Chamber and committees

Chest Heart & Stroke Scotland indicate that as of the end of November 2022, a total of 3,444 referrals have been made to the charity’s long COVID Support Service since its inception in February 2021.

Scottish Government funding of £156,924 has been made available to Chest Heart & Stroke Scotland to support the continuation and development of the service over 2022-23. This funding has not been drawn from the long COVID Support Fund.

The development of the National Digital Platform (NDP) is a core commitment from the joint SG/COSLA Digital Health and Care Strategy (2018). This strategy was refreshed in 2021. NHS Education for Scotland (NES) was commissioned as the lead delivery partner.

Information on this important work is available via the website: www.nationaldigitalplatform.scot .

Up to 31 March 2022, a total of £6.838m was spent on the design, development and support for the NDP. NES accounts for spend during 2022-23 financial year have yet to be finalised and so associated costs for the NDP in this financial year cannot be provided as part of the answer.

This information is not held centrally. Public Health Scotland do not hold the information that would allow us to identify individuals who have been referred to other countries within the UK.

We have made an initial £3 million available from our £10m long COVID Support Fund over this financial year to provide NHS Boards and partners with additional resource to respond to the needs of people with long COVID in their areas.

Territorial NHS Boards’ 2022-23 funding from the long COVID Support Fund has been split into two tranches. The first tranche (70%) was provided to NHS Boards in June. The second tranche (30%) will be made later in the financial year following progress reporting.

This is a well-established practice for the allocation of health board funding to account for any slippage in programme delivery, and is used across a range of policy areas.

The following table outlines the organisations to which funding has been made available for 2022-23, and the associated amounts. The full amount spent for 2022-23 will only be known at the end of the financial year.

All planning applications must be determined in accordance with the development plan unless material considerations indicate otherwise.

Currently, Scottish Planning Policy (SPP) outlines that development plans should set out the criteria that will be considered in deciding all applications for wind farms of different scales – taking account of the considerations set out at paragraph 169 of SPP which include landscape and visual impacts.

The Revised Draft National Planning Framework (NPF4) makes clear the Scottish Government’s support for onshore wind energy other than in National Parks and National Scenic Areas. Criteria for assessing proposals are included in draft policy 11, and impacts on communities, nature and other receptors, including significant landscape and visual impacts, remain important considerations in the decision-making process.

I published and laid the Revised Draft NPF4 in the Scottish Parliament on 8 November 2022 for Parliament’s consideration and approval. If approved and adopted, NPF4 will form part of the statutory development plan and will replace SPP.

We continue to engage with Crown Estate Scotland on this matter and consideration is ongoing. Timescales are dependent on the 2023-24 Budget process, which will not conclude until the 2023-24 Budget Bill is passed.

£10.3million a year has been made available to ADPs for the implementation of the 10 MAT Standards. This is the specific funding for MAT implementation, and is in addition to the general funding for specific MAT-related activities such as outreach and near-fatal overdose pathways.

Published information on drug-related (or drug-misuse) deaths can be obtained from the National Records Of Scotland website - Drug-related Deaths in Scotland in 2021 | National Records of Scotland (nrscotland.gov.uk). Information on Local Authority Wards is information that is not held.

The following tables provide the information by Local Authority.

All drug misuse deaths by Local Authority

The number of drug-related deaths by Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD) data zone quintile is not information that is held, but the following table provides the rate.

Drug misuse deaths in Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD) Quintiles, age-standardised death rates per 100,000 population, 2010-2021

According to Supplementary Report to the Benchmarking Report published on 2 August 2022 the following areas are yet to fully implemented MAT 3:

NHS Shetland - Shetland ADP area

NHS Grampian - Moray ADP area

NHS Highland - Argyll & Bute ADP area

MAT 3 states that ‘Each service within the drug treatment system should have a documented procedure to identify and follow-up people at high risk of severe drug-related harm, including death’. These areas are as follows:

In January 2023 the Scottish Government will be publishing a formal response to the Taskforce report – Changing Lives – which includes an action to address inconsistencies in implementing near-fatal overdose (NFO) pathways under MAT standard 3.

Additionally, local areas have been directed by Ministers to have standards 1-5 implemented by April 2023. The Government continues working with identified areas to support them to progress the implementation in line with this timeframe.

The National Health Service (Scotland) Act 1978 Act places a broad general duty on the Scottish Ministers to improve health in Scotland and confers functions which assist in performing that duty. However, that duty and those functions cannot be viewed in isolation. Per the Scotland Act 1998, the Scottish Ministers cannot exercise their functions in a manner which would be outside of devolved competence.

Although the Scottish Government is taking a public health approach to drug dependence, if the Scottish Ministers were to exercise their functions (including functions which relate to health improvement) in a way which conflicts with the subject matter of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 then that would be outside competence.

The work being done by Glasgow City Health and Social Care Partnership to explore the possibility of a Safer Drug Consumption Facility in Scotland, within the current legal framework, has been done carefully with the benefit of their independent legal advice. In the event of a positive outcome to work carried out by partners, we will quickly establish a Safer Drug Consumption Facility in Glasgow.