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There is no specific financial support to assist with the purchase of gluten-free food products. However, people who have been clinically diagnosed with coeliac disease or dermatitis herpetiformis can receive a range of gluten-free food on prescription at no charge.

There is a monthly unit allowance and people may choose to use all or part of that allowance to access gluten-free items through their local community pharmacy if they wish. To help with costs, patients may choose to order their maximum number of units each month.

The Scottish Government received confirmation from the Maritime Coastguard Agency on 20 October 2022 that a UK registered fishing vessel was the cause of damage to the subsea cable affecting telecommunications on Shetland.

The Covid Recovery Strategy focuses on reducing poverty and inequality and making progress towards three priority outcomes: to enhance the wellbeing of children and young people; to increase the financial security of low income households; and to create good, green jobs and fair work. These outcomes have been agreed with local government and the Scottish Government remains committed to achieving these outcomes together with partners across Scotland.

The financial situation facing the Scottish Government is, by far, the most challenging since devolution; the impacts of the pandemic coupled with Russia’s continued illegal invasion of Ukraine have created a disruptive set of financial and economic challenges that every government must address. The fiscal constraints of devolution mean that the Scottish Government cannot borrow to meet increased costs associated with the current financial situation. This means we have had to make hard choices to prioritise spending which supports those who need it most and find savings. In the context of the ongoing cost crisis, we are prioritising funding to help families, back business and protect the delivery of public services; the recent Programme for Government and Emergency Budget Review provide more detail about the Scottish Government’s approach.

The Emergency Budget Review, published in November 2022, identified savings in excess of £1.1 billion from the 2022-23 budget and confirmed a range of additional support in response to the cost of living crisis, guided by the principles of the Covid Recovery Strategy. This includes: expanding the Scottish Child Payment to eligible 6-15 year olds and increasing its value to £25 per child per week; doubling the Fuel Insecurity Fund to £20 million in 2022-23; and providing local authorities with additional Discretionary Housing Payment funding to mitigate the UK Government’s benefit cap as fully as possible.

The Scottish Government is committed to making progress towards the shared Covid Recovery Strategy outcomes and will continue to prioritise spending which is targeted to support those in most need across Scotland.

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde are currently achieving their 14 day wait to scan, with their current wait to scan being 11 days.

The NHS Recovery Plan published in August 2021, sets out the plans for health and social care over the next 5 years. Backed by over £1 billion of funding, the plan will support an increase in planned care and diagnostic capacity, including through seven mobile MRI scanners and five CT scanners across NHS Scotland. This additional capacity will support PET-CT waiting times across NHS Scotland.

The Scottish Government have also significantly increased the number of available Clinical Radiology training places, following the recommendations of the Scottish Shape of Training Transition Group (SSoTTG). Since 2014, Scottish Ministers have created 573 additional training places for trainee doctors. Of these, 78 have been in Radiology (68 in Clinical Radiology and 10 in Interventional Radiology). This followed a Ministerial commitment in 2018 to create 10 additional Clinical Radiology places per year over a 5-year period. The final 10 places are being recruited to by NHS Education for Scotland (NES) in 2022.

The most recent NES statistics from end-November 2021 show that the 182 established training places in Clinical Radiology were 100% full with no vacant posts.

The Scottish Government published the shingles Chief Medical Officer (CMO) letter on 31 August, providing information on the 2022-23 shingles vaccination programme. The CMO letter is shared with NHS Immunisation Coordinators to action the recommendations. The CMO letter states eligibility for the 2022-23 programme, outlining that the routine vaccination of those aged 70 year olds should be continued alongside and an active call and recall of 71–79 year olds who have not previously been vaccinated.

NHS Health Boards are responsible for organising shingles vaccination for their population. NHS GG&C will locally contact individuals eligible for Shingles Vaccination to offer an appointment.

Our aspiration is for uptake to be as high as possible across all groups, this includes health and social care workers.

Vaccination uptake for Frontline Health & Social Care workers is currently at 40% for Covid-19 vaccines. The uptake for Flu vaccines for all healthcare workers is currently at 49%.

We have been working closely with Health Boards to increase uptake in this group. Specific interventions include drop in clinics for workers, outreach vaccination teams visiting workplaces, tailored local and national communications to encourage uptake. We are also conducting surveys to gather insight on why some people are choosing not to get vaccinated this winter.

COVID-19 and Flu vaccine uptake data is available from the Public Health Scotland dashboard . As of 23 November 2022 there has been a total of 1,625,091 Adult (18+) flu vaccinations and 1,653,929 COVID-19 vaccinations administered under the 2022 Winter Vaccination Programme. The data on the dashboard is updated every Wednesday and includes the latest headline figures by week and JCVI priority group.

Vaccine supply for the shingles vaccination programme is procured on a four nations basis by UK Health and Security Agency. NHS Health Boards order the volume of vaccine required, which is then delivered to vaccine holding centres, where Health Boards can access the vaccine to deliver their vaccination clinics at any time of the year.

The Scottish Government currently has no plans to reduce the speed limit on the M8 through Glasgow for the purposes of assessing the relationship between speed limit and congestion, noise and air pollution.

In accordance with the requirements of the Railways Act 1993 and the Scottish Ministers’ Franchising Policy Statement, consideration is being given to the successor arrangement for the continued provision of Caledonian Sleeper services.