Questions and answers

Question reference: S6W-33231

Asked by: Jackson Carlaw, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 13 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Natalie Don-Innes on 24 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has evaluated what positive or negative impact the Bright Start Breakfasts programme may have on breakfast clubs within schools that are organised by not-for-profit providers for primary school pupils.

The Draft Scottish Budget on 4 December 2024 announced plans to invest £3m in 2025-26 in Bright Start Breakfasts.

At this stage the Budget remains subject to Parliamentary approval and therefore, more detail about Bright Start Breakfasts will be provided ahead of the fund launching in Spring 2025.

Recent mapping work carried out by the Improvement Service and Assist FM shows that nearly half of all primary and special schools in Scotland are already providing breakfasts at the start of the school day, with a range of delivery models and service providers supporting delivery. Bright Start Breakfasts aims to enhance and expand provision across Scotland, building on this existing local delivery.

Question reference: S6W-33222

Asked by: Mercedes Villalba, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 13 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Gillian Martin on 24 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6O-04138 by Gillian Martin on 19 December 2024, and its statement that the new hub for offshore wind "is not going to be a training hub as such", how much of the £150 million of public funding will be used to fund the cost of retraining offshore oil and gas workers to transition to the offshore wind sector.

Offshore wind offers a significant opportunity to create thousands of good jobs in Scotland, and the Scottish Government will drive forward skills development for the sector, including supporting the transition of workers from oil and gas.

We are almost tripling our capital funding to £150 million for 2025-26, year two of our five-year commitment to invest up to £500 million in critical infrastructure and manufacturing and fabrication facilities to support the growth of the offshore wind sector. Our Offshore Wind Focus paper sets out the priorities for investment, underpinned by a strategic assessment of current market opportunities that will have a catalytic effect and maximise the economic value to Scotland.

In addition, we remain committed to our ten-year Just Transition Fund, which has allocated £75 million to date supporting projects and communities across the North East and Moray to create jobs, support innovation, and secure the highly skilled workforce of the future. This involves a dedicated package of skills interventions, including £4.5 million over 5 years for the Energy Skills Transition Hub which aims to support 1,000 people into energy transition roles, £3.7 million for the development of the Energy Skills Passport (an initial version of which was launched by industry partners on 22 January) and £1 million for a National Energy Skills Accelerator pilot scheme to better understand future energy skills needs and deliver workforce training.

Question reference: S6W-33232

Asked by: Jackson Carlaw, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 13 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Natalie Don-Innes on 24 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to integrate the Bright Start Breakfasts initiative with breakfast clubs operated in primary schools by not-for-profit providers.

Question reference: S6W-33153

Asked by: Annie Wells, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 10 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 24 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what its resonse is to reported concerns that elements of the new Parkhead Hub facilities in Glasgow are not a friendly environment for dementia patients.

It is the responsibility of local authorities, health boards and health and social care partnerships to manage and provide appropriate services in their area, and to engage with their communities on how this is provided.

The Scottish Government is committed to improving the dementia experience, and the 10-year Dementia Strategy for Scotland recognises the critical role of community services and supports in enabling people to live well for longer following a dementia diagnosis. We are now working to realise the ambitions of this Strategy through initial activities set out in the first 2-year Delivery Plan. This includes efforts to deliver the SIGN dementia guidelines, which provides evidence-based guidance on where and how care and support should be provided across primary and secondary care settings.

Question reference: S6W-32368

Asked by: Mercedes Villalba, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 06 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 24 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the potential impact on passenger numbers in Scotland, what discussions it has had with National Rail regarding its current Railcard terms and conditions, including that tickets must be bought before boarding the train.

The terms and conditions of all GB-wide railcards are set by National Rail, part of the Rail Delivery Group (RDG) under UK Government rail industry rules. There have been no recent specific discussions concerning changes to railcard terms. ScotRail has confirmed with officials at Transport Scotland that National Railcards can be used to buy tickets online, via the app, or at TVMs. Where ticket purchasing facilities are not available at a station, passengers can use their National Rail card when purchasing a ticket from a member of staff on-board of ScotRail trains.

Question reference: S6W-33397

Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 17 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 24 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-33091 by Ivan McKee on 14 January 2025, for what purposes the (a) heavy goods lorries and (b) light commercial vehicles in its fleet are used.

Question reference: S6W-33334

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 24 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on whether any so-called postcode lottery in neurological care and support provision has been fully addressed through the actions set out in the document, Neurological Care and Support in Scotland: A Framework for Action 2020 – 2025.

