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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: S5W-23329

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 22 May 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 4 June 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how many continence (a) specialist nurses and (b) advisers there have been working in the NHS in each year since 2014.

Continence specialist nurses can be found under the continence specialty in the Clinical Nurse Specialist (CNS) table published on the ISD website available here: ‎ https://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Workforce/Publications/2018-12-04/Clinical_Nurse_Specialists_S2018.xls .

The whole time equivalent for the continence clinical nurse specialists by board since September 2014 can be seen in Table 1.

ISD Scotland data on CNS categories is incomplete because of data quality concerns in a number of NHS Boards, ISD Scotland is working with these NHS Boards on their concerns. The CNS data for the following nine NHS Boards (NHS Ayrshire & Arran, NHS Borders, NHS Fife, NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde, NHS Highland, NHS Lanarkshire, NHS Lothian, NHS Tayside and State Hospital) has been omitted from published data for September 2018. The * in Table 1 represent omitted data.

Table 1: Whole Time Equivalent for Continence Clinical Nurse Specialists as at
‎ 30 September each year from 2014.

NHS Board	2014	2015	2016	2017	2018
NHSScotland	19.0	19.8	17.2	19.5	*
NHS Borders	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	*
NHS Fife	1.0	1.0	1.0	1.0	*
NHS Lothian	3.7	3.7	3.7	3.7	*
NHS Highland	1.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	*
NHS Grampian	1.0	1.0	1.0	2.9	2.9
NHS Orkney	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
NHS Tayside	1.0	1.0	1.0	0.4	*
NHS Western Isles	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
NHS Shetland	1.0	1.0	1.0	0.4	0.4
NHS Ayrshire & Arran	1.6	1.6	1.0	1.0	*
NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde	7.9	8.0	6.0	7.7	*
NHS Lanarkshire	0.9	0.9	0.9	0.9	*
NHS Forth Valley	0.0	1.7	1.7	1.6	1.6
NHS Dumfries & Galloway	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0

Information on continence ‘advisers’ is not held centrally by ISD.

As well as working with Boards on data quality, ISD Scotland is also reviewing the CNS definition, role and specialty categories and has confirmed that it intends to recommence the publication of CNS data in December 2019.

The Scottish Government will continue to work with ISD Scotland and NHS Boards to ensure improved recording.

Further notes:

? Further information on the statistics, including information on how the data are collected and notes to aid interpretation, is given in the 'FAQs' section of the Workforce Statistics website at http://www.isdscotland.org/workforce/ .

Question reference: S5W-23330

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 22 May 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 4 June 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what action NHS boards have taken in relation to point 6 of the joint letter of 17 August 2018 to boards from the Chief Medical Officer and Chief Nursing Officer to ensure that patients are "reassessed regularly to ensure that the care they are receiving remains the most appropriate for their needs".

NHS Boards regularly reassess continence patients' needs, with the reassessments undertaken by dedicated Bladder and Bowel Teams or community nursing staff. This ensures that patients' needs are met, either through treatment or provision of appropriate containment products. Referrals can also be made by patients' GPs where necessary.

An Excellence in Care Working Group is currently considering a key performance indicator (KPI) relating to continence management, which would include both the initial patient assessment and subsequent reassessments.

Question reference: S5W-23328

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 22 May 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 4 June 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how many nurses have been trained to deliver training for patients on the use of intermittent self-catheterisation (ISC).

Question reference: S5W-23339

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 22 May 2019
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 29 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the to answer to question S5W-2124 by Fiona Hyslop on 1 February 2019, by what date in 2019 it will publish its Culture Strategy for Scotland.

Question reference: S5W-23111

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 13 May 2019
Current Status: Answered by Ash Denham on 22 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how it supports local authorities in taking action to make people feel safer when walking at night.

We know from Scottish Household Survey and Scottish Crime and Justice Survey data that the majority of people in Edinburgh, and across Scotland, feel safe in their local area and around their home at night; and that the proportion of adults in Scotland feeling safe has increased in the last decade.

The Scottish Crime and Justice Survey shows that in 2017-18, the vast majority of adults in Scotland (77%) felt very or fairly safe walking alone in their local area after dark and that 96% of adults felt very or fairly safe alone in their home at night. On both counts demonstrating an increase in feeling safe within Scotland’s communities since 2008-09.

The Scottish Government supports the Scottish Community Safety Network to champion community safety across all 32 local authorities in Scotland. This includes providing advice and support, networking and training events for local practitioners.

The Scottish Government also supports and works with a number of partner agencies who are engaged at the local level, including Neighbourhood Watch Scotland (NWS), Crimestoppers, the Violence Reduction Unit and the Scottish Business Resilience Centre who play an important role in offering reassurance to local communities, sharing messages on potential criminal activities, offering advice on keeping safe and encouraging communities to look out for one another.

Question reference: S5W-23107

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 13 May 2019
Current Status: Answered by Kevin Stewart on 21 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-21643 by Kevin Stewart on 27 February 2019, how it will support each group at high risk of homelessness, including those (a) who have experienced domestic violence and (b) with experience of care.

The Homelessness Prevention and Strategy Group agreed an initial scope and approach to the development of the prevention pathways for each group at high risk of homelessness at its meeting on 7 March. Officials will lead sequential work on each pathway initially identified, which will allow key partners to be involved across all relevant pathways. The approach builds on the experience of developing the SHORE standards (Sustainable Housing On Release for Everyone) and is making use of existing understanding of best practice.

Work has begun on a care leavers pathway, with officials from across the Scottish Government partnering to convene a working group of key external stakeholders to develop the detail.

Policy officials have been building internal connections around the prevention pathway for women experiencing domestic violence, ahead of convening key external partners as a working group later in 2019.

Question reference: S5W-23108

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 13 May 2019
Current Status: Answered by Kevin Stewart on 21 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-22703 by Kevin Stewart on 1 May 2019, whether it will provide a breakdown of the other reasons for loss of accommodation.

Question reference: S5W-23109

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 13 May 2019
Current Status: Answered by Kevin Stewart on 21 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how it supports homeless households that have (a) dependent children and (b) pregnant women.

Scotland’s strong homelessness rights ensure that homeless households have a place to stay until settled accommodation is found which meets their needs. The vast majority of homeless households with children and pregnant women are given temporary accommodation in the social rented sector. For others, the Homeless Persons (Unsuitable Accommodation) (Scotland) Amendment Order 2017 provides extra protection to ensure that families and pregnant women do not stay in unsuitable accommodation, such as bed and breakfast accommodation, for more than seven days.

Question reference: S5W-23302

Current Status: Withdrawn

Question reference: S5O-03265

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 May 2019
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 22 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government when it last met representatives of the Edinburgh International Festival.