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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-20394

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 December 2018
Current Status: Answered by Ash Denham on 13 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government plans it has to assess the availability of lawyers that accept legal aid.

Question reference: S5W-20201

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 27 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Clare Haughey on 11 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government whether child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) referrals and rejections are monitored by ethnic group and if (a) so, whether it will provide a breakdown of these for each of the last five years and (b) not, what its position is on whether such data should be collected.

Data is not centrally held by ISD, CAMHS data is submitted by an aggregate return for all therapies by each NHS Health Board. We are unable to split this data by ethnic group.

The Government’s position is that this data should be collected in the future once IT systems allow for this to happen. Better data on ethnicity will help ensure that high quality services are always available to treat mental health problems.

Question reference: S5O-02695

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 December 2018
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 13 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with the UN regarding proposals to raise the internationally-advised minimum age of criminal responsibility to 14.

Question reference: S5W-20153

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Thursday, 22 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 4 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to expand teacher training capacity following the reported over-subscription for STEM teacher training places in higher education institutions.

Each year, the Scottish Government conducts a national teacher workforce planning exercise in partnership with other educational stakeholders. This annual exercise determines the requirement for newly qualified teachers and provides guidance to the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) who are responsible for setting intake targets for initial teacher education (ITE) courses. This process takes into account intakes to ITE courses.

The teacher workforce planning exercise for 2019-20 commenced in Autumn 2018 with the aim of SFC agreeing student intake targets with universities by the end of February 2019.

Question reference: S5W-20003

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 16 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 4 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what information regarding (a) incontinence and (b) pelvic floor exercises is included in Personal Health and Social Education (PHSE) lessons for secondary school pupils.

Curriculum for Excellence is the national approach to learning and teaching for young people aged 3 to 18 in Scotland. It provides significant flexibility, within broad national guidelines, for teachers to develop lessons which best meet the needs of individual learners. The Scottish Government will shortly publish the outcome of the review into personal and social education which will include recommendations that continue to allow teachers flexibility to tailor learning for specific issues, such as lessons about incontinence and the importance of pelvic floor exercises. Teachers, head teachers and other professional educational practitioners are best placed to decide what is taught in Scotland’s schools.

Through Curriculum for Excellence, education practitioners have an important role in equipping all children and young people with the knowledge, skills and understanding they need to keep themselves and others fit and healthy.

Question reference: S5W-20006

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 20 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Joe FitzPatrick on 3 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what information it has regarding how many working days have been lost because of incontinence in each of the last five years, and what the economic cost has been.

Question reference: S5W-20000

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 16 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Joe FitzPatrick on 3 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what guidance and standards the six-week post-natal check is based on.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines (2015) on Postnatal care up to 8 weeks after birth state that, “at each postnatal contact the healthcare professional should ask the woman about her health and wellbeing and that of her baby. This should include asking women about their experience of common physical health problems.” And in relation to the 6-8 week check it states, “At the end of the postnatal period, the coordinating healthcare professional should ensure that the woman's physical, emotional and social wellbeing is reviewed. Screening and medical history should also be taken into account.”

The Child Health Pre-School Clinical Guidelines published by NHS Scotland Information Services Division states that a physical and developmental 6–8 weeks assessment of new-borns is undertaken and recorded jointly by the child’s Health Visitor and GP.

Question reference: S5W-20168

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 23 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Kevin Stewart on 3 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many live homeless applications there were in each local authority area on Christmas Day in each of the last three years, and how many (a) adults and (b) children these related to.

The following table gives the number of live homeless applications at December 25th for each local authority for each of the years 2015, 2016 and 2017.

