Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government welcomed the publication of this report and is considering its conclusions and any actions to be taken, whether nationally or locally, as a result of the research findings. In particular, the information will inform our ongoing response to the COVID-19 pandemic in areas such as antenatal education, telecare and visiting.

We published our maternity and neonatal visiting guidance Coronavirus (COVID-19): hospital visiting guidance - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) which aligns with wider NHS guidance and the lifting of restrictions, and includes advice on partner and sibling visiting.

Enforcement of legislation around the sale and purchase of NVP's is carried out by Local Authorities as part of the ETSEP (Enhanced Tobacco (and NVP) Sales Enforcement Programme) overseen by The Society of Chief Officers of Trading Standards in Scotland (SCOTSS), and funded by the Scottish Government. These activities in relation to this are reported annually to the Scottish Government with figures provided on a national basis.

The following table shows verified sales of NVPs to under 18s, following test purchase failures during trading standards activity over the past five financial years.

In the five financial years from 2017-18 to 2021-22, the Scottish Government provided a total of £330,500 in grant funding to the Royal Highland Education Trust (RHET) for the purposes of their programme of school farm visits and associated educational resources for schools.

These grants are applied for and awarded on an annual basis. It is therefore not possible at this time to estimate accurately how much might be provided in funding over the next five financial years.

The Scottish Government does not facilitate any forums or roundtables for self-employed inventors. We are working with industry and key stakeholders to develop a new innovation strategy to ensure businesses, people and institutions are ready to meet the challenges and opportunities we face over the next 10 years. We will ensure the support we provide is easy to access and focused on areas of greatest opportunity to meet our vision in becoming a world leading, innovation nation.

The Pursuer Panel is a group of lawyers with expertise in dealing with professional negligence claims, and in particular claims against solicitors. About half of the firms represented are registered to carry out civil legal aid, but whether or not the lawyers take on legal aid cases is a matter for them. The Scottish Government cannot compel solicitors to provide advice. Funding is available under the civil advice and assistance scheme for applicants to consult solicitors to get advice on professional negligence. Civil legal aid fees have risen by 10.25% in the last 12 months. There is also funding available for any necessary reports to be obtained to allow the solicitor to confirm whether or not the test for professional negligence is met. Where there is evidence of negligence civil legal aid is available for professional negligence cases, including actions against solicitors. There are other solicitors who may take on this work outside the Pursuer Panel.

As part of our recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, we are reassessing all our priorities to take a systematic, person-centred approach to planning and delivering health and social care services for the people of Scotland.

As we go through a process of realignment, we are taking time to ensure all our strategies are designed around the people using and delivering health and social care services and working together to improve health outcomes. This is even more pertinent for those living with a rare disease.While we expected to publish our Action Plan in the spring, the Rare Disease Action Plan will now be published once this work is complete to ensure maximum impact for the people who need it. This will result in a stronger, interlinked action plan that has a real impact for people with a rare disease.

We will continue to work with Scotland’s Rare Disease Implementation Board and other key partners to progress work that will improve the lives of people in Scotland living with rare diseases.

The act of drink spiking is utterly abhorrent and the Scottish Government remains absolutely committed to continue working with partners to tackle this unacceptable behaviour. Police Scotland have recorded over 492 crimes of ‘Drugging’ and ‘Administering a substance for sexual purposes’, since October 2021, and continue to work closely with Scottish Government to monitor the situation. These can be broken down as follows:

In line with the Scottish Government’s Programme for Government commitment to ‘create a new brand marque, and build on existing campaign activity, to enhance Scotland’s international reputation’, the new single nation brand marque for Scotland was introduced as part of the Brand Scotland ‘Scotland is Open’ international marketing campaign and in support of Scotland’s domestic and international presence at COP26 in Glasgow, capitalising on this key international moment.

The current arrangements, which were implemented at the start of the pandemic, will remain in place. The Scottish Government is currently reviewing the provision of early medical abortion at home, and expects to make an announcement on this soon.

Whilst there is no legal definition of elder abuse, the World Health Organisation has defined it as ‘a single or repeated act, or lack of appropriate action, occurring within any relationship where there is an expectation of trust, which causes harm or distress to an older person' ( Elder abuse (who.int) ). They note this can cover several types of violence, including but not limited to physical, sexual, psychological and financial abuse or neglect.

In general the Scottish Government does not hold information centrally on levels of elder abuse, as the Official Statistics on police recorded crime and criminal proceedings do not include details on whether the victim was an older person, or their relationship to the perpetrator. Police Scotland are in the process of introducing a new system to record crime, which once fully operational may allow for more detailed analysis within Scotland’s recorded crime statistics (including victim age for each type of crime committed). Going forward, statisticians will keep users of crime statistics informed of developments, as the new system rolls out during 2022 and 2023.

Some information on the age of victims and their relationship to perpetrators is available from topic based Official Statistics, including for example police recorded Domestic Abuse and Homicide. In 2020-21, victims of domestic abuse aged 60 and over had a rate of 12 incidents per 10,000 population (compared to 119 incidents for all ages). This has remained broadly stable over the past five years. Between 2016-17 and 2020-21 there were 36 victims of homicide in Scotland aged 60 or over. Of these, over two-thirds (69% or 25 victims) were known to the perpetrator (including partners or ex-partners, relatives and acquaintances). Furthermore the Scottish Crime and Justice Survey (SCJS) can provide estimates of some measures by age, however this only covers adults living in private households and excludes other settings such as care homes. In 2019/20, 6.9% of those aged 60 and over experienced crime in Scotland (including those not reported to the police), compared to 11.9% for all aged 16 plus. The victimisation rate for those aged over 60 has shown no change since 2014/15.

Some data is also available from the Care Inspectorate, which operates a complaints procedure for registered care services. For example in 2019/20 there were 35 upheld complaints about protection of people in care homes for older people. Further information on this process is provided in Care Inspectorate reports Complaints Annual Report 2019-20 final 12012021 (1).pdf (careinspectorate.com) and their published board papers (June 2021) Board_1706202_Final_Published.pdf (careinspectorate.com) .