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The Scottish Government’s policy towards local authorities’ spending is to allow local authorities the financial freedom to operate independently. As such, the vast majority of funding is provided by means of a block grant as part of the annual local government finance settlement. It is then the responsibility of individual local authorities to manage their own budgets and to allocate the total financial resources available to them, including any funding for local authority-funded care home places, on the basis of local needs and priorities, having first fulfilled their statutory obligations and the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities.

The total number of hours of social care provided each year by integration joint boards is not held centrally.

Public Health Scotland publish the Experimental Statistics publication: “Insights into Social Care: Statistics for Scotland” which includes some information on the number of hours of social care provided by different Health and Social Care Partnerships. This includes the number of hours of home care provided by Fife HSCP in each quarter since Q4 2017-18. This release is publicly available via the following link:

https://publichealthscotland.scot/publications/insights-in-social-care-statistics-for-scotland/insights-in-social-care-statistics-for-scotland-support-provided-or-funded-by-health-and-social-care-partnerships-in-scotland-201920-202021/home-care/

ScotRail’s temporary timetable aims to provide the best possible service to as many passengers as possible with the available resources. The major determining factor is driver availability by rostered hours, location and with the necessary competencies, which fluctuates daily.

ScotRail has regularly reviewed the temporary timetable to take account of stakeholder feedback, wherever possible, and changes to driver availability and just recently was able to add additional services. With the positive progress made on pay negotiations with ASLEF, I have tasked ScotRail with reintroducing the previous timetable as soon as possible.

: In way of introduction it may be helpful to provide a general summary of the Scottish Government estate and the approach used in the management of asbestos. For buildings occupied by the core Scottish Government there are 18 owned (Crown) and 47 leased. The Scottish Government also has responsibility for the management of asbestos in these leased properties. Every agency looks after their own estate and are consequently not covered under the auspices of the facility management services contract for the core estate.

The Scottish Government estate comprises buildings and sites that are used to deliver the business of the core Scottish Government. These buildings are primarily offices. The estate includes a small number of other facilities that support the agriculture and marine sectors such as the Bull Stud Farm at Knocknagael, Inverness and Marine Scotland Science fishery research stations around the country. The Scottish Government estate does not include any buildings or sites to which the public have regular access. On occasion, visitors may attend for pre-arranged meetings when they would be accompanied.

Most of the buildings on the core Scottish Government estate were constructed at a time when asbestos was still in use as a building material and have been surveyed. Asbestos Management Plans have been produced where appropriate. This includes an Asbestos register and action plan on how to mitigate any risks from Asbestos Containing Material (ACM). Each case is assessed individually and it is often recommended to be safer to leave asbestos in place than to remove it. Our maintenance contractor regularly inspects areas of known asbestos to confirm that they have not been disturbed. Sometimes asbestos will be removed as part of wider building works. In such cases a refurbishment/demolition survey is undertaken ahead of any works happening. Information is then relayed to the Scottish Government’s Project Management Unit. The safe removal of any known asbestos is then integrated into the Project Delivery Plan.

There are 17 buildings currently known to contain asbestos.

In the last three fiscal years numerous operations have been carried out to remove asbestos from buildings for which the Scottish Government is responsible. This is summarised in the following table:

Public Health Scotland (PHS) uses the national waiting times warehouse to collect electronic patient records covering the waits that patients experience waiting for treatment as an inpatient or day case under the Treatment Time Guarantee. This data source can be used routinely to identify the specialty of treatment. However this information does not provide the level of detail requested.

More detailed information on the procedure(s) that is planned or undertaken for a patient will be held locally by NHS Boards.

Statistics relating to the waits patients experience for inpatient or day case treatment at specialty level are published up to 31 March 2022 and can be found using the link below:

https://publichealthscotland.scot/media/13252/ipdc_may22.xlsx

To date our commitment to provide long-term investment of over £500 million on bus priority infrastructure has taken the form of the Bus Partnership Fund (BPF) and the Bus Priority Rapid Deployment Fund (BPRDF). Both funds aim to support local authorities – in partnership with bus operators – to tackle the negative impacts of congestion on bus services.

In March 2020, the BPF was paused as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. The BPRDF provided funding to local authorities to deliver temporary bus priority measures during the pandemic. The BPF relaunched in November 2020 for proposals for permanent priority measures on local roads. Through BPF, an initial £25.8m of funding has been awarded to eleven partnerships covering 28 local authorities for initial appraisal work to develop ambitious new bus priority infrastructure.

We welcome Leukaemia Care’s report and its recommendations to improve patient outcomes. We are pleased to say that we are closely aligned to the recommendations found in this report. Our Scottish Referral Guidelines for Suspected Cancer, published in January 2019, ensure patients on active monitoring are accounted for in planning cancer care and support primary care clinicians in recognising cancer symptoms, including chronic lymphocytic leukaemia.

We continue to work with health professionals and the Scottish Primary Care Cancer Group to raise awareness of symptoms and promote referral best practice.

Alongside this work, funding of up to £2.5 million has been issued over 2021-22 and 2022-23 to support 12 pilot programmes across Scotland to deliver a single point of contact (SPoC) for cancer patients. This contact will support patients to discuss questions or anxieties related to their clinical care from the point of diagnosis, receive timely and accurate advice on their appointments, test and results, have the chance to discuss what non-clinical support may be available for them and their family following a cancer diagnosis, understand their treatment plan and expected timelines for treatment delivery, self-manage (aspects of) their condition, and access available services as appropriate following discharge.

Additionally, we have worked with the Scottish Cancer Coalition (SCC) to produce a patient leaflet to highlight the work of the charities which are members of the coalition and the support they can provide to patients.

It is not possible to undertake an assessment of the impact on emissions from road vehicles as a direct result of the reduced ScotRail timetable. There is not specific data available on any change in road vehicle kilometres that could be attributed to reduced rail services.

Transport trends data since 16 May 2022 show a fall in rail travel of 14% and an increase in concessionary bus patronage and car use, both by 1% in the same period.

Most Health Boards across NHS Scotland offer fast-track clinics for patients with an urgent suspicion of skin cancer, including malignant melanoma. We are supportive of coordinating tests where possible to support faster diagnosis and improve patient experience, which is why we are developing national optimal cancer diagnostic pathways.

£10 million was released in 21-22 to support the recovery and redesign of cancer pathways, including to support one-stop clinics, with similar levels of investment expected this year.

Meanwhile, we continue to support the Dermatology Consortium that are exploring solutions for the rapid diagnosis of skin cancer in NHS Scotland.

The specification of, and recruitment to staff roles supported by investment through the long COVID Support Fund is a matter for individual NHS Boards.

The Strategic Network for long COVID managed by NHS National Services Scotland is providing support to NHS Boards as they plan and implement service developments.

We are supporting NHS Boards to test the introduction of models of care that will generate learning and benefit the management of other long-term and complex conditions, including Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME).