- Asked by: Jamie Halcro Johnston, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 03 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 11 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government whether any assessment has been made of squid bycatch by the inshore Nephrops fisheries.
Answer
There is limited evidence about the impacts of targeted squid fishery and associated bycatches. The occurrence of squid in samples of bycatch from the Nephrops fleet is rare. The Marine Directorate is undertaking a limited trial with a number of inshore vessels to help gather information and evidence on bycatch within inshore areas to support a longer-term policy decision on fishing for squid.
- Asked by: Jamie Halcro Johnston, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 03 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Neil Gray on 11 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government whether any NHS boards have reported difficulty in commissioning external care providers in each of the last five years, and, if so, what impact this has had on (a) service delivery and (b) waiting times.
Answer
This information is not held centrally by the Scottish Government. This information would therefore need to be requested from the Health Boards. There have been no national tenders since the pandemic, during which time private hospitals supported with cancer treatment. Whilst the Scottish Government works with Health Boards through planning to make best use of existing NHS resources and capacity, it is for Health Boards locally to determine how they use the private sector and to agree any contractual arrangements. The Scottish Government no longer provides direct funding for planned care for private providers.
Health Boards are encouraged to improve waiting times through engaging with the Centre for Sustainable Delivery, a national unit designed to sustainably improve and transform Scotland's health care system through innovation, collaboration and clinical leadership.
- Asked by: Jamie Halcro Johnston, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 03 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 11 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-36787 by Mairi Gougeon on 22 April 2025, what the membership is of the co-management group established to develop a squid fishing trial.
Answer
The Squid Co-management Group was established for the purpose of bringing industry and eNGOs together to work collaboratively with Scottish Government officials to support a longer-term policy decision on fishing for squid under the North Sea Cod Avoidance Plan (NCAP).
Stakeholder nominations for membership of the Squid Co-development Group were provided by the co-management stakeholder forum Fisheries Management and Conservation Group (FMAC). The first stakeholder Squid Co-management Group meeting took place 1 November 2024.
- Asked by: Jamie Halcro Johnston, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 03 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 11 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how many vessels in the Scottish squid fishery are licensed to use (a) trawling gears and (b) jigging gear.
Answer
Squid is a non-quota species and consequently there are no Scottish vessels specifically licenced to fish for this species as their primary catch. Details of the Scottish fishing fleet and primary gears employed can be found in the annual Marine Directorate statistical bulletin at: Scottish Sea Fisheries Statistics 2023 - corrected March 2025 - gov.scot, tables 42 & 43 provide data on the number of active Scottish registered vessels and their main fishing method.
- Asked by: Jamie Halcro Johnston, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 03 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Neil Gray on 11 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how many cataract operations have been conducted per week since 2020, broken down by NHS board.
Answer
Public Health Scotland publish annual information on cataract procedures in our Acute hospital activity and NHS beds information (annual) publication.
The publication does not have weekly figures but annual figures for cataract procedures between financial year 2019-20 to financial year 2023-24 can be found within the ‘Eye’ grouping in table 7 of our publication. This table includes splits by admission type and by health board of treatment and can be downloaded here.
- Asked by: Jamie Halcro Johnston, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 19 May 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Jenni Minto on 2 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what the average waiting time has been for specialist palliative care referrals to be actioned in each of the last five years, broken down by NHS board.
Answer
This information is not held centrally.
Referral to specialist palliative care services for people living with serious health conditions and/or those who require specialist palliative care when they are dying is based on individualised needs assessments. As a wide range of specialist and generalist staff in hospitals, care homes, primary care, social care, hospices and the third sector are involved in providing palliative care to individuals and their families, and could all be considered as delivering palliative care, it would be challenging to efficiently and effectively gather this data centrally.
- Asked by: Jamie Halcro Johnston, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 19 May 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Jenni Minto on 2 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government whether any NHS boards have reported difficulty in recruiting specialist palliative care professionals in the last five years, and what actions it has taken in response.
Answer
Health boards are autonomous institutions responsible for their own planning, recruitment, employment and deployment of staff. The Scottish Government supports Health Boards in these matters through the setting of strategic policies and frameworks at a national level.
- Asked by: Jamie Halcro Johnston, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 19 May 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Jenni Minto on 2 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking to reduce waiting times for access to palliative and end-of-life care services across Scotland.
Answer
The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that everyone who needs it can access high-quality palliative care that is right for their circumstances.
The Scottish Government published a draft palliative care strategy ‘Palliative care matters for all’ on 02 October 2024 for consultation. The consultation closed on 10 January 2025. The responses have now been analysed, and the final version of the strategy and analysis report are due to be published in the summer. The strategy will be published alongside a delivery plan, which will set out our approach to ensuring that everyone who needs it can access timely palliative care and care around dying. This work has been closely developed on a partnership basis with key partners, including those with lived experience of receiving palliative care and their families.
- Asked by: Jamie Halcro Johnston, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 19 May 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Jenni Minto on 2 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish the average referral-to-treatment times for patients receiving palliative care in (a) hospital, (b) hospice and (c) community settings for each of the last five years, broken down by NHS board.
Answer
This information is not held centrally.
Referral to specialist palliative care services for people living with serious health conditions and/or those who require specialist palliative care when they are dying is based on individualised needs assessments. As a wide range of specialist and generalist staff in hospitals, care homes, primary care, social care, hospices and the third sector are involved in providing palliative care to individuals and their families, and could all be considered as delivering palliative care, it would be challenging to efficiently and effectively gather this data centrally.
- Asked by: Jamie Halcro Johnston, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 19 May 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Jenni Minto on 2 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how many palliative care nursing and medical posts have remained unfilled in each of the last five years, broken down by NHS board.
Answer
Information on the NHS medical and non-medical workforce can be found on the NHS Education for Scotland (NES) website on the following link: NHS Scotland workforce | Turas Data Intelligence