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Questions and answers

Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for MSPs to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)
Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

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Question reference: S6W-32902

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 23 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what information it has regarding the number of homeless people who are hospitalised each year who (a) die while receiving treatment and (b) are unable to be discharged due to concerns regarding their welfare.

The number of discharges from Scottish acute inpatient hospitals is presented in the following table. These figures do not include mental health facilities. These discharge figures have been produced using the Public Health Scotland SMR01 dataset which does not hold details on discharges delayed due to concerns regarding welfare.

Table 1: Discharges from Scottish acute hospitals where the patient was recorded as having no fixed abode at hospital admission.

Financial Year	Count of discharges	Count where patient died before discharge
2014-2015	237	1
2015-2016	296	1
2016-2017	312	2
2017-2018	347	6
2018-2019	206	1
2019-2020	230	1
2020-2021	183	3
2021-2022	103	2
2022-2023	62	0
2023-2024	91	0

Question reference: S6O-04267

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 22 January 2025
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 30 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government when it last discussed plans to reduce corridor care and the use of temporary escalation spaces with NHS boards.

Question reference: S6W-32898

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Kaukab Stewart on 21 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to introduce a strategy for dealing with poverty among older people.

The Scottish Government’s ‘A Fairer Scotland for Older People: framework for action’ contains a dedicated strand focused on activity we are undertaking to ensure people are financially secure and supported as they age.

In addition, we provide funding of £2.2 million, through the Equality and Human Rights Fund, to older people’s organisations and age equality projects. This funding is delivering a range of initiatives that tackles poverty among older people. A copy of the fund’s progress report can be found here Oct 23-Mar 24_E&HR Progress Report and provides details on initiatives we are delivering with this funding.

Our Pension Age Winter Heating Payment supports older people in receipt of relevant benefits to help with the costs of heating. Next winter, we will introduce a universal Pension Age Winter Heating Payment for all pensioner households in Scotland, meaning every pensioner household will receive a minimum of £100 with support towards their energy bills. This universal payment will provide much needed support not available anywhere else in the UK.

Question reference: S6W-32811

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 06 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 20 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what its strategy is to tackle the reported long waiting times for gynaecological treatments.

Women’s Health is key priority for this government which is why Scotland was the first country in the UK to publish an ambitious Women’s Health Plan in August 2021. Timely access to gynaecology services will remain a priority as we continue to develop our Women’s Health Plan.

The Budget we set out on 4 December 2024 will throw the weight of the government behind performance improvements with almost £200 million to reduce waiting lists and help support reduction of delayed discharge. By March 2026, we expect no one to be waiting longer than 12 months for a new outpatient, inpatient treatment or day case treatment.

We have already invested £30 million to reduce waiting lists that built up throughout the pandemic. This funding is being targeted at a series of national and local plans to reduce backlogs by maximising the use of local and national resources across Scotland. As part of this, we have allocated additional funding to Gynaecology services which we expect to deliver around 3,500 new outpatient appointments.

Question reference: S6W-32900

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 20 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to reduce NHS waiting times for adults with autism.

The Scottish Government is working with NHS Boards, community partners, and the National Autism Implementation Team (NAIT) to improve access to diagnosis, by supporting local health partners to develop, enhance and redesign existing local neurodevelopmental services.

We are working with NAIT to implement Adult Neurodevelopmental Pathways across Scotland. By implementing a single diagnostic pathway for autism and ADHD, and by adopting a stepped care model, we hope to ensure that diagnostic and post-diagnostic support is provided in a timely and effective fashion.

Question reference: S6W-32899

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 20 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what strategies are in place to increase public awareness of the issues that people with autism might face.

The Scottish Government has produced several resources to increase public awareness of the issues that autistic people might face.

We launched the Different Minds website in 2020 to provide clearer information and a better understanding of autism, as well debunking myths around autism. The site was co-produced with and features autistic people, and was accompanied by an television advertising campaign and resources in local libraries and schools.

Furthermore, the Scottish Government, COSLA and Inspiring Scotland have recently collaborated with autistic people through our leadership and engagement framework. This work resulted in the co-creation of a package of lived experience resources, which were launched in November 2024. The resources look to increase autism awareness and the understanding of how autistic people experience health settings and are now available on the website.

Question reference: S6W-32855

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 07 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 16 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what information it holds on which stations that are managed by (a) Network Rail in Scotland and (b) ScotRail provide Changing Places toilet facilities, and during which hours these facilities are open to the public.

Question reference: S6W-32809

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 06 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 16 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what strategies are in place to reduce any inequality faced by women, in light of them being statistically less likely to receive bystander cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) than a man.

The Out of Hospital Cardiac Arrest Strategy 2021 – 2026 contains a commitment to addressing key inequalities in out of hospital cardiac arrest outcomes and references inequality in the provision of CPR in women.

Through the delivery of this strategy, Save a Life for Scotland partners have been working to address misconceptions about CPR and embed the knowledge that it is a gender neutral, life-saving technique.

Question reference: S6W-32810

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 06 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 16 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what plans are in place to ensure that the recent reports of "medical misogyny" within gynaecological health care will not affect people in the future.

The Women’s Health Plan set out actions which aim to address women’s health inequalities by raising awareness around women’s health, improving access to health care for women across their lives, and reducing inequalities in health outcomes for women and girls.

We have taken specific action through the Plan to support practitioners providing care to women accessing their service including commissioning NHS Education for Scotland to create bespoke training packages on menstrual health and menopause for general practice and others working in Primary Care.

In addition, our ‘Women's experiences of discrimination and the impact on health’ report was published on 27 June 2023. The report examines the current evidence base on women's health inequalities and reports on a two-phase research project. The findings in this project contribute to the evidence base on women's health inequalities, discrimination and young women through in-depth exploration of women in Scotland's intersectional experiences. The findings from this report will inform the next phase of the Women’s Health Plan.

Our ambition is that ‘women and girls enjoy the best possible health, throughout their lives’. This remains the ambition of the Scottish Government, and will continue to be our guiding principle as we consider the next phase of the Women’s Health Plan.

Our Women’s Health Plan 2021 - 2024 Final Report on progress provides further details of our work to date.

Question reference: S6W-32808

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 06 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 16 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to data from the British Heart Foundation showing that, in Scotland, women are less likely to undergo angiography, receive revascularisation therapies and receive potentially lifesaving medications when they leave hospital.

We thank researchers at the University of Aberdeen and the Keele Cardiovascular Research Group for their important contribution to understanding sex disparities in care and outcomes across Scotland amongst men and women admitted for heart attacks.

We will continue to engage with women and girls, clinicians, academics and the third sector to explore the drivers and solutions to disparities in care for women with heart disease as we develop the next phase of the Women’s Health Plan.