The Women's Health Plan: A Plan for 2021-24 sets out 66 actions to improve women’s health inequalities across the short-term (year one), medium-term (year one to three) and longer-term (year three and beyond).

The Women’s Health Plan First and Second Annual Reports on Progress set out the progress made to date on delivering the Plan.

I have asked Teresa Medhurst, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS), to respond. Her response is as follows:

HMP Glasgow will deliver safe and secure accommodation, with maximum possible benefit and opportunity to those who live and work there, as well as the surrounding communities.

The new prison will provide a better quality of living environment and enable strong relationships with staff and those in our care. Based on the current plans, HMP Glasgow has a design capacity of 1344.

The review on abortion law will begin once the Scottish Parliament has considered the Abortion Services (Safe Access Zones) (Scotland) Bill.

In the meantime, the Scottish Government is working towards convening an expert group, which the Women’s Health Champion, Professor Anna Glasier, has agreed to chair. The Scottish Government is also starting discussions with other stakeholders who are likely to advise the expert group on particular topics. The expert group will be asked to set out options and any recommendations for reforms. These recommendations, along with other stakeholder input, will be considered by Ministers before setting out any proposals for potential reform.

Health Boards are responsible for delivering abortion services as part of their overall budgets, in a similar way to most other health services. Therefore the Scottish Government does not determine how much is allocated to the provision of abortion services. Health Boards will decide appropriate levels of funding for their requirements within their overall funding.

The Women’s Health Champion, Professor Anna Glasier, has not met with the First Minister. The Champion meets with myself on a quarterly basis.

Since 2019, the Scottish Government has provided funding to Central Advocacy Partners from the Victim Centred Approach Fund and from the Victim Surcharge Fund.

Victim Centred Approach Fund

Organisations that receive support from VCAF are required to demonstrate how the services they provide, or propose to provide, can contribute towards delivery of one or more of the following priorities:

• Priority 1 - Victims will have access to practical and emotional support, regardless of: whereabouts in Scotland they live; the nature or severity of the crime; whether it has been reported; or what stage of the justice journey they are at.
• Priority 2 - Victims will have access to joined-up services that are inclusive and accessible to all, are trauma-informed, provide streamlined support, and reduce the need for victims to recount their experiences to several different organisations.
• Priority 3 - Families bereaved by crime committed in Scotland or abroad will have access to specialist practical and emotional support.
• Priority 4 - Victims / survivors of gender based violence will have access to consistent and specialist criminal justice advocacy support.
• Priority 5 - Adult victims of human trafficking and/or slavery, servitude and forced or compulsory labour will have access to support and assistance.

Full details on the terms and conditions for the Victim Centred Approach Fund are set out in the application guidance .

Victim Surcharge Fund

The Victim Surcharge Fund (VSF) supplements and enhances support core services that the victim support organisations (VSO) already provide to victims of crime

The VSF is intended to meet:

• costs that would not have been incurred if the person was not a victim of crime;
• costs which cannot be met reasonably by any other source.

In many cases, this will mean using the fund to pay for one-off expenses or services incurred by the victim or their relative within the first 6 months of the victim engaging with the VSO. However, VSOs have flexibility to determine on a case-by-case basis how long after initial engagement support can be provided.

Funding provided is to allow VSOs to make payments to third parties, contractors, etc for goods and services provided.

Full details on the terms and conditions are set out in the Victim Surcharge Fund Guidance .

The treatments available for those living with renal vascular compression depend on the underlying cause. There are many potential causes of renal vascular compression which all have specific treatment options. Treatments available range from surveillance (in less severe cases), medication such as ACE inhibitors and aspirin, and various types of surgery.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on consultant specialties.

Waiting time information is available from Public Health Scotland and is not held centrally by the Scottish Government. However, as treatment pathways vary, specific information is not available on the timescales for treatment for those living with renal vascular compression.

The Scottish Government is open to considering all options and will continue to work with the industry and other stakeholders to achieve improvements in pig welfare.

FSS intend to initiate stakeholder engagement during the 2024 – 25 business year, and will seek early opportunities to gather initial views on braille labelling from relevant business stakeholders where practical.

FSS officials meet with officials in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the Food Standards Agency (FSA) in Wales and Northern Ireland, lead departments for food labelling in the rest of the UK, on a bimonthly basis. FSS continues to highlight that braille labelling of food products is being considered by the Scottish Parliament Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee, and the importance being placed on this issue in Scotland. Development of any policy proposals would need to be considered on a four-nation basis under the UK Food Compositional Standards and Labelling Common Framework.