All of the £375 million identified by the Scottish Government to provide businesses with support has now been allocated, including underspend from some of the funds, where business demand has been less than initially forecast.

I wrote to all MSPs in January to provide an update on how the initial £276 million of the £375 million Omicron business support package had been allocated.

On 10 February, I set out how a further £39.5 million of the funding package would be allocated, and on 21 Feb we announced the £80m Covid Economic Recovery Fund for local authorities to support local economies and cities recover from the pandemic.

As with all our previous business support funding, we are publishing management information on the funding paid out to businesses from this support package on a weekly basis.

The Scottish Ambulance Service continues to provide data each year to Operational Research in Health (ORH) to continually update the model. This enables resourcing requirements to be modelled each year to take account of changes in the data and wider health and social care system, therefore the most recent modelling includes the impact of COVID 19.

I refer the member to the answers to question S6W-06508 on 28 February 2022. 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 .

The NHS complaints procedure does not provide for financial compensation. 

Public Health Scotland produce an annual statistical release with links to each NHS Board Annual Complaints and Feedback reports. All data prior to 2010 has been archived to the National Records of Scotland web archive.

The information available on service user complaints, including complaints upheld can be accessed from the following links;

Links to NHS Complaints Data

2020/21 - Annual report on NHS complaints - 2020 to 2021 - Annual report on complaints - Publications - Public Health Scotland

2019/20 - Annual report on complaints - 2019/20 - Annual report on complaints - Publications - Public Health Scotland

2018/19 - Quality Indicators | NHS Complaints Statistics | Health Topics | ISD Scotland

2017/18 - Quality Indicators | NHS Complaints Statistics | Health Topics | ISD Scotland

2016/17 - 2017-10-03-Complaints-Report.pdf (isdscotland.org)

2015/16 - 2016-10-04-Complaints-Report.pdf (isdscotland.org)  

2014/15 - 2015-09-29-Complaints-Report.pdf (isdscotland.org)

2013/14 - 2014-11-25-complaints-Summary.pdf (isdscotland.org)

2012/13 - 2013-09-24-Complaints-Report.pdf (isdscotland.org)

2011/12 - 2012-09-25-Complaints-Summary.pdf (isdscotland.org)

2010/11 - 2011-10-25-Complaints-Report.pdf (isdscotland.org)

The Scottish Government will only make plans to introduce any changes to the eligible age range for the bowel screening programme in Scotland if this is recommended by the UK National Screening Committee (UK NSC).

The UK NSC advises Ministers and the NHS in the 4 UK countries on all aspects of screening. The Committee’s recommendations are based on the latest evidence and agreed criteria for appraising the viability, effectiveness and appropriateness of a screening programme.

The current age ranges for the Scottish Bowel Screening Programme are based on the 2018 recommendation that screening for bowel cancer using the faecal-immunochemical test should be offered every 2 years to men and women between the ages of 50 and 74 in the UK.

The Scottish Government continues to stress that it is important at any age to be aware of the signs and symptoms of cancer, and to report any concerns to a GP Practice so that these can be investigated.

I welcome the reports from Royal Society of Chemistry on making Polymers in Liquid Formulations (PLFs) more sustainable, helping to raise awareness of the complex issues around sustainable paint, and waste management.

Zero Waste Scotland provide further detail on what to with used paint and paint cans here: What to do with used paint | Recycling | How to Waste Less . Zero Waste Scotland also work through Revolve to promote the wider reuse of items and materials and help raise awareness of responsible consumption.

This service provision supplements social enterprise and third sector initiatives running paint collection and redistribution reuse networks for waste paint.

Annex F of the updated Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment (BRIA) for Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme (DRS), which we published alongside the draft DRS Regulations on 15 December 2021, provides a sensitivity analysis of the economic case for DRS by analysing two assumptions for key scheme parameters raised by industry: a figure of 2.7bn containers per year placed on the market (compared to the 2.2bn originally modelled) and a figure of 37,000 return points (compared to the 17,000 originally modelled).

Although the original assumptions published in Table 3 of the same BRIA remain our final, and best, estimate of the costs and benefits associated with DRS, we analysed the impact on the 25-year net present value (NPV) based on these two figures suggested by industry.

Annex F, Table 2 sets out an overall NPV of £583m if the two industry assumptions are taken into account, and provides a breakdown of this figure by sector. The overall figure of £583m has been re-validated and is correct. However, a manual error was made in copying over some of the data cells in this table. The corrected figures are set out in the table below. It is important to note that the error does not affect the overall findings of the BRIA; nor does it change the overall net present value that was presented in Table 2, Annex F.

When we were notified of this error we immediately corrected it by writing to the Convener of the Net Zero, Energy, and Transport Committee. We have amended the published Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment on the Scottish Government website. To provide further reassurance following the detection of this error, all other data presented in the BRIA have been re-validated and confirmed to be correct.

The original timeframe for the Best Start Implementation Programme Board envisaged a five year implementation timeline, ending in 2022. However the programme has been effectively paused for nearly two years as NHS Boards prioritised the response to COVID-19. I therefore agreed a two year extension to the implementation period for Best Start last year. The expectation is that NHS Boards will have implemented all of the recommendations by mid-2024, with implementation of continuity of carer within the lifetime of this Parliament.

In addition to monitoring of implementation, the Scottish Government is working with Public Health Scotland on the overall evaluation of the Best Start approach.

In light of the pressures of the COVID-19 pandemic, the wellbeing of our health workforce, wherever they work, remains a key priority. The 2021/22 pay uplift saw staff receive an average 4% pay rise, the highest in the UK. The Scottish Government is committed to ensure that NHS Scotland nursing staff continue to benefit from the best pay and conditions in the UK.

In 2021-22, the Scottish Government made £12 million available to support the wellbeing of the workforce. This includes £8 million from the NHS Recovery Plan to provide ongoing wellbeing support for the workforce alongside an additional £4 million to provide further support to address winter pressures.

To complement this at a local level, we also have a range of resources including the National Wellbeing Hub, a 24/7 National Wellbeing Helpline, confidential mental health treatment the Workforce Specialist Service and funding for additional local psychological support. We are also providing further support for practical measures to aid rest and recuperation alongside additional resources such as Coaching for Wellbeing and grief and bereavement support.

Nursing and midwifery staffing is also at a record high, up by 13.1% since September 2006.