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a) The Scottish Government want all children and young people to realise their full potential regardless of their circumstances or any protected characteristic, including sex (gender). Education in primary schools and Early Learning and Childcare establishments is underpinned by policies which have equality considerations embedded throughout, including: Getting it Right for Every Child; Curriculum for Excellence; and Additional Support for Learning.

Education Scotland’s self-evaluation tools How Good is Our Early Learning and Childcare? How Good is Our School? And How Good is our College? enable early learning settings, schools and colleges to evaluate the quality of outcomes for learners’ wellbeing, equality and inclusion.

The Scottish Funding Council (SFC) has published a Gender Action Plan in order to address gender imbalances and reduce gender gaps in college and undergraduate courses, while its Outcome Agreements ask colleges to remove barriers and support full participation and successful outcomes for all groups of learners in their local community. This, for example, helps us recruit more males in to early learning and childcare. In turn, ensuring a more gender balanced workforce, with more male role models for our young children.

The “Standard for Childhood Practice” sets out the learning outcomes all candidates must demonstrate when studying for a career in early learning and childcare. One of which includes: ‘demonstrating an awareness of the significance of race, ethnicity, gender, class, disability, sexuality and other social backgrounds and the interactions between them in the development of individual children and young people and; promoting fairness and justice and adopt anti-discriminatory practices which challenge inequalities of race, ethnicity, gender, class, disability, sexuality and other social backgrounds and their interactions’. This creates an awareness and understanding of gender equality in our young children, but also in the workforce who are developing the children’s understanding.

b) In response to Developing the Young Workforce recommendations, Skills Development Scotland (SDS) published the Equalities Action Plan for Modern Apprenticeships in Scotland in December 2015. The five year plan outlines the challenges to be addressed and the actions SDS will undertake with partners to improve the participation of under-represented groups within the MA programme.

Apprenticeship areas where there are gender imbalances, for example females in science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) and males in childcare related apprenticeships, will be tackled by the plan.

An annual report detailing progress against the plan will be published by SDS shortly.

The Scottish Government wants all children and young people to realise their full potential regardless of their circumstances or any protected characteristic, including sex (gender). School education is underpinned by policies which have equality considerations embedded throughout, including: Getting it Right for Every Child; Curriculum for Excellence; and Additional Support for Learning. We published a 2013-17 equalities outcome for education, which includes a focus on gender, and reported progress on mainstreaming the equality duty in 2015. We will report progress again in April 2017.

We define our vision for Equity and Excellence in schools in the 2017 National Improvement Framework (NIF) and Improvement Plan. NIF sets out our high-level strategic plans for improvement and identifies specific improvement activity, such as actions around teacher professionalism and school leadership intended to mainstream equality.

Gender equality in Further and Higher Education is a priority for all of Scotland’s colleges and universities as both an employer and educational establishment. The Scottish Funding Council has published a Gender Action Plan in order to address gender imbalances and reduce gender gaps amongst staff and students. Its Outcome Agreements ask institutions to remove barriers and support full participation and successful outcomes for all groups of learners in their local community.

The Gender Representation on Public Boards (Scotland) Bill announced in the Programme for Government 2016-17, will require positive action to be taken to redress gender imbalance on public sector boards, including colleges and universities.

Education Scotland’s self-evaluation tools How Good is Our Early Learning and Childcare?, How Good is Our School?, and How Good is our College?, enable early learning and childcare settings, schools and colleges to evaluate the quality of outcomes for learners’ wellbeing, equality and inclusion.

Priority for social housing in Scotland is based on an assessment of an applicant’s need and circumstances. Scottish housing law requires social landlords (registered social landlords and local authorities) to give reasonable preference to certain applicants, including those who are homeless or threatened with homelessness. Veterans who find themselves homeless, threatened with homelessness or with a high level of housing need will receive priority for social housing.

Scottish Government practice guidance on allocations provides advice to social landlords to consider and address the needs of ex-Service personnel as part of their housing allocations policies and procedures and ensure they are not disadvantaged. It includes practice examples that highlight approaches used by social landlords to respond to the housing needs of Service leavers and the wider veterans' community.

There are no formal proposals to reduce unscheduled care assessment or admission points at the Vale of Leven Hospital. Patient care, operational matters and service delivery are the statutory responsibility of local healthcare providers such as NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde (GG&C) to consider for its local population needs.

