Chamber and committees

Transport Scotland officials regularly meet with the A77 Action group, to which representatives from the ferry operators are invited. Meeting invites to these meetings are sent to PO Ferries, Belfast Harbour and Stena Line.

The last meeting of this group was held on 3 February 2023, however, the last meeting attended by ferry operators was in September 2022.

Representatives from Transport Scotland’s operating company AMEY also meet the ferry operators on an ad hoc basis, as part of the consultation process around planned roadworks on the trunk road network.

NHS Health Boards have a legal requirement through the Organisational Duty of Candour Regulations (2018) to review certain types of adverse events (defined as unintended or unexpected incidents that result in, or could result in, death or harm), record each incident where the organisational duty of candour procedure is followed, meet personally with those affected, offer an apology and consider how the learning can be applied.

Boards are required to record all Significant Adverse Event Reviews commissioned and report them to Healthcare Improvement Scotland. This system has been in place since January 2020.

Our ambitious 10-year cancer strategy is nearing completion, with publication planned this Spring. The strategy will be under-pinned by action plans which will evolve with the changing cancer landscape. The strategy will take a comprehensive approach to improving patient pathways from prevention and diagnosis through to treatment and post-treatment care.

It will encompass a new earlier cancer diagnosis vision for Scotland and will continue to focus on those cancer types that are the largest burden and have poorer survival, in particular the less survivable cancers, including liver cancer.

The annual summary analysis report will be published on or before‎ 1 May on the Sustainable Scotland Network website ( Sustainable Scotland Network - The Sustainable Scotland Network ).

The Scottish Government does not hold this information. This is a matter for Health Boards locally.

The devolved responsibilities for Minister for Equalities, Migration and Refugees are published on gov.scot: Minister for Equalities, Migration and Refugees - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) .

The Scottish Government is planning to bring forward a draft of the next Climate Change Plan before the end of 2023 to set clear asks and responsibilities for all of the main actors on delivering climate policy in support of our climate change targets. We will also bring forward draft Just Transition Plans at the same time.

As part of the work in developing an enhanced framework for action with local government, the Scottish Government will explore co-producing a roadmap with local government partners, setting out the roles and responsibilities of local authorities in delivering net zero as part of the development of the next Climate Change Plan.

As referred to at the debate held on 14 March on the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee's Inquiry Report on ‘The role of local government and its cross-sectoral partners in financing and delivering a net-zero Scotland’, we are pleased to confirm that we are taking forward plans with local government partners to establish a Climate Intelligence Service for local authorities this year.

The Climate Intelligence Service will provide local authorities with the data, tools and skills to help ensure that they are on the right trajectory for net zero and to embed climate impact into local decision making.

PHS publish waiting times data on a quarterly basis. The next publication covering the period to March 2023 will be published on 30 May 2023.

We remain committed to increasing capacity to support recovery, including providing additional endoscopies. To support this we have put in place four mobile endoscopy units, which are providing five to six endoscopy rooms across NHS Scotland. A Dyce facility continues to provide additional endoscopy for NHS Grampian and a new endoscopy room is due to open in NHS Ayrshire and Arran on 1 May 2023.

NTC Golden Jubilee Phase 2 is planned to open in late 2023 bringing additional capacity of five orthopaedic theatres, five endoscopy rooms and two general theatres, and around 9,400 procedures in 2023-24.

We continue to work with Boards on a series of measures to increase diagnostic capacity. Scotland’s world-leading diagnostic bowel service, Colon Capsule Endoscopy (CCE), has supported nearly 3,000 patients since becoming operational in June 2020, including around 2,500 since April 2021.

International trade and import controls are matters reserved to the UK Government. The Scottish Government has limited powers to reduce the amount of food imported. However, our Vision for Trade strategy clearly shows, we are committed to a balanced and nuanced approach to trade, and we know that imports are an important source of food for Scotland, offering products that cannot be produced domestically and protecting us against shocks to production. Our approach to trade preserves food security by protecting our sensitive agricultural sectors but also enabling us to comply with our World Trade Organisation obligations. We continue to press the UK Government to adopt this approach and take in account food security when negotiating trade deals, specifically market access aspects. The Scottish Government are disappointed that the UK Government has repeatedly postponed introducing checks on imports coming from the EU which causes an unacceptable risk to health and welfare. For example, the lack of checks on pork imports is currently of particular concern given the number of cases of highly contagious African Swine Fever. We have continually raised this issue with UK Government and will continue to press for checks on imports.

The Scottish Government recognises the importance of domestic food production and the ongoing challenges faced by our farmers and crofters through the continued impact of Brexit, COVID-19, the ongoing situation in Ukraine, and now the cost crisis.

We recognise the importance of maintaining support for the sector; this is why we have committed to maintaining direct payments. We have also provided additional support to the food producing sector by ensuring payments through the Basic Payment Scheme and Greening payments were made in advance. Annually, the Scottish Government pays out around £420 million through these schemes. We have also established a Food Security Unit within the Scottish Government to develop evidence-based systems to monitor risks or threats to the supply chain to help mitigate future shocks and impacts on food security.

Supporting our local food businesses provides important markets for local food producers: we have provided: £15m funding towards the Scotland Food & Drink Recovery plan over 2020 to 2023; £17.5m to businesses across Scotland over the last two years through the Food Processing Marketing & Co-operation grant scheme; and £500k towards the Scottish Grocers Federation’s “Go Local” programme which has helped many independent convenience operators transform their stores and stock more locally sourced produce.