Questions and answers

Chamber and committees

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 ��˿�� 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-14072

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 25 January 2018
Current Status: Answered by Aileen Campbell on 5 February 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to roll out human papilloma virus (HPV) primary screening, and what discussions it has had with (a) NHS boards, (b) charities and (c) other stakeholders��regarding this.

Implementation of HPV primary screening is underway and is expected to be introduced to the Scottish Cervical Screening Programme during 2019-20.

The Full Business Case (FBC) for the introduction of HPV primary screening was developed in consultation with a range key stakeholders including experts and professionals from across the Cervical Screening Programme. The FBC was also shared and approved by NHS Board Chief Executives and the Scottish Screening Committee

Stakeholders, including NHS Boards and charities, are represented on a number of working groups supporting implementation.

Question reference: S5W-14081

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 25 January 2018
Current Status: Answered by Aileen Campbell on 5 February 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many cases of clostridium difficile (C.Diff) have been reported within a community/home setting in each year since 1999.

Question reference: S5W-14087

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 25 January 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 2 February 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what information it has regarding how many GP (a) phone and��(b) video call consultations��there have been��in each year since 1999, broken down by NHS board.

This information is not held centrally by the Scottish Government. The use of GP phone and video call consultations is a local decision made by NHS Boards and their contractors. Once the new GMS Contract is introduced GP practices will provide agreed information on consultation rates, consultation types, health care professional being consulted and complexity within consultations. This will be done using the Scottish Primary Care Information Resource (SPIRE) electronic extraction unless the practice wishes to collect the information itself.

Question reference: S5W-14100

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 25 January 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 2 February 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many patients��with terminal conditions have not had a��Patient Care Plan in each year for which information is available, broken down by NHS board, and what advice it provides to GPs regarding these plans.

This information is not centrally held.

Our Strategic Framework for Action on Palliative and End of Life Care, which was published in December 2015, emphasised the importance of people having care plans in place to enable those who would benefit from palliative and end of life care to get access to it.

The Scottish Government wrote to all GP services in September 2017 to note the importance and value of fully completing Key Information Summaries to support person centred anticipatory care planning.

Question reference: S5W-14027

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 23 January 2018
Current Status: Answered by Maureen Watt on 2 February 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the comment by the First Minister in its news release of 17 January 2018, Ambition on Human Rights,��that�� "it is vital we are not complacent and continue��to push ourselves to do more to ensure human rights are embedded in everything we do",��whether it considers��that its mental health legislation takes full account of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and, if not, what action it is taking to amend this.

Scottish mental health and incapacity legislation is based on rights and principles. Our mental health legislation promotes patients’ rights and provides safeguards which include that any function should be carried out for the maximum benefit of the patient, with the minimum necessary restriction on the freedom of the patient and having regard to the views of the patient.

Our legislation is compliant with the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) and has never been found, in part or in whole, by the European Court of Human Rights to be incompatible with the Convention. In addition, the Human Rights Act 1998 ensures that every public authority in Scotland is obliged to act compatibly with the Convention and enables human rights cases to be taken in domestic courts.

We have recently implemented the Mental Health (Scotland) Act 2015 and are undertaking a range of work through the Mental Health Strategy to move forward Scottish mental health and incapacity legislation.

During the passage of the 2015 Act, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities was influential. For example, measures were taken to strengthen the provisions in the existing 2003 Act. These promote supported decision making so that users are able to exercise their capacity. This includes:

• more autonomy for patients in the right to have a named person (often a relative or friend);

• promoting the right to make an advance statement setting out what treatments they would or would not like to be given; and

• promoting the right to support from an independent advocate.

The Scottish Government is working with partners including the Mental Welfare Commission, the Office of the Public Guardian and professional and human rights bodies to develop changes to the Adults with Incapacity Act (2000) in relation to deprivation of liberty, and to assess compliance with UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. A full public consultation on reform of the Adults with Incapacity legislation has just been launched.

We have also commenced the review to consider how the provisions of the 2003 Act fulfil the needs of people with learning disability and autism.

Question reference: S5W-13669

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 04 January 2018
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 2 February 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how much the Baby Box scheme will cost in 2018-19, in light of FOI response FOI/17/02557, which states it will cost £8.8 million, and its��Draft Budget, which states the budget��is £8 million.

Question reference: S5W-13668

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 04 January 2018
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 2 February 2018

To ask the Scottish Government for what reason the Baby Box scheme is mentioned in the Education and Skills section of its Draft Budget while the £8 million budget is shown in Level 4 of the Health and Sport budget.

Question reference: S5W-14086

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 25 January 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 2 February 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many hospitals in each NHS board��have been in crisis bed-management mode in each month since April��2007.

Crisis bed-management mode is not a term that the Scottish Government recognises. Each hospital site have a management system in place for capacity and would relate this to escalation procedures as required. We have issued guidance on improving management of whole system capacity through improved communication in morning safety flow huddles.

Weekly official statistics are published on emergency department activity and performance in Scotland, which is a good whole system marker. These reports are available on the Information Services Division (ISD) website:

In partnership with Health Boards and the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges, the Scottish Government produced emergency department capacity management guidance through the 6 Essential Actions programme which offers a framework of escalation to proactively manage and prevent crowding in Emergency Departments and/or assessment areas.

Question reference: S5W-14092

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 25 January 2018
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 2 February 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how��many social care employees��from the EU are employed by each local authority, also broken down by what percentage of staff this represents.��

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Question reference: S5W-14058

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 24 January 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 2 February 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-13734 by Shona Robison on��18 January 2018, in light of reports that NHS Lothian estimates that it requires��£26 million to improve facilities, whether it will provide a breakdown of how��the cabinet secretary calculated it as being £15 million.

As previously stated, the Scottish Government is planning on allocating additional funds to support these plans and the current estimate is that NHS Lothian will require an additional £15 million to deliver this project. This estimate is based on advice received direct from NHS Lothian, following an extensive process to prioritise service requirements against available capital funding. The Scottish Government will continue to engage direct with NHS Lothian and additional funding assumptions will be updated as their plans develop.