The aims contained in the document Neurological Care and Support in Scotland: A Framework for Action 2020 – 2025 are applicable to healthcare delivery across Scotland. Through this we have supported a number of national initiatives to improve care and reduce variation, including:

Self-evaluation by all NHS boards against the General Standards for Neurological Care and Support 2019. Development of national care pathways for headache and Functional Neurological Disorder, with care pathways for further conditions in development
Agreement of a Business Case and funding to adopt the Scottish Epilepsy Register across Scotland, improving the safety and quality of care for people with epilepsy
Development of a neurology nurse specialist competency framework
Formation of collaborative improvement networks which include NHS boards, Health and Social Care Partnerships, third sector organisations and people with lived experience to encourage consistent adoption of the successful approaches funded through the Framework
Development, by third sector partners, of a toolkit for the consistent commissioning of social support for people with epilepsy
Improved provision of public information on individual neurological conditions through the development and/or revision of 23 NHS inform webpages
Through national charities, development of nationally-accessible sources of self-management support for people with MS, spina bifida hydrocephalus, progressive supranuclear palsy, cerebral palsy and non-epileptic seizures
Re-development of the internationally recognised neurosymptoms.org web resource to support people with Functional Neurological Disorder
Dissemination of nationally-accessible clinician education resource for ME/CFS

Question reference: S6W-33316

Asked by: Annie Wells, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 24 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how it is working with law enforcement agencies to tackle the supply of pipes and other paraphernalia used to consume illicit drugs.

We remain committed to reducing harm for individuals from the use of unsafe paraphernalia and will continue collaborating with stakeholders and harm reduction services on this matter.

We acknowledge the risks posed by unsafe, makeshift inhalation pipes, often shared among drug users. We are working closely with Police Scotland, Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, and other law enforcement agencies through the Serious Organised Crime Taskforce to address these issues.

In 2021, the Drug Deaths Taskforce advocated for expanding drug paraphernalia provision for safer consumption and urged the UK Minister for Policing to reconsider legal restrictions. Though initially rejected, Scottish Government officials are engaging with the new UK administration to revisit this matter.

Question reference: S6W-33304

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 24 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on what NHS patient record digitisation projects are being taken forward.

The Digitisation of records is an operational responsibility of individual Health Boards and GP practices.

At a national level, and building on the existing use of electronic patient record systems, we are focussed on allowing medical records to be stored, linked, and shared securely. This will support our ambition set out in the 2021 Digital Health & Care Strategy to make the right information available to all appropriate staff, when and where it is needed.

To achieve this, most Health Boards have a Clinical Portal. This system works across organisational, regional, and national boundaries to provide a timely transfer of information. The key projects to improve the sharing of information within Health Boards and GP Practices is the GPIT Programme, the National Digital Platform, TRAK Care and Clinical Portal.

HEPMA (Hospital Electronic Prescribing and Medicines Administration) is a system that can also replace paper prescribing and medication administration systems within hospitals. It has already been successfully implemented in thirteen Health boards across Scotland with the remainder being progressed. We are also developing the Digital Prescribing and Dispensing Pathways (DPDP) programme which will replace the current paper prescription in Scotland with a digital approach.

The specific actions being taken can be read in the Strategy: https://www.gov.scot/binaries/content/documents/govscot/publications/strategy-plan/2021/10/scotlands-digital-health-care-strategy/documents/enabling-connecting-empowering-care-digital-age/enabling-connecting-empowering-care-digital-age/govscot%3Adocument/enabling-connecting-empowering-care-digital-age.pdf

Question reference: S6W-33332

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 24 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government which NHS boards have not received any direct investment in neurology services since the start of the period covered by the Neurological Care and Support Framework for Action 2020-2025.

All Health Boards in Scotland receiving baselined funding from the Scottish Government toward their neurology services. As part of Planned Care funding, the Scottish Government has also invested £217,000 in total towards improving waiting times in NHS Tayside and NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde.

Through the Neurological Framework, the Scottish Government has given direct investment to numerous territorial Health Boards to undertake projects focusing on neurological care, in line with the Framework’s commitments. Health Boards that have received direct investment are:

NHS Ayrshire and Arran
NHS Forth Valley
NHS Grampian
NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde
NHS Lanarkshire
NHS Lothian
NHS Orkney
NHS Tayside

Third sector organisations have also been awarded funding to work in partnership with a number of statutory organisations to better integrate services, including NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde and NHS Fife. The Migraine Trust has worked in partnership with seven NHS boards to improve treatment for migraine in community pharmacy.

A full list of projects funded through the Neurological Framework can be found here.

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