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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: S6W-41441

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 22 October 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 19 November 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-40975 by Jenni Minto on 21 October 2025, whether it has completed a risk assessment and evaluated any liabilities of independent prescriber pharmacists not having read/write access to patient records in 2026.

Question reference: S6W-40975

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 02 October 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 21 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-38600 by Jenni Minto on 19 June 2025, what assessment it has made of any potential risk to patients from independent prescriber pharmacists not having read/write access to patient records in 2026.

The Scottish Government remains committed to collaborate with key partners across the NHS in Scotland to ensure that relevant information, with the appropriate safeguards in place, is available to all healthcare professionals, including community pharmacists, when and where they need it. The Scottish Government is continuing to explore the possibility of granting further access to clinical records. Health Boards continue to work with community pharmacists prescribers to ensure the safe and effective prescribing of medicines.

The Digital Health & Care Strategy, published 2021, sets out ambitions for greater access to medical information both for staff and the public. In the medium to longer term, as part of the Digital Health & Care strategy, a National Digital Platform is being developed and has started to bring together service data that is appropriately accessible to the workforce regardless of where they are based.

Question reference: S6W-41064

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 08 October 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 21 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the impact of flu in the winter 2024-25 period on NHS staff absence rates, and how this compares with the (a) 2017-18, (b) 2018-19, (c) 2022-23 and (d) 2023-24 period.

The Scottish Government receives NHS Scotland sickness absence management information on a fortnightly basis, but this data does not include detailed absence reasons. This sickness absence data enables us to review and compare against the known seasonal pattern, with generally higher sickness absence in the winter months commonly caused by cold and flu.

Furthermore, management information is collected by NES on individual level absence which contains detailed absence reasons, including a cold, cough and flu category. NES have been developing this data to enable more detailed analysis.

Question reference: S6W-41081

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 07 October 2025
Current Status: Answered by Tom Arthur on 20 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the Royal College of Psychiatrists' recent report, Multi-system solutions for meeting the needs of autistic people and people with ADHD in Scotland.

The Scottish Government welcomes the Royal College of Psychiatry’s report on meeting the needs of autistic people and people with ADHD in Scotland.

The Scottish Government agrees with the College, that the demand for neurodevelopmental assessment and support now exceeds what Scotland’s current mental health infrastructure can deliver and that a different response is needed, which recognises the complex nature of this issue.

We are grateful to the College for their work in preparing this report and will now take time to consider it fully.

Question reference: S6W-40951

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 01 October 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 17 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what its position is regarding whether all NHS workers working on night shift should be entitled to at least one hot meal per shift.

The Scottish Government recognises that access to a hot meal during shifts plays an important role in supporting the health and wellbeing of NHS staff.

The provision of healthy food or out-of-hours catering for NHS staff working night shifts is currently managed by individual Health Boards, who are best placed to determine local needs and allocate resources within their respective budgets.

NHS employers are encouraged to ensure, wherever possible, that staff have access to nutritious food, out-of-hours catering and appropriate rest spaces.

Scottish Government have undertaken scoping work to identify potential opportunities for collaboration with Health Boards to expand wellbeing initiatives for all staff working shifts. This will be looked at universally across NHSScotland.

Question reference: S6W-40983

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 02 October 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 15 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how the roll-out of the MyCare.scot app aligns with its ambition to establish a single digital platform for the NHS, and when that technology will be available in Scotland.

Scotland’s National Digital Platform (NDP) brings together cloud-based digital components and services. The technology available on the platform will improve consistency of access to core digital tools in the health and care system. MyCare.scot will make extensive use of the reuseable digital components and data services offered by NDP. The NDP is currently operational, and the member can read more about it at: https://www.nationaldigitalplatform.scot/about/.

Question reference: S6W-40978

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 02 October 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 15 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what engagement and collaboration it has had with (a) COSLA and (b) individual local authorities in the development of the MyCare.scot app.

COSLA and Scottish Government, along with NES, are working together to develop and deliver MyCare.scot. COSLA are joint owners of our Digital Health and Care Strategy and previously committed to supporting delivery of the Digital Front Door Programme and by extension, MyCare.scot. COSLA also represents local authorities in that. The member can find more information about the strategy here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/scotlands-digital-health-care-strategy/.

Question reference: S6W-40980

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 02 October 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 15 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a list of the functions that the MyCare.scot app will perform compared with a list of those of the NHS app used in England.

The initial launch of MyCare.scot in Lanarkshire will allow people to securely access and manage some hospital appointments online, receive communications, find local services and update personal information.

Information on which functionalities will be available can be found in our high-level Rollout Summary at: https://www.gov.scot/binaries/content/documents/govscot/publications/strategy-plan/2025/09/health-social-care-app-mycare-scot-national-rollout-high-level-summary/documents/health-social-care-app-mycare-scot/health-social-care-app-mycare-scot/govscot%3Adocument/health-social-care-app-mycare-scot.pdf.

The member may also find it useful to refer to NHS England’s published information on the NHS App to understand its functionality. This can be found on their website at: https://www.nhs.uk/nhs-app/about-the-nhs-app/

Question reference: S6W-40981

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 02 October 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 15 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of its recent announcement regarding the MyCare.scot app, whether any interoperability barriers of the different IT systems have been overcome.

It has been a critical aim of the Scottish Government over a number of years to improve interoperability within health and social care. We recently passed the Care Reform (Scotland) Act 2025, which includes the introduction of mandatory information standards across systems to support this aim. Details of the legislation can be found here: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/asp/2025/9/enacted.

I can confirm that we are currently looking at the proposed secondary legislation associated with the Act. This has included the process of setting up appropriate governance for this work.

The Scottish Government and partners actively seek to address interoperability challenges on an on-going basis. This includes work to ensure that key NHS systems will be interoperable with MyCare.scot.

Question reference: S6W-41037

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 October 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 15 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the announcement of the launch of MyCare.scot, Scotland’s new health and social care online app, when it anticipates that NHS patients will be able to re-order prescriptions via the app.

I can confirm that enabling people to re-order prescriptions are a core part of the plans for future functionality of MyCare.scot. Scotland’s Digital Prescribing and Dispensing Programme (DPDP) is a critical dependency for this functionality. The full business case for this programme is currently progressing through the appropriate national governance and will establish timescales that will allow for this functionality.

The member can find out more information on DPDP on NSS’ website; https://www.nss.nhs.scot/national-programmes/digital-prescribing-and-dispensing-pathways/about-the-digital-prescribing-and-dispensing-pathways-programme/.