Chamber and committees

(a) As set out on 22 January 2024 in response to question S6W-24720, the Scottish Government has established an Expert Group to lead on scoping work to consider and provide recommendations on how Scotland will work towards reaching the targets set by the World Health Organisation (WHO) to eliminate Cervical Cancer.

As well as the Expert Group itself, three subgroups have been established to support the Expert Group in considering and analysing data on specific topics (vaccination, screening and cancer treatment).

The sub groups held inaugural meetings in September, and discussions are ongoing to inform recommendations on how Scotland will progress towards Cervical Cancer elimination and when this could potentially be achieved. These recommendations will be considered by the Scottish Government.

(b) The Scottish Government recognises the importance of HPV vaccination and screening.

(i) The latest published HPV vaccination uptake data from PHS shows that pupils living in the most deprived quintiles had lower coverage of the HPV vaccine compared with pupils from the least deprived areas. We are working with Public Health Scotland (PHS) and territorial Health Boards to consider what further actions can be taken to increase vaccination uptake, support those eligible for vaccination, and to address any inequalities in accessing immunisation services. Reducing vaccine inequalities is one of the three primary objectives in PHS’s recently published Scotland's 5-Year Vaccination and Immunisation Framework and Delivery Plan.

Completion of consent forms is required to participate in school vaccination programmes. We therefore welcome the return of the PHS marketing campaign, “chat.sign.protect”, which builds on the messages of last year’s campaign to raise awareness of vaccines offered in secondary school and encourage an increase in the numbers of parents and young people giving consent to be vaccinated.

Timed to coincide with the distribution of informed consent materials to young people, the campaign aims to increase understanding of why these vaccines are important, and the seriousness of the diseases they protect against, and encourages parents and carers to take action and sign consent forms to ensure our young people receive the protection offered by immunisation.

Addressing the inequalities in HPV uptake and maximising the opportunities for young people to receive the vaccine is a primary focus of the Cervical Cancer elimination work.

(ii) The Equity in Screening Strategy, combined with an action plan, was published on 27th July 2023. The vision of the strategy is for access for all eligible individuals, across the full screening pathway. The Strategy launched alongside the Equity in Screening Network which supports the strategy by capturing local and third sector research activity and allows individuals that work across screening to share evidence, best practice and learning around screening inequalities.

Several national projects are being supported by the Inequalities Fund of £1 million. This includes changes to national IT systems to improve engagement with participants. Research and learning from past projects has shown some ways to increase access to screening and uptake, including appointment reminders and targeted follow-up with non-responders.

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

In setting up of the DBI pilot programme in 2017, the Scottish Government created a dedicated DBI Central team to support and monitor implementation of this innovative programme. The Central team works closely with Public Health Scotland to provide monitoring reports to Government (and wider partners), and this evidence has informed the expansion of the programme across Scotland over the last eight years.

In addition to routine monitoring, the Government has commissioned two independent evaluations of the DBI programme to review its impact. The first evaluation relates to the original pilot phase of DBI (for over 18s) Distress Brief Intervention Pilot Programme evaluation: findings report - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) and the second relates to the NHS24 expansion https://www.gov.scot/publications/evaluation-extended-distress-brief-intervention-programme-summary-findings/

Both evaluations confirmed that DBI is a highly effective model in supporting people in distress, with 90% reporting that their distress levels continued to decrease and that they felt it had given them the tools and skills to manage their distress. Additionally, evaluation suggests that, in around 10% of referrals, DBI support has helped prevent suicidal thoughts, or even suicide. Additionally, feedback from frontline services suggests that DBI helps ensure they can help people to access the support they need, easing pressure on frontline services.

A further independent evaluation, relating to how effective DBI is for under 18s, is underway, and is expected to report to the Scottish Government in June 2025.

To enable a smooth expansion of the DBI programme, we have used improvement science and an active learning approach.

The DBI programme has now supported over 78,000 people across Scotland (as of November 2024).

