and committees

Police Scotland has concluded that a stand-alone portal is neither the optimum nor best value route to create the capability for digital media to be submitted by members of the public.

Police Scotland will utilise the Digital Evidence Sharing Capability (DESC) Programme, currently in pilot in Dundee, which will make it easy for a member of the public to submit digital evidence as part of an investigation following a report to the police. DESC will enable development of further capabilities where scope to further improve the service to the public is identified.

DESC is planned to be rolled out on a phased approach across Scotland between 2024 - 2026.

We recognise the importance of timely access to speech and language therapy. We have increased the flexibility Health Boards have in reducing waiting times, ensuring those with greatest need are seen first, while maximising prevention and early intervention approaches for those waiting. The number of Speech and Language Therapists working in the NHS has also increased by 1.9% (September 2022 - September 2023), this increased staffing will support reduction of waiting times for this service.

‎Also, Scottish Government's Best Start - strategic early learning and school age childcare plan 2022 to 2026, outlined a commitment to invest in work to support early intervention in speech and language. As part of that work six Full Time Equivalent Regional Leads for Early Years Speech and Language have been recruited – in collaboration with Education Scotland.

The leads are based in each region in Scotland, aligned to Regional Improvement Collaboratives. This will improve outcomes for children’s speech and language across Scotland, by setting up new stakeholder networks, supporting frontline staff, promoting quality improvement and learning from best practice.

While the Scottish Government provides the policies, frameworks and resources for high quality healthcare, it is for each NHS Board to decide best how to utilise funding, facilities and staff while taking account of national and local priorities to meet local health needs. We expect NHS Boards to plan their facilities and workforce to deliver these services, ensuring the provision of safe, effective and high quality patient care, delivered by the right professional at the right time.

The vast majority of spending on mental health is delivered through NHS board budgets – and this is not directly affected by the Path to Balance reprioritisation. Between the Scottish Government and NHS boards we expect spending on Mental Health to be well in excess of £1.3 billion in financial year 2023-24.

The 2023-24 direct mental health budget of £260.3 million is still more than double the 2020-21 mental health budget of £117.1 million and will support delivery of the new ten-year Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy and recently published delivery plan. The Delivery Plan has been produced with affordability and deliverability within that financial envelope as a primary consideration.

Throughout the development of the Scottish Government and COSLA’s Mental Health & Wellbeing Strategy, we engaged with NHS Boards, Integration Joint Boards, professional bodies, third sector and equalities organisations, and many other partners and stakeholders covering interests across the whole mental health system. This was invaluable in helping to shape the Strategy and subsequent Delivery and Workforce Action Plans.

As an example of feedback from professional bodies following the Strategy’s publication, the British Psychological Society issued a statement supporting the direction of the Strategy, saying they are encouraged by its focus on a promotion of positive mental health, early intervention and prevention, and provision of support. The BPS have welcomed our ‘mental health in all policies’ approach which recognises that factors such as poverty, housing and employment can all have an impact on people’s mental wellbeing. They state that looking holistically at the whole person, considering not just psychological factors but also the social determinants of health, is the right approach.

We will continue to engage widely with medical professionals and other stakeholder groups on future refreshes of the Delivery Plan. This will ensure that we continue to develop actions that make further progress towards the Strategy’s outcomes.

Due to the interruption of dental studies during the pandemic and the need for students to repeat a year of teaching, student places for academic years 2021-22 and 2022-23 were reduced in order to manage capacity within institutions.

Targets for the 2023-24 academic year reflect the resumption of full intake cohorts, aligned to pre-pandemic intake, and can be found here on the Scottish Funding Council website.

The Scottish Government is currently reviewing demand as part of intake modelling for the 2024-25 academic year, and targets will be published by Scottish Funding Council in June 2024.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-23358 on 11 December 2023. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

The funding and commissioning of specialist and general palliative and end of life care services, including workforce planning and allocating resources for staffing, is a matter for Integration Joint Boards (IJBs). It is the responsibility of IJBs to plan and commission adult palliative and end of life care services for their areas using the integrated budgets under their control.

Scottish Government officials will continue to engage with Health and Social Care Partnerships (HSCPs) and Scottish hospices in relation to supporting local planning, commissioning and resourcing of independent hospice care.

Financial planning for the significant challenges our public finances continue to face took place in advance of the Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Finance's update on the 2023-24 in-year budget changes on 21 November.

The difficult decisions which have had to be made have allowed us to help balance the Scottish Government's budget while still progressing implementation of our mental health and wellbeing strategy from a revised direct budget of £260.3 million.

The in-year budget changes impacted on a number of planned new programmes which could not proceed as anticipated. Planned increased funding to existing programmes were also not able to be progressed.

Despite the savings made, we have continued to focus on delivery of our mental health and wellbeing strategy and recently published delivery plan, which includes commitments around mental health services and specific programmes of work around learning disability and autism, and cross-cutting trauma work.

In line with statutory duties, annual reports on climate adaptation are laid in Parliament every May setting out progress made towards implementing climate adaptation objectives, proposals and policies. Twice every 5 years, Ministers also commission the UK Climate Change Committee to provide an independent assessment of progress on adaptation in Scotland.

To strengthen the existing monitoring and evaluation framework for climate adaptation, the Scottish Government has committed to identifying indicators that can assist with more effective monitoring of progress to the outcomes of the next Scottish National Adaptation Plan (SNAP3).

The next Scottish National Adaptation Plan (SNAP3) responds to the risks identified by the 2022 UK Climate Change Risk Assessment . This Assessment identified 61 risk and opportunities. The Scottish Government has assigned Director-level owners for all identified climate risks. The overall development of SNAP3 is overseen within Scottish Government by the Director-level Global Climate Emergency Programme Board.