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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: S3W-30645

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 January 2010
Current Status: Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 26 January 2010

To ask the Scottish Executive how much debt Scottish Water accrued for domestic water consumption in 2008-09, also broken down by property valuation band.

Question reference: S3W-30650

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 January 2010
Current Status: Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 26 January 2010

To ask the Scottish Executive how much it cost Scottish Water to collect domestic water charges in 2008-09, broken down by property valuation band.

Question reference: S3W-30651

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 January 2010
Current Status: Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 26 January 2010

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it is taking forward recommendations in the Waterwatch Scotland report, Affordability of Scottish Household Water and Sewerage Charges: Historic Trends and Current Position, and, if so, which recommendations.

The Scottish Government has already responded to Waterwatch Scotland about this report on 10 September 2008. Following consultation in 2008 the Scottish Government''s policy on water and sewerage charges for the 2010-15 period was set out in its Principles of Charging Statement which was published on 27 October 2009.

I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-30648 on 26 January 2010 for further details of that policy. 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/Business/PQA/Default.aspx.

Question reference: S3W-30646

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 January 2010
Current Status: Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 26 January 2010

To ask the Scottish Executive whether Scottish Water has the power to write off debt.

Question reference: S3W-30738

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 January 2010
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 26 January 2010

To ask the Scottish Executive how many staff work in the Directorate of Equalities and Planning of NHS Health Scotland and what their different job remits are.

There are 29 staff in total in the Directorate of Equalities and Planning, comprising three teams:

(i) Planning and Performance Team (three staff) with a remit to provide the corporate planning and performance management function for NHS Health Scotland

(ii) Equalities Development Team (15 staff) with a remit to support all NHS boards in the delivery of programmes to support equality priorities identified by the Scottish Government Health Directorates. These include: race equality in mental health services; national support for translation, interpreting and communications; national support for community engagement; national support for equality impact assessment, and support in equalities data collection, monitoring and reporting.

(iii) Equalities Support Team (10 staff) with a remit to support all NHS boards in the improvement of equalities work within boards, including boards'' compliance with legal equalities duties.

The general remits of individual staff within the directorate are programme or project management or administrative support. All management level staff have specific expertise in one or more equality areas.

Question reference: S3W-30691

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 13 January 2010
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 26 January 2010

To ask the Scottish Executive, with reference to the letter to the Public Petitions Committee from the Deputy Director of the Scottish Government’s Healthcare Policy Strategy Directorate on 27 July 2009, how it will (a) continue to ensure that guidance to NHS boards is being implemented and (b) manage boards that do not implement the guidance in a timely fashion.

The Scottish Government expects NHS boards and clinicians to take full account of Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) and NHS Quality Improvement Scotland (NHS QIS) recommendations in the planning and provision of NHS services. Where there is evidence that an SMC or NHS QIS accepted medicine (or its equivalent) is not being made available, or there are undue delays in reaching such decisions, these will continue to be addressed directly with the NHS board concerned in order that appropriate action is taken where necessary.

The decisions of individual clinicians in relation to patient care are a matter of professional judgement in line with clinical need. However, all NHS staff operate within the management framework of their employing organisations.

Question reference: S3W-30741

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 January 2010
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 26 January 2010

To ask the Scottish Executive how many patients, service users and community groups are involved on a regular basis in deciding the work and direction of the Directorate of Equalities and Planning of NHS Health Scotland and evaluating whether that work is having an impact on patients' experience of the NHS.

The Directorate of Equalities and Planning manages two community reference groups, which have 47 members in total. Of these, 25 are individual community members and 22 are representatives of community and voluntary sector organisations.

The National Reference Forum (NRF) (for ethnic minority) and the Disability Reference Group (DRG) provide the perspective of people who are disabled and those from minority ethnic communities on key programmes of work undertaken by NHS Health Scotland.

In August 2009, the directorate established service level agreements with 13 community and voluntary organisations which provide specialist advice to develop programmes that address inequalities in health, eliminate discrimination and promote equality, specifically through our programme of equality impact assessments.

The knowledge and experience of these groups help inform the direction and work of the directorate, as do the views of other stakeholders such as the Scottish Government and NHS boards.

Question reference: S3W-30739

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 January 2010
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 26 January 2010

To ask the Scottish Executive what difference the Directorate of Equalities and Planning of NHS Health Scotland has made to the individual experience of (a) disabled people, (b) people from black and minority ethnic communities and (c) lesbian, gay and bisexual and transgender people in achieving equality of access to health services.

I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-30737 on 26 January 2010. 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/Business/PQA/Default.aspx.

In addition NHS Health Scotland is delivering a number of programmes of work which are supporting boards to improve equality of access in the NHS. Examples include:

Supporting NHS boards to engage with disabled people and also help staff to understand the specific needs of people with disabilities, leading to easier access to health services for disabled people;

Hosting a mental health and race equality programme since 2006 to support practitioners to deliver equitable services to ethnic minority individuals and groups;

Commissioning the Black Leadership Network to provide specialist review and capacity building to enable selected NHS boards to improve their race equality schemes;

Providing national project management to support boards to combine their resources and experience in improving the quality and consistency of delivery of interpreting, translation and communication services;

Involving Stonewall Scotland in the planning and delivery of facilitated support for NHS boards on equality in sexual orientation, and

Involving the Scottish Transgender Alliance in workshops on experiences of health services to support boards improve services for transgender people.

The Equalities and Planning Directorate is also working closely with the Better Together National Patient Experience Programme to gather information about the individual experiences of patients using GP and hospital services, disaggregated by equality characteristics.

Question reference: S3W-30737

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 January 2010
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 26 January 2010

To ask the Scottish Executive how NHS Health Scotland is taking forward its role in supporting NHS boards to comply with legal duties on equality and eliminating discrimination.

Responsibility for compliance with legal duties on equality and the elimination of discrimination rests with the individual NHS boards.

Following the publication in 2009 of NHS Health Scotland''s report The Big Picture 2009: A review of progress on equality in the NHS in Scotland the Equalities and Planning Directorate is providing support and working with boards to agree and provide a planned programme of specific actions to help improve on areas where compliance on the equality duties was identified as a concern.

The directorate is also working to support selected boards with a review of their disability schemes. These include: national support for translation, interpreting and communications; national support for community engagement; national support for Equality Impact Assessment; support in equalities data collection, monitoring and reporting.

Question reference: S3W-30743

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 January 2010
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 26 January 2010

To ask the Scottish Executive what its position is on the value for money represented by NHS Health Scotland spending up to £300,000 on public relations consultants to help the organisation communicate with MSPs, over and above their publicity budget of £55,000.

The Scottish Government can confirm that NHS Health Scotland has decided not to proceed with a contract for an agency to assist them in ensuring there is an understanding of public health issues and campaigns across all stakeholders. These stakeholders include health professionals, the media, members of the public as well as MSPs.

A decision has been taken to carry out all of NHS Health Scotland''s corporate communications activity in-house.