Chamber and committees

The Women’s Health Plan sets out that healthcare for women should be holistic, inclusive, respectful, centred around the individual and responsive to their needs and choices.

In 2023, we carried out research on ‘Women's experiences of discrimination and the impact on health ’ so that we can better understand the lived experience of women and girls in Scotland and the discrimination they have experienced when seeking healthcare.

Through the Women’s Health Platform on NHS Inform we have created resources that can be used by women and girls and healthcare professionals to support shared decision making and a patient centred approach. This includes symptom questionnaires on menopause and menstrual health and clinical tools such as the Endometriosis Care Pathway and the Heavy Menstrual Bleeding Pathway to support informed discussions and provide better understanding of the next steps on a healthcare journey.

We have also funded the development of educational resources to support health professionals to learn more about menstrual health, endometriosis and menopause, the symptoms and treatment options.

Section 6 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (Incorporation) (Scotland) Act 2024 makes it unlawful for a public authority to act, or to fail to act, in a way that is incompatible with the UNCRC requirements. The section 6 compatibility duty in that Act applies when a public authority is delivering functions conferred by or under an Act of the Scottish Parliament or common law. All of the free standing provisions in the Housing (Scotland) Bill and those provisions that amend Acts of the Scottish Parliament will be in scope for this compatibility duty. This includes protections for tenants and provisions to help prevent homelessness.

There are some provisions on homelessness that are conferred by Acts of the UK Parliament. As housing is devolved to the Scottish Parliament, it would be possible to bring these provisions into the scope of the section 6 compatibility duty by re-enacting them in Acts of the Scottish Parliament. (The same is true of all devolved measures that are conferred by Acts of the UK Parliament.) However, that would be a time-consuming task that would have a significant impact on the Scottish Parliament’s law-making capacity.

Our hope is that, through engagement with the UK Government, there may be a more straightforward way of extending the reach of the compatibility duty in the UNCRC Act (and other future human rights protections), which would not require the re-enactment of individual Acts of the UK Parliament. Next steps are being considered.

Total known direct costs were £7,792.64 including VAT. This covered publishing costs for the main report and the supporting evidence paper - A Review of Antisocial Behaviour in Scotland - Data Survey and Literature Review; travel expenses of any members/officers who claimed for in-person attendance at meetings and fact-finding visits to two local authority areas; and teas/coffees for meetings.

Members provided their services free of charge with costs - other than travel expenses, which were met by the Scottish Government - being assumed within their own organisation’s budgets. There were no meeting venue costs as these were held hybrid in Scottish Government buildings or members’ sites. Refreshments were also provided by the respective hosts for these meetings. Most engagement meetings, with stakeholders, were hybrid so incurred no direct expense.

We do not hold any other known direct costs or estimates. The group was supported by a secretariat - generally two Scottish Government officials - whose time costs were contained within existing budgets. One member did require printed copies of meeting papers - contained within a central budget. The Scottish Community Safety Network held two online engagement sessions and costs of these were met from within their existing Scottish Government grant.

To avoid accusations of bias or undue influence in planning and consenting decisions, Minsters cannot undertake any discussions with developers or objectors about the merits or otherwise of forthcoming, or live applications.

Ministers may of course undertake meetings with companies, as part of everyday Scottish Government business. However, these meetings do not contain conversations about specific planning applications and are properly recorded to ensure full transparency.

The Scottish Government is committed to increasing the availability of safe and effective medicines that people in Scotland would benefit from. The Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) assesses the clinical and cost effectiveness of newly licensed medicines on a once for Scotland basis and publishes advice for Health Boards to consider. It is expected that Health Board Area & Drug and Therapeutics Committees (ADTCs) will consider making a SMC recommended medicine, or an equivalent, available on their local or regional formulary for routine prescribing within 90 days of SMC advice being published.

Health Boards are expected to apply common principles and processes in the introduction of newly licensed medicines to facilitate consistency of approach to local decision-making. The decision to prescribe a medicine, and which medicine to prescribe, is entirely for the clinician in charge of a person’s care, having considered their clinical condition, their safety, and any relevant clinical guidance.

The Scottish Government understand the importance of sport and physical activity for women and girls in Scotland and the positive impact that has on their physical, mental, and social health. Football plays a key role in this because it has a reach into communities like no other sport, and participation levels in women and girls football are at record levels.

The Scottish Government supports the Scottish FA in making football accessible for all and believes in the power of football in bringing communities together. We are also keen to support the SWPL in promoting and improving the elite women’s game to help encourage more women and girls into the sport.

Produced in partnership with UEFA, the Scottish FA’s Accelerate Our Game strategy has been designed to a provide focus to the Scottish FA’s commitment to progress the girls’ and women’s game in Scotland. The strategy aims to harness the power of women’s football by changing perceptions and empowering people to inspire the nation, whilst developing and promoting women’s football for all, enabling current and future generations to enjoy our national game equally.

In addition, the Scottish FA leads three key programmes targeting girl’s football:

• UEFA Disney Playmakers
• KDM Soccer Centres
• SPAR Future Stars Cup Square

Furthermore, sportscotland works in partnership with all 32 local authorities to invest in and support the Active Schools Network. Active Schools aims to provide more and higher quality opportunities to take part in sport and physical activity before school, during lunchtime and after school, and to develop effective pathways between schools and sports clubs in the local community. In the 2022-23 academic year, football was the second most popular activity for girls within the Active Schools programme, with girls and young women making 379,944 visits to Active Schools football sessions.

I am pleased to confirm that the NHS Scotland Operational Improvement Plan has published today: www.gov.scot/isbn/9781836914556

The plan focuses on the following four critical aspects to help protect the quality and safety of care, supported by the increased investment for health and social care in the 2025-26 Scottish Budget:

• improving access to treatment;
• shifting the balance of care;
• digital and technological innovation;
• prevention.

It details how the specific commitments outlined in the answer to question S6W-34287 will be delivered – building on health boards’ own delivery planning to prioritise how services will be improved across NHS Scotland. This plan will be followed by publication of a population health framework later in the spring and a health and social care service renewal framework in June.

The following table provides information on the number of patients under 18 years admitted to hospital where a diagnosis of tooth decay was recorded, from April 1999 to March 2024, in Scotland, by financial year.

Table 1: Number of patients under 18 years admitted to hospital where a diagnosis of tooth decay was recorded, from April 1999 to March 2024, in Scotland, by financial year.

Information on the number of carers at Scottish universities and colleges is published by the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) in their report for widening access.

Latest publication: Report on Widening Access 2022-23 - Scottish Funding Council

Carer information can be located in the background tables, for universities (table 16) and for colleges (table 17).

Further information can be requested directly from the SFC.

The safety of patients and staff is an absolute priority. Assaults on patients or staff are completely unacceptable, and everyone has the right to access healthcare, or their place of work, without the fear of verbal or physical abuse.

NHS Boards have reporting systems to capture data on violence and aggression - including sexual assault. I strongly encourage staff to report any and all instances of violent and aggressive behaviour. All instances of such behaviour should be reported and escalated to Police Scotland as quickly as possible for consideration of necessary action. The courts have extensive powers to deal robustly with sexual offending.

Health Improvement Scotland are working with all NHS boards and partner organisations to standardise the reporting of adverse events, and have developed a national framework which was published in February.

The Scottish Government recognises the importance of national standards of reporting and the requirement for monitoring and publishing of data. We have committed to work with HIS and Health Boards to improve the collection of data nationally.