Local Authority	2015	2016	2017
Aberdeen City	1133	1107	1167
Aberdeenshire	743	748	797
Angus	638	728	752
Argyll & Bute	302	285	335
Clackmannanshire	198	180	232
Dumfries & Galloway	378	286	283
Dundee City	680	539	667
East Ayrshire	133	202	211
East Dunbartonshire	504	518	562
East Lothian	640	686	661
East Renfrewshire	114	149	97
Edinburgh	2387	2648	2961
Eilean Siar	139	133	124
Falkirk	1433	1503	1664
Fife	1140	1154	1187
Glasgow City	3701	3518	3523
Highland	741	835	888
Inverclyde	159	161	174
Midlothian	981	1033	1027
Moray	190	213	205
North Ayrshire	303	311	393
North Lanarkshire	961	904	1008
Orkney	87	103	117
Perth & Kinross	676	307	256
Renfrewshire	274	289	333
Scottish Borders	204	220	288
Shetland	170	152	124
South Ayrshire	168	180	207
South Lanarkshire	1126	1116	1056
Stirling	290	311	364
West Dunbartonshire	354	481	430
West Lothian	822	982	1059
All	21769	21982	23152

In addition, the following table gives the total number of adults and children associated with these applications.

	2015		2016		2017
	Number of adults	Number of children	Number of adults	Number of children	Number of adults	Number of children
Aberdeen City	1250	379	1215	359	1271	366
Aberdeenshire	923	444	941	407	948	410
Angus	745	264	862	309	877	324
Argyll & Bute	365	151	329	138	397	190
Clackmannanshire	216	42	192	45	252	92
Dumfries & Galloway	420	116	312	87	307	104
Dundee City	759	337	596	315	743	368
East Ayrshire	142	33	216	37	228	39
East Dunbartonshire	572	320	596	349	656	384
East Lothian	745	254	816	362	794	363
East Renfrewshire	131	68	166	64	111	52
Edinburgh	2761	1009	3107	1359	3446	1825
Eilean Siar	155	42	143	43	137	65
Falkirk	1677	850	1765	847	1928	919
Fife	1287	657	1346	729	1381	795
Glasgow City	4275	1951	4115	2019	4213	2310
Highland	868	395	994	436	1040	429
Inverclyde	178	35	177	41	187	48
Midlothian	1141	522	1199	610	1182	570
Moray	227	81	251	101	239	94
North Ayrshire	313	23	337	66	435	113
North Lanarkshire	1074	473	1024	430	1158	568
Orkney	104	72	122	71	139	79
Perth & Kinross	767	311	358	223	292	149
Renfrewshire	289	40	309	56	356	83
Scottish Borders	248	105	267	149	338	213
Shetland	196	47	178	38	140	20
South Ayrshire	185	47	191	65	222	43
South Lanarkshire	1272	874	1258	868	1202	881
Stirling	325	120	345	110	402	171
West Dunbartonshire	385	95	514	97	460	118
West Lothian	911	351	1130	528	1265	673
All	24906	10508	25371	11358	26746	12858

Source: HL1 dataset as at 10/05/18

Question reference: S5W-19998

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 16 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 3 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what information regarding (a) pelvic floor exercises, (b) general pelvic health and (c) incontinence is contained in the Baby Box.

Question reference: S5W-20004

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 16 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Joe FitzPatrick on 29 November 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to revise A Healthier Future - Scotland’s Diet & Healthy Weight Delivery Plan to include measures regarding incontinence management.

A Healthier Future: Scotland’s Diet & Healthy Weight Delivery Plan, published in July 2018 following wide consultation with stakeholders, sets out a vision for everyone in Scotland to eat well and have a healthy weight.

The delivery plan has a strong focus on prevention while also recognising that some people need additional support to help them achieve a healthy weight. That is why outcome 3 of the plan makes a commitment to improve access to effective weight management services, as a way of reducing health conditions associated with excess weight.

While there is no specific mention of incontinence in the plan, I am aware of evidence showing that overweight and obesity are strong risk factors for this condition.

People with incontinence issues are therefore likely to be among the service users to benefit from improved access to weight management services.

Given that it is newly published, and that we are now focussed on delivery of the plan’s 60+ actions, we currently have no plans to revise our delivery plan.