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The Scottish Government recognises and values the role that educational psychologists play in supporting learners. They have a key role in identifying needs and providing support for individual pupils to help them overcome barriers to their learning arising from a range of circumstances, including social and emotional factors. It is for local authorities to take decisions around the prioritisation and delivery of the services educational psychologists provide and the numbers of educational psychologists they employ.

Funding for educational psychologist training was introduced in 1998 in response to a staffing shortage in that sector and removed under the spending review 2011 to ensure a consistent approach to funding of postgraduate training. The Scottish Government is working with the National Scottish Steering Group for Educational Psychologists to ensure a sustainable supply of education psychologists to meet potential future needs. We are funding a seconded position in Education Scotland to work with the steering group to undertake a workforce planning project for educational psychology services in Scotland. The secondee took up post in mid-January 2015.

I refer the member to the answer to question S4W-22511 on 22 September 2014. 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/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx

The State of the Estate Report 2013 (published in February 2014) identified backlog maintenance of £858 million of which 11% was classified as high risk (£96 million) and 32% as significant risk (£275 million), of which £209 million is clinical space.

The Scottish Government provides the policies, frameworks and resources for high quality healthcare in Scotland and it is for each NHS board to decide how best to deliver those services to meet the needs of the population. This includes how best to utilise funding, facilities and staff, while taking account of national and local priorities, to meet local health needs. We expect NHS boards to have robust processes in place to ensure the provision of safe, effective and high quality patient care, delivered by the right professional at the right time.

We have invited patients, families, clinicians, politicians and other stakeholders to work with us in shaping the long term future of NHSScotland, signifying a genuinely new relationship between the Scottish Government and local health and social partnerships. We want to reach consensus about improving services for people across Scotland, and an important component of this involves ensuring our workforce continues to deliver the best possible care as part of our refreshed long-term vision for Scotland’s NHS. Alongside those stakeholders, the professional bodies and Royal Colleges will be key to informing that work.

The Deputy First Minister has confirmed that all of the £127.4 million of consequentials will be utilised for health.

The Care Inspectorate assesses the delivery of palliative and end of life care to care home residents as part of its inspections. Best practice guidance is signposted, including NHS Education for Scotland’s guidance on anticipatory care planning, which includes looking at a person’s resuscitation wishes and if they have a prior advance statement of living well. Each year the Care Inspectorate asks care homes for information about the number of residents who have an anticipatory care plan in place and this information is used to inform inspections.

The Care Inspectorate requires all registered services, including care homes, to notify them of the death of any resident on an ongoing basis. Their inspectors monitor these notifications and the Care Inspectorate will take action if the rate of notification is higher than expected, including requesting their medical adviser to undertake a review of deaths in that service.

The Care Inspectorate does not currently require care homes to inform them of all admissions to hospital, although the Care Inspectorate do ask to be notified of significant incidents and accidents which in some cases may lead to hospital admission. Their inspectors monitor all notifications from services and will take action where necessary.

Scottish care homes have been brought within the remit of the Controlled Drugs (Supervision of Management and Use) Regulations 2013. The Care Inspectorate has been designated as a ‘responsible body’ under the terms of these Regulations and has been given powers to ask for self-declarations about how care homes manage and use controlled drugs.

The Care Inspectorate responds to any concerns raised with them as complaints, or noted by their inspectors during inspections about the appropriate use of medicines in care homes. Where such concerns arise, the Care Inspectorate’s pharmacy advisers can carry out an audit of practice, the findings of which are shared with the service provider, health board and local authority.

None of the equal pay claims identified in Audit Scotland’s financial review of the NHS in 2012-13 have been quantified.

5,953 claims were disclosed as unquantified contingent liabilities in the boards’ accounts for 2013-14.

The following table details the original repayable brokerage to NHS 24 for the ‘Futures’ IT system.

The following table details the revised provision of repayable brokerage to NHS 24 for the ‘Futures’ IT system. Brokerage was provided to avoid financing charges of £4.6 million associated with the phased payment of the implementation costs over the 10-year contract term of the future programme (combining the delivery of new technology and applications with service redesign).