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As the Golden Jubilee National Hospital provides services on a national basis, it is not appropriate for the NHS Resource Allocation Formula (NRAC) to be applied to determine their funding.

The Golden Jubilee Hospital provides a number of services on a regional or a national basis, which are funded through the allocation by the Scottish Government on the basis of activity level and, where relevant, contributions are deducted from other Boards as appropriate. Where there are services that are invoiced directly to other health boards, this is on the basis of activities undertaken.

The NRAC formula is used to allocate funding to NHS Territorial Boards and recognises relative needs across Board areas by taking into account a number of geographical factors including population level, relative deprivation and the need for healthcare in different Board areas. In 2018-19 the Scottish Government is supporting frontline NHS Boards with increased funding of £354.5 (3.7%) million, including an increase of £175 million for investment in reform. As part of this, the Golden Jubilee Hospital’s resource budget has increased by £0.5 million to £54 million in 2018-19.

The Scottish Government recognises that mentoring can be valuable in supporting women into leadership positions. The First Minister mentors a young woman and has encouraged other women in leadership positions, across all sectors including retail, to consider mentoring as one tool to support the next generation of women leaders.

In addition, the Scottish Chambers of Commerce Network along with Women's Enterprise Scotland and Scotland's leading women entrepreneurs are working together to provide the "Women's Business Mentoring" programme to help support and create more female business owners, including those in retail.

We are currently working in partnership with the Scottish Retail Consortium to develop a national retail strategy and, as part of that process, will be considering action on a wide range of issues including any measures that will encourage employment and greater gender diversity throughout the industry.

Information on the numbers of people with cystic fibrosis who have died since Orkambi became licensed on 16 November 2015 is not held centrally by the Scottish Government.

The Scottish Government is committed to gender equality and to ensuring that women have equal opportunities and access to power and resources as men. Evidence shows that having more women at senior levels and in the boardroom is good for business and contributes to better decision making.

In June 2015, the Scottish Government launched the Partnership for Change 50/50 by 2020 campaign encouraging organisations from across Scotland’s public, voluntary and private sectors to sign up to a voluntary commitment to work towards gender balance on their boards by 2020. It is heartening that organisations, such as The Scottish Grocers' Federation, have signed up to this initiative.

Improving women’s representation at senior levels must also reflect the barriers that women experience in the labour market, including due to their disproportionate responsibility for providing childcare and other forms of care. The Scottish Government is taking a broad range of action including a commitment to: expand childcare provision; promote flexible working and a Scottish living wage, and address pregnancy and maternity discrimination.

We are currently working in partnership with the Scottish Retail Consortium to develop a national retail strategy and, as part of that process, will be considering a wide range of issues including any measures that might be taken to promote a better gender balance in senior levels of retail.

We are currently working in partnership with the Scottish Retail Consortium to develop a national retail strategy and, as part of that process, will be considering action on a wide range of issues, including what measures could be taken to encourage more women's employment throughout the industry.

The Equalities Impact Assessment (EQIA) for the Fuel Poverty (Target, Definition and Strategy) (Scotland) Bill, estimated that in 2016 approximately 137,000 fewer older households and 55,000 fewer rural households, would have been categorised as fuel poor under the proposed new definition.

This is as a result of the inclusion of an income threshold in the new definition in line with the recommendations of the independent, academic Scottish Fuel Poverty Review Panel. This aligns fuel poverty more closely with low income households, as can be seen in the graphic (BIB No. 60298) available from the Scottish Parliament Information Centre. However the threshold applied in the new definition is considerably higher, for most household types, than the standard 60% of median income (after housing costs) used to define relative income poverty. This ensures households above the income poverty line, that are struggling with their fuel bills, will still be captured in the definition.

I refer the member to the answer to S5W-20125 on 6 December 2018. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx .

In line with the Rail Enhancements & Capital Investment Strategy, published in March 2018, the Scottish Government generally makes rail infrastructure investment decisions.

Such decisions take account of comprehensive advice from the Scottish rail industry, including Network Rail Scotland and ScotRail.

The ScotRail Alliance is a collaborative working relationship between Abellio ScotRail and Network Rail Scotland. The Alliance was included in Abellio’s bid for the ScotRail Franchise, which commenced on 1 April 2015.

The purpose of the Alliance is to improve the railway in Scotland, being more responsive to customer’s needs. While remaining separate companies, both organisations work collaboratively to achieve common aims and objectives, led by a single managing director, Alex Hynes.

The Scottish Government continues to press for further devolution of Network Rail’s central functions to better align with Scottish strategies and priorities. That includes de-centralising system operator functions, such as strategic timetabling and the delivery of major enhancement works, where key decisions taken at a local level improves the likelihood of stronger performance and resilience on the Scottish network.

There have been no changes to the fuel poverty definition since it was introduced in 2002.

The definition set out in the Fuel Poverty (Target, Definition and Strategy) (Scotland) Bill is the first proposed change.