Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government does not hold this information.

The teaching standards set by the General Teaching Council for Scotland require teachers to be able to identify and respond appropriately to pupils with difficulties in or barriers to learning. During initial teacher education, student teachers will gain sufficient knowledge of additional support needs for them to be able to support the child in question themselves or to seek specialised information and specialised support if necessary. Scottish Ministers have recently outlined in our Programme for Government 2023-24 our commitment to work with teachers to provide additional professional learning opportunities while seeking to build on the Additional Support for Learning Action Plan.

In 2022-23, the Scottish Government provided over £500,000 to voluntary sector organisations to support children and young people with additional support needs, including sensory loss. This includes funding to the Scottish Sensory Centre to support the training of school staff to provide effective support to Deaf children and young people.

In December 2021, we published the Autism in Schools Action plan and the majority of the actions are complete. Several of the actions, such as the funding of professional learning resources like the Autism Toolbox are intended to be ongoing, to reflect best practice and current research in this area.

It is a matter for Local Authorities to decide whether they want to adopt PARD or use a different system. The Civil Contingencies Act 2004 places a duty on Category 1 and 2 responders to share and access information to support decision making.

To date, Scottish Government and the Improvement Service have held workshops with colleagues from Social Work and Emergency Planning in all Scottish Local Authorities. These workshops have focused on how PARD data can be used to identify people at risk during and to support decision making during incidents.

The UK National Screening Committee (UK NSC) advises ministers and the NHS in the 4 UK Nations, including Scotland, about all aspects of population screening. The UK NSC does not currently recommend screening for cardiac conditions associated with sudden cardiac death in the young (age 12 – 39).

Police Scotland do not have the legal powers to directly issue antisocial behaviour orders. Local authorities and registered social landlords, in consultation with the police, can apply to the sheriff court for an order where there is evidence that a person (aged at least 12 years) has behaved in an antisocial manner and that an order is necessary for the protection of persons from further antisocial behaviour. There is also the power for a court to make an ASBO on conviction in the criminal court as part of a sentence.

The Scottish Government does not hold data on allocation of Community Link Worker posts and capacity at individual General Practice level. This data will be held by individual Health and Social Care Partnerships (HSCP) alongside their local Primary Care Improvement Plans (PCIP).

At 31 st March 2023, there were over 308 WTE primary care Community Link Workers in post across Scotland. The following PCIP publication shows a breakdown of the Whole Time Equivalent by HSCP area:

Primary Care Improvement Plans: Summary of Implementation Progress at March 2023 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

The Scottish Funding Council’s “College Infrastructure Strategy: The Approach to Delivering Scotland’s College Infrastructure”, was published in November 2022. Following on from publication of the strategy, the Infrastructure Investment Plan for colleges, due to be published by autumn 2024, will identify future infrastructure investment needed for a sustainable college estate. The work on delivering the plan has begun and will include baselining the condition of the college estate.

As outlined in my letter to the Scottish Parliament’s Education, Children and Young People Committee dated 27 September 2023, Scottish universities and colleges can bid for one short term grant for a minimum of £1,000 and maximum of £25,000 to undertake international projects by 31 March 2024. They can also apply for an additional £10,000 for projects which contain cross sector educational partnerships e.g., with schools, youth work providers, adult learning, and sports organisations and will prioritise placements for disadvantaged groups.

As outlined in the Programme for Government, in 2024-25, we will build on this initial test and learn project to further develop the Scottish Education Exchange Programme.

We are grateful to Heart Research UK for their continued work to prevent, treat and cure heart disease in Scotland.

We recognise the scale and impact of heart disease in Scotland and have set out our strategic direction to address this in our Heart Disease Action Plan (2021).

The plan outlines a collaborative approach and acknowledges the important role of the third sector in minimising preventable heart disease and ensuring that everyone with suspected heart disease has timely and equitable access to diagnosis treatment and care.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-21921 on‎ 27 October 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 Scottish Government receives correspondence on a wide variety of topics. However, our Correspondent Management System does not offer a feature in which most-common subjects can be viewed.