Health Boards need to design services that meet the needs of the local population and if there are any proposals for service change they would be subject to the well-established public engagement process.

This information is not held centrally.

The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) publishes statistics on accidental dwelling fires, however this data is not broken down into specific causes.

These statistics are available on SFRS’s website, and can be found at this link: http://www.firescotland.gov.uk/about-us/fire-and-rescue-statistics.aspx

The SFRS has a statutory duty to promote fire safety across Scotland. In the Fire and Rescue Framework for Scotland 2016, Scottish Ministers require SFRS to contribute fully to improving the safety and well-being of Scotland’s communities and to ensure that there is a clear process for working with partners to identify the risks faced by communities and individuals so that activity can be targeted using a risk-based approach.

The SFRS considers how best to reduce dwelling fires, including those caused by electricity, what the focus of its preventative action will be, and with which partner organisations it will work to achieve this.

In addition to a programme of fire safety awareness campaigns and community safety engagement events, the SFRS carried out 71,743 Home Fire Safety Visits in 2015-16. The SFRS website also carries safety information for householders on a range of issues, including home appliances and electrical safety.

NHS Scotland, Health and Social Care Partnerships together with local authorities and third sector partners are ideally placed to work together to provide a range of care, services and support that responds appropriately to the assessed health and mental health needs of veterans and their families.

The Scottish Government set out its commitment to Veterans in Renewing Our Commitments, which recognised veterans and their families as a true asset to Scotland and reaffirmed that no member of the Armed Forces, Service family member or veteran in Scotland should face disadvantage when accessing services and support. Amongst other achievements, Renewing Our Commitments highlighted the Scottish Government’s funding of over £3.6 million over three years to 2018 in partnership with NHSScotland for the provision of specialist mental health services for veterans resident in Scotland at the Hollybush House Combat Stress facility in Ayr.

The Scottish Government will also shortly publish a new ten-year national Mental Health Strategy to transform and improve mental health and wellbeing. The strategy will build on previous successes and will set out a longer term vision for Scotland where good mental health and wellbeing flourishes for all, including veterans. The strategy, underpinned by additional investment of £150 million over five years, will focus on the need for prevention and early intervention, joined up accessible services that respond appropriately, and tackling the early mortality rate of people experiencing mental ill health.

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde have responsibility for the planning and provision of local services. We expect all Health Boards, including NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, to keep their services under review to ensure they remain of the highest quality and are as efficient as possible.

The Scottish Government remains committed to the provision of quality services in the Clyde area, and the Chair of NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde has given an assurance that the continued provision of comprehensive hospital, community and primary care services across the Clyde area, including at the Vale of Leven Hospital, is a key priority for the Health Board.

The national review of maternity and neonatal services was published at the end of January and NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde are currently considering their Clyde birthing proposals in light of the review’s recommendations. The Health Board’s next steps will be informed by a report from their Medical and Nurse Directors who are working with colleagues, including the Chief Medical Officer, and stakeholders to ensure the proposals are consistent with the national review. There are no other formal service change proposals affecting the Vale of Leven Hospital. It remains the case that any proposals designated as major service change must be subject to formal public consultation and, ultimately, Ministerial approval.

The National Clinical Strategy sets out an initial analysis of which services might best be planned and delivered nationally regionally and locally, based on evidence supporting best outcomes and the populations those services will serve.

It will be for NHS Boards, working together, to plan and deliver services locally, regionally and nationally, to enhance the quality of care, improve services, patient outcomes and ensure we have a sustainable NHS for all of Scotland.

The Health and Social Care Delivery Plan states that in 2018, the appropriate national and regional groups will set out how services will evolve over the next 15 to 20 years, in line with the National Clinical Strategy. This approach to planning will see a different configuration of services across some parts of Scotland, one based on what will ensure high-quality, timely and sustainable provision of services to people.

Scottish Development International records the value of inward investment through the number of jobs and projects, as provided in the response to S5W-05179 on 13 December 2017. No other assessment of value is made by Scottish Development International.

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.

Information on the number of beds there are in each hospital in NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is published by ISD Scotland and can be found at the following link:-

https://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Hospital-Care/Publications/2016-10-04/Annual-Trends-in-Available-Beds-by-Health-Board-of-Treatment-and-Hospital-Oct16.xlsx