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Scottish Government is not aware of any capital projects, other than that at the East Ayrshire Community Hospital PFI, where BAM Construct UK’s has a contractual funding relationship with the Ahli United Bank.

The projected cost of work on the project incurred by NHS Ayrshire and Arran is £758,381.

Within the above cost, £146,727 was spent on permanent improvements to facilities. Of direct benefit to the Frail Elderly and Elderly Mental Health’s Pennelburn and Holmburn Wards were building alterations, including door widening and floor improvements. Also included in the cost of the permanent improvements were additional car parking spaces and changes to the kitchen.

With the exception of paediatric cardiac transplantation, a full range of paediatric cardiac surgery services is provided in Scotland by Yorkhill Hospital in Glasgow.

In addition, where it is necessary due to rarity and/or complexity, a very few children may require to be referred to relevant centre(s) in England. In such exceptional cases care is jointly shared between the relevant service and Yorkhill.

The Scottish Ambulance Service has advised that the overtime budget since 2007-08 has been:

It is important to note that these figures cannot be compared on a like for like basis. Prior to 2008-09, the budget associated with covering vacancies was included in the basic pay budget. However, as vacancies are covered on overtime, since 2008-09 this provision has been included in the overtime budget. Also in 2009-10, the overtime budget was increased to backfill for 40 additional staff to be trained in specialist operational response procedures.

The budget for 2011-12 is currently £4,363,000 but this figure is subject to revision over the course of the year. The Scottish Ambulance Service are continuing to make every effort to reduce overtime across the service.

The Safe and Sustainable Programme’s review of paediatric cardiac surgery services in England was subject to full public consultation which took place earlier this year. Interested groups, organisations and individuals from across the UK had the opportunity to submit their views during that period.

I refer the member to the answer to question S4W-02389 on 27 September 2011. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/Apps2/MAQASearch/QAndMSearch.aspx.

Through representation on the Safe and Sustainable review group we have had the opportunity to ensure that the views of Scottish Government and NHS Scotland are taken into account in the Department of Health’s consideration of the proposals for the future of paediatric cardiac surgery in England.

Whatever the outcome of that review, high quality, sustainable heart transplantation services will continue to be available for patients from Scotland.

Since 1999, 24 children have accessed the paediatric congenital heart service at the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle. The breakdown per year is as under.

The information requested has been provided by the Scottish Ambulance Service and has been placed in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 53208).

The Care Inspectorate now has responsibility, as of 1 April 2011, for inspecting, regulating and supporting improvement of care and social work and child protection services across Scotland. The Care Inspectorate has powers under section 62 of the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Act 2010 to serve an improvement notice on a care service, specifying the improvements required to bring a care service up to the standards required and the timescale for meeting these standards.

The Care Commission, as the Care Inspectorate’s predecessor, had similar powers to issue improvement notices under section 10 of the Regulation of Care (Scotland) Act 2001.

The total number of improvement notices issued by the Care Commission and/or the Care Inspectorate between 1 April 2007 to 31 July 2011 is 365, broken down on an annual basis as shown in the following table:

Improvement Notices Issued