Questions and answers

Question reference: S6W-09118

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 June 2022
Current Status: Answered by Kevin Stewart on 21 June 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide its official estimate of the current number of unpaid carers of people with dementia.

It is not possible to accurately estimate, from nationally held data, the current number of unpaid carers of people with dementia.

Data collected by Public Health Scotland (PHS) through their social care data collection provides some information on people receiving social care support who have dementia. However, while data on whether the person receives help from an unpaid carer is requested, this was recorded as ‘Unknown’ or was left blank for 48% of records in 2020-21. As such, it was not possible to accurately estimate the number of unpaid carers of people with dementia from this data.

Question reference: S6W-08729

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 May 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 21 June 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many trains (a) departing and (b) arriving at Glasgow Queen Street Station were cancelled in the week beginning 16 May 2022.

Reasons for train cancellations week beginning 16 May 2022 included driver shortages, trespass onto the tracks, fleet issues, signalling issues, points failures and other track faults. The following table provides the data for cancellations, week beginning 16 May 2022, for Glasgow Queen Street station:-

	Total cancellations (planned + unplanned)			Number of trains planned (booked + planned cancellations)			% of train cancellations
	Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *	Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *	Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *
Glasgow Queen St High Level	201	187		1162	1159		17.3%	16.1%
Glasgow Queen St Low Level			190			1,390			13.7%

* trains call at Glasgow Queen St Low Level but do not commence or terminate at the station

Question reference: S6W-08728

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 May 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 21 June 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many trains (a) departing and (b) arriving at Glasgow Central Station were cancelled in the week beginning 16 May 2022.

Reasons for train cancellations week beginning 16 May 2022 included driver shortages, trespass onto the tracks, fleet issues, signalling issues, points failures and other track faults. The following table provides the data for ScotRail service cancellations, week beginning 16 May 2022, for Glasgow Central station:-

	Total cancellations (planned + unplanned)			Number of trains planned (booked + planned cancellations)			% of train cancellations
	Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *	Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *	Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *
Glasgow Central High Level	219	241		2,516	2,528		8.7%	9.5%
Glasgow Central Low Level			87			1,343			6.5%

* trains call at Glasgow Central Low Level but do not commence or terminate at the station

Question reference: S6W-08730

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 May 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 21 June 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many trains (a) departing and (b) arriving at Rutherglen Station were cancelled in the week beginning 16 May 2022.

Reasons for train cancellations week beginning 16 May 2022 included driver shortages, trespass onto the tracks, fleet issues, signalling issues, points failures and other track faults. The following table provides the data for cancellations, week beginning 16 May 2022, for Rutherglen station:-

	Total cancellations (planned + unplanned)				Number of trains planned (booked + planned cancellations)			% of train cancellations
	Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *		Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *	Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *
Rutherglen				91			1,341			6.8%

* trains call at Rutherglen but do not commence or terminate at the station

Question reference: S6W-08731

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 May 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 21 June 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many trains (a) departing and (b) arriving at Newton (Lanark) Station were cancelled in the week beginning 16 May 2022.

Reasons for train cancellations week beginning 16 May 2022 included driver shortages, trespass onto the tracks, fleet issues, signalling issues, points failures and other track faults. The following table provides the data for cancellations, week beginning 16 May 2022, for Newton station:-

	Total cancellations (planned + unplanned)				Number of trains planned (booked + planned cancellations)			% of train cancellations
	Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *		Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *		Departing	Arriving	Pass Through *
Newton	19	16		68	228	228	908		8.3%	7.0%	7.5%

* Some trains calling at Newton do not commence or terminate at the station

Question reference: S6W-09060

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 10 June 2022
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 20 June 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what preparation and research it has carried out regarding the proportion of Ukrainian refugees arriving in Scotland who cannot speak English, in order to ensure that they can access ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) and other language support and learning services.

Upon arrival of Ukrainian Displaced People at Welcome Hubs, communication needs are assessed to ensure that information is provided in a format that meets their needs. This may include easy to read documents in community languages and interpretation services for those who experience language barriers.