The Scottish Government is currently working on a National Treatment Specification for Alcohol and Drug Treatment in Scotland.

This document will be informed by numerous sources including the forthcoming UK Clinical Guidelines for Alcohol Treatment and the recently published Public Health Scotland review into Alcohol Brief Interventions as well as key independent reports such as Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems (SHAAP) report, Exploring the delivery of alcohol-related health advice in dental practice settings: A scoping review.

Officials will work closely with colleagues within Primary Care including the team of the Chief Dental Officer to ensure that the National Treatment Specification fully reflects the importance of dentistry as an integral part of Scotland’s alcohol treatment provision.

The Scottish Government has discussed the proposed new condition to schedule 1 licences with NatureScot on a number of occasions. The new condition will require prior notification to landowners, where reasonably practical, of all visits to nests, or other sites, potentially involving disturbance of schedule 1 birds.

NatureScot, as the licensing body, have discussed the additional licensing condition with a range of stakeholders including the Scottish Raptor Study Group, RSPB, British Ornithology Trust and the Scottish Gamekeeper’s Association.

In addition to this, I have met with some of the above stakeholders to discuss their concerns about the issue.

The Scottish Government is currently working on a National Treatment Specification for Alcohol and Drug Treatment in Scotland.

This document will be informed by numerous sources including the forthcoming UK Clinical Guidelines for Alcohol Treatment and the recently published Public Health Scotland review into Alcohol Brief Interventions as well as key independent reports such as Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems (SHAAP) report, Exploring the delivery of alcohol-related health advice in dental practice settings: A scoping review.

Officials will work closely with colleagues within Primary Care including the team of the Chief Dental Officer to ensure that the National Treatment Specification fully reflects the importance of dentistry as an integral part of Scotland’s alcohol treatment provision.

The Scottish Government recognises the gradual reduction of alcohol-related hospital admissions over the past decade and is working closely with Public Health Scotland, local services and other stakeholders to ensure the reasons behind the gradual reduction are factored in to service provision.

The cap of £86,000 proposed by the previous UK Government had been due to come into force in October 2025, however, on the 29 July 2024 the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced that these reforms (and thus the cap on care costs) would not be taken forward in October 2025.

It should be noted that the proposals put forward by the UK Government were for personal care costs and did not include “hotel costs” - accommodation, food, energy bills, lifestyle and wellbeing and consumables etc. In Scotland personal care costs for adults who have been assessed as requiring such personal care do not pay for this service, regardless of their condition or means. Nursing care is also free at the point of delivery. The Local Authority pay for these elements of the residential care for all those assessed as needing them.

There is already existing discretion within NHS arrangements for dentists to charge patients for late cancellations and missed appointments, in accordance with their business need.

As circumstances may vary considerably between practices with respect to demography, registered patient numbers and other key determinants for the viability or necessity of additional charging, it would not be appropriate to implement a national policy on such matters.

We must ensure our children and young people learn about the issues affecting their daily lives, including consent and healthy relationships. The concerns raised by the Young Women's Movement and NSPCC around the consistency in delivery of RSHP education highlight the need for us to ensure we get the revision of the RSHP guidance right.

However, that should not restrict the professional judgement of our teachers who are able to use a range of resources to deliver age-and-stage appropriate education on consent and healthy relationships in a way that enables children and young people to make informed decisions about their lives. That can include using the excellent resources developed by the Young Women's Movement through their Young Women Know campaign.

As confirmed in the latest Programme for Government, we will implement the Curriculum Improvement Cycle (CIC), with work already underway on a number of curricular areas, including health and wellbeing. The CIC introduces a systematic approach to ensure that Scotland's curriculum remains relevant, forward looking, clarifies knowledge and ultimately support high quality teaching and learning. We will ensure this important work aligns with the work to update the RSHP teaching guidance to help ensure consistency in delivery of learning and teaching.

I refer the member to the answer to the question S6W-32859 on 20 January 2025. 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