- Asked by: Alexander Burnett, MSP for Aberdeenshire West, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 11 February 2022
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Current Status:
Answered by Maree Todd on 28 February 2022
To ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking to ensure that people are still able to access community defibrillators, that require an access code sent to a mobile phone, during times when mobile phone networks are down, such as during the recent storms Arwen, Malik and Corrie.
Answer
The Out of Hospital Cardiac Arrest (OHCA) Strategy 2021 to 2026 , recognises the importance of defibrillation within the chain of survival. The strategy outlines a number of actions to ensure that Public Access Defibrillators (PADs) are mapped, maintained and accessible to the public.
If a PAD is stored in a secure, passcode-protected cabinet and is registered on the National Defibrillator Network (The Circuit), the security code to access the PAD cabinet will be held by the Scottish Ambulance Service (SAS). This security code will be verbally provided to any member of the public that requires access to the cabinet. The code is not texted or transmitted to the caller’s mobile device.
In the event that the mobile network is down, as a consequence of poor weather conditions, and a member of the public requires access to a locked PAD cabinet, they should endeavour to contact the Scottish Ambulance Service via an available landline or public telephone.
We would recommend that defibrillator guardians follow the advice of the Resuscitation Council of the UK (RCUK) and consider placing their defibrillators in an unlocked cabinet in order to make them as accessible as possible. Further information is available at: https://www.resus.org.uk/about-us/news-and-events/consensus-statement-aed-cabinets.
- Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 11 February 2022
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Current Status:
Answered by Humza Yousaf on 28 February 2022
To ask the Scottish Government how many staff in each NHS board have taken early retirement, and what the total cost was of those early retirement packages, in each year since 2007.
Answer
I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-06508 on 28 February 2022. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at: https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers .
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Friday, 11 February 2022
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Current Status:
Answered by Humza Yousaf on 28 February 2022
To ask the Scottish Government (a) how and (b) when the outcomes of the Scottish Ambulance Service's demand and capacity review will be implemented.
Answer
Since agreement of phased funding, SAS have been actively recruiting staff at pace and increasing vehicles on the ground on a transition basis into priority locations across the country. Seven additional satellite stations have already been established, with a further three still to be established, enabling resources to be spread across busy urban areas to better match patient demand.
Alongside this, the service having been working in partnership to design new rosters. SAS are expecting new rosters to be implemented in April 2022 for the majority of locations across the East and North Regions. The West Region full implementation is expected to be concluded by the end of July.
Recruitment for phase 3 of the review has commenced and will enable SAS to increase their establishment by a further 162 staff as well as further increase our station locations and vehicles on the ground.
- Asked by: Sharon Dowey, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 11 February 2022
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Current Status:
Answered by Angus Robertson on 28 February 2022
To ask the Scottish Government for what reason it reduced the budget under the heading, National Records of Scotland, by £3.7 million in its Budget for 2021-22, compared with 2020-21.
Answer
The budget for National Records of Scotland is made up from two elements. The core budget for service delivery and the programme budget for Scotland’s Census. The Census Programme budget runs to 2024/25 with peak spend in the years around Census day. Scotland’s Census 2022 ‘goes live’ on 28th February, with Census day being 20th March 2022. Throughout the lifecycle of the Census Programme the budget requirement has fluctuated year on year in line with the requirements to deliver this key digital programme. Over the last two years the budget allocation to NRS for the Census Programme element has been £38.4m and £35.1m for 2020-21 and 2021-22 respectively.
While the Census Programme budget allocation has reduced over the last two years, reflecting requirements for spend, the remainder of the resource funding allocated to NRS, which funds the core operating costs of the organisation, have not seen a similar reduction. Funding for NRS core operating costs has remained stable across the two years.
- Asked by: Sharon Dowey, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 11 February 2022
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Current Status:
Answered by Kate Forbes on 28 February 2022
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on how much of the £375 million committed to support businesses impacted by COVID-19 has been allocated, and whether it will provide a breakdown of how it has been distributed.
Answer
All of the £375 million identified by the Scottish Government to provide businesses with support has now been allocated, including underspend from some of the funds, where business demand has been less than initially forecast.
I wrote to all MSPs in January to provide an update on how the initial £276 million of the £375 million Omicron business support package had been allocated.
On 10 February, I set out how a further £39.5 million of the funding package would be allocated, and on 21 Feb we announced the £80m Covid Economic Recovery Fund for local authorities to support local economies and cities recover from the pandemic.
As with all our previous business support funding, we are publishing management information on the funding paid out to businesses from this support package on a weekly basis.
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Friday, 11 February 2022
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Current Status:
Answered by Humza Yousaf on 28 February 2022
To ask the Scottish Government how the experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic have been taken into account in the Scottish Ambulance Service's demand and capacity review.
Answer
The Scottish Ambulance Service continues to provide data each year to Operational Research in Health (ORH) to continually update the model. This enables resourcing requirements to be modelled each year to take account of changes in the data and wider health and social care system, therefore the most recent modelling includes the impact of COVID 19.
- Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 11 February 2022
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Current Status:
Answered by Humza Yousaf on 28 February 2022
To ask the Scottish Government how many staff in each NHS board have (a) been made redundant and (b) taken voluntary severance, in each year since 2007.
Answer
I refer the member to the answers to question S6W-06508 on 28 February 2022. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at: https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers .
- Asked by: Craig Hoy, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 11 February 2022
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Current Status:
Answered by Humza Yousaf on 28 February 2022
To ask the Scottish Government how many service user complaints have been brought against each NHS board, how many of those complaints were upheld, and how much was paid in compensation from those complaints, in each year since 2007.
Answer
- Asked by: Sharon Dowey, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 11 February 2022
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Current Status:
Answered by Neil Gray on 28 February 2022
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide details of the review process of its development programmes and small grants programmes in Malawi, Zambia, Rwanda and Pakistan.
Answer
Again, I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-35666 of
3 March 2021 which sets out in detail the review process of the development and small grants programmes in Malawi, Zambia, Rwanda and Pakistan undertaken by the Scottish Government. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at
https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers
- Asked by: Monica Lennon, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Friday, 11 February 2022
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Current Status:
Answered by Maree Todd on 28 February 2022
To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to lower the age for bowel screenings, and what assessment it has made of recent research and practice, including the US Preventive Services Task Force B-grade recommendation for screening for colorectal cancer in adults aged 45 to 49.
Answer
The Scottish Government will only make plans to introduce any changes to the eligible age range for the bowel screening programme in Scotland if this is recommended by the UK National Screening Committee (UK NSC).
The UK NSC advises Ministers and the NHS in the 4 UK countries on all aspects of screening. The Committee’s recommendations are based on the latest evidence and agreed criteria for appraising the viability, effectiveness and appropriateness of a screening programme.
The current age ranges for the Scottish Bowel Screening Programme are based on the 2018 recommendation that screening for bowel cancer using the faecal-immunochemical test should be offered every 2 years to men and women between the ages of 50 and 74 in the UK.
The Scottish Government continues to stress that it is important at any age to be aware of the signs and symptoms of cancer, and to report any concerns to a GP Practice so that these can be investigated.