ESOL provision is offered by a range of providers including Community Learning and Development services through local authority partnerships, colleges, schools, voluntary organisations, universities and private language providers. Scottish Government ESOL funding is currently provided through colleges as part of the grant allocated to the Scottish Funding Council. Colleges are instructed to work with Community Planning Partnerships to determine the level of need for provision and agree with partners how this need can be met.

Question reference: S6O-01273

Current Status: Withdrawn

Question reference: S6W-08914

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 07 June 2022
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 15 June 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to ensure that gender mainstreaming approaches will be embedded into the implementation of the Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan.

As set out in response to S6W-08423 on 19 May 2022 , we remain firmly focused on supporting the six priority family types identified within our first Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan and will continue to engage with our partners, including gender representative stakeholders and women with experience of poverty, to ensure an intersectional and gendered approach is embedded in the development, implementation and monitoring of the actions set out in the plan.

‘ Best Start, Bright Futures ’ , our second Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan for the period 2022-26, recognises that to tackle poverty effectively we must deliver holistic, person-centred services and support that meets the needs of families - whilst also driving forward the transformation in our wider economy, necessary to tackle inequalities in our labour market.

The Plan is underpinned by robust data and evaluation, this includes our recently updated Child Poverty Measurement Framework as well as policy level evaluations and overall Child Poverty Evaluation Strategy . We also produce focus reports on the various child poverty family groups that explore progress achieved over time. This includes experiences of lone parents (who tend to be women) and mothers aged under 25.

Whilst quantitative data will enable us to track progress towards our outcomes, families will often fall into more than one priority group and in reality many face a combination of barriers and discrimination. We will ensure we use lived experience and a deeper understanding of the impact of intersection of characteristics in the design, implementation and monitoring of our actions and policies to ensure delivery approaches which are increasingly tailored and, ultimately, more effective.

To support our focus on implementation we have strengthened our approach to governance, including establishing a new Child Poverty Programme Board bringing together leaders, decision-makers, delivery partners and those who champion change across Scotland. The Programme Board will complement the statutory functions of the Poverty and Inequality Commission to ensure we hold ourselves to account on our performance against the plan, challenge our ambition, maintain a focus on our priority families and implement learning from the new approaches we are taking and testing.

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

Question reference: S6W-08725

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 01 June 2022
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 14 June 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how much funding it received, in each year since 2019, as a result of the UK Government levy on providers of credit, and, whether it will set out how it spent this funding.

We have published tables showing the debt advice levy funding for Scotland and the funding allocation for each year since 2019:

Debt advice levy funding: 2019 to 2020 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

https://www.gov.scot/publications/levy-funding-allocated-by-scottish-government-for-2020-21/

https://www.gov.scot/publications/levy-funding-allocated-by-scottish-government-for-2021-22/

https://www.gov.scot/publications/levy-funding-allocated-by-scottish-government-for-2022-23/

Question reference: S6W-08822

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 30 May 2022
Current Status: Answered by Kevin Stewart on 10 June 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking to safeguard access to psychosocial professionals for people with (a) paediatric and (b) adult cystic fibrosis in the event that vacancies arise among these professionals.

Mental health and psychosocial support is an integral part of care for people who suffer from cystic fibrosis and the Scottish Government continues to invest in the mental health workforce to increase its capacity and capability. NHS Scotland’s Mental Health Nursing, Psychology and Children and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) staffing numbers were at a record high on 31 March 2022. The number of psychology staff has doubled (105.9%) and the number of staff within CAMHS has almost doubled (95.6%).

Our overall investment includes £9 million in 2021-22 for psychological services to grow the applied psychology and psychological therapies workforce. Further funding will be provided for 2022-23 to support services to provide psychological care to all clinical areas of care detailed in the psychological services and therapies standard.

The Scottish Government has committed to develop a long term Mental Health Workforce Plan in the first half of this Parliament to ensure that, by 2026, 10% of frontline NHS budget is invested in mental health with 1% directed specifically for children and young people.

More broadly, the Scottish Government is committed to working to improve outcomes for people with rare conditions, including Cystic Fibrosis. We are developing an Scottish Action Plan for Rare Disease based on the four priorities of the UK Rare Disease Framework: faster diagnoses, increased awareness, better care co-ordination, and access to specialist treatments and care.

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