Chamber and committees

On behalf of the Scottish Government, Skills Development Scotland (SDS) plays an active role in managing information relating to the performance of apprenticeships and regularly engages with training providers and employers to continue to adapt and improve apprenticeship provision and delivery in Scotland.

SDS’ Skills Investment Advisers provide support on an individual basis to training providers, working with them to ensure they can support learners and overcome any challenges they are facing. This support is also provided as part of ‘Community of Practice’ events which SDS host to provide valuable information and best practice for all training providers.

In relation to engagement with employers, SDS and the Scottish Funding Council (SFC), as members of the Scottish Apprenticeship Advisory Board , engage directly with the employers who are responsible for overseeing the end-to-end delivery of apprenticeships on behalf of employers, ensuring they are fit for purpose and reflect the needs of business, learners and the Scottish economy.

SDS regularly seeks out the views of employers on apprenticeship delivery and one of the key mechanisms for doing this is the Apprenticeship Employer Survey , with the most recent survey from 2020 highlighting 88% employer satisfaction with Modern Apprenticeships overall.

We are planning on the basis that the full model should be implemented by mid 2025.To aid with implementation we will work with regional chief executives and strategic planning leads to undertake modelling and capacity work to help develop local implementation plans. It is important that the whole multidisciplinary team are involved in developing local plans, including obstetric and maternity staff.

For parents of babies currently in neonatal care, there will be no immediate change. This model of care is based on how neonatal care has been delivered in Scotland for many years. For example, babies born in the Borders needing specialist intensive care have for many years received intensive care in Edinburgh or Glasgow, before being transferred back to hospitals closer to home as their condition improves.

The identification, assessment and management of people with long-term effects of COVID-19 in Scotland is guided by the recommendations of an evidence-based UK-wide clinical guideline developed by the Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN), the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and the Royal College of GPs (RCGP).

We have worked with specialist clinicians in different disciplines to develop an 'Implementation Support Note' for healthcare professionals, which is intended to accompany and support delivery of the clinical guideline in Scotland. This has been shared with all NHS Boards and is accessible on the SIGN website .

We’ve also supported the development of the SIGN Decision Support platform, which provides healthcare professionals with an integrated point of access to the information from both the clinical guideline and the Implementation Support Note, on a web based platform and mobile app. In addition, NHS Education for Scotland’s learning platform ‘Turas’ contains video and webinar content on long COVID.

GPs and Allied Health Professions may also access information and training resources through relevant professional bodies. For example, the Royal College of GPs has an e-learning course on long COVID, which aims to teach people how to describe the various presentations of long COVID, understand the current guidance and the impact that long COVID has on patients. Additionally, the Royal College of Occupational Therapists has also produced resources, which can be accessed at: Post-COVID Syndrome (Long Covid) - RCOT .

Given the reserved nature of telecoms legislation, it is the responsibility of the UK Government to ensure that people across Scotland can access reliable broadband. Despite this, the Scottish Government has had to step in and our R100 programme is currently delivering gigabit-capable, full fibre connections across Scotland. We want to push coverage as far as possible via the three R100 contracts and, so far, Openreach have connected over 6,700 additional premises, over and above those contracted at no extra cost to the Scottish Government.

The UK Government’s Project Gigabit should be a vehicle to connect any remaining premises but, to this point, UK Ministers have yet to commit a sufficient level of funding to deliver coverage across all parts of Scotland. We continue to urge them to do so.

The New Scots Refugee Integration Delivery Project includes a workstream on research and evaluation. This entails working with New Scots partners and external evaluators to carry out project monitoring, research work and an evaluation of the New Scots Strategy 2018-2022. This evaluation report is due to be published in August 2023.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-20183 on‎ 14 August 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

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-20183 on‎ 14 August 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 Climate Change Plan Advisory Group has undergone 4 of 7 plenary meetings and has so far elicited wide ranging input from diverse stakeholders into the next draft Climate Change Plan. This input includes on topics such as our vision for the future of Scotland, just transition work and energy use, with a Sub- Group meeting on the topic of heat in buildings planned in September.

The Scottish Government will produce an Outcomes Report regarding the policy outputs from the Climate Change Plan Advisory Group after the final meeting in October 2023. Policy outcomes from the group will be used to inform development of the upcoming draft Climate Change Plan.

We need to understand if there are any underlying causes that explain the increase in neonatal mortality across Scotland in 2021-22 and that is why we have commissioned Health Improvement Scotland (HIS) to undertake a review of the deaths. The review will consider the systems, processes and governance for the delivery of neonatal care which are relevant to the review scope. The HIS report will be published later this year.

In addition, the Scottish Government is funding a National Hub to review all child and neonatal deaths which was launched on 1 October 2021. The National Hub is jointly operated by Healthcare Improvement Scotland and the Care Inspectorate, following the successful piloting of the approach in NHS Lothian, NHS Tayside and NHS Lanarkshire.

The Hub’s focus is to use evidence to inform practice to reduce the number of child and young people’s deaths in Scotland and to report annually on its findings. The aim of the National Hub is to ensure that a quality review is undertaken following the death of every child in Scotland and identify themes and trends via the use of standardised forms and processes for Health Boards and local authorities.

The number of patients waiting for first appointments with specialist chronic pain services and the length of wait they experience is published by Public Health Scotland. The latest report can be found here: https://publichealthscotland.scot/publications/chronic-pain-waiting-times/ .

The national data collection and the statistics published on completed waits focus on the waits of those patients who attended a consultant-led clinic. This is in line with the current national target for waiting times for new outpatient appointments.

Some Health Boards have introduced new pathways that offer patients alternatives to being seen at a consultant-led outpatient clinic. Patients are given the opportunity to opt-in to these new pathways, and they are considered as no longer waiting once they take up this offer. Alternatively, patients can choose to remain on the waiting list for a first appointment at a consultant-led outpatient clinic.

National data on those waiting to access Chronic pain services includes patients who may choose to opt-in to these new pathways. The data shows a recent increase in the number of patients following these new pathways. In the most recent publication, the impact of these new pathways on published statistics is discussed in the full report on pages 12, 13 and 17. The publication includes a description of some of the new pathways that Health Boards have shared with Public Health Scotland. However, detail of pathways provided by individual Health Boards is a matter for the Board and is not information held centrally by the Scottish Government.