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Links workers undergo a robust selection process to ensure they can work autonomously, are able to work with patients who have complex issues and prevent issues from being bounced back to the GP. The existing Links Workers funded by the Scottish Government come from a range of backgrounds including community development, nursing and some have counselling qualifications. Training and learning needs are included in their personal development plans and reflect the needs of the patients that Links Workers find themselves working with. This may include ASIST, Safetalk, Scotland’s Mental Health First Aid, motivational interviewing as well as other mandatory training.

The requirements and content of the GP training curricula is a matter for the Royal College of General Practitioners, and is approved by the General Medical Council as regulator of the medical profession. This approach applies to the training requirements of the other health care professions.

The Scottish Government has no plans to seek changes to GP and other Primary Care sector training about ensuring parity of access to treatment between mental and physical health, as current training already emphasises equal importance to mental and physical illness and is not discriminatory. NHSScotland Health Boards together with general practice providers are, responsible for the provision of treatment.

Within this additional funding £15 million has also been made available through the Mental Health Innovation Fund during 2015-18 to develop innovative approaches to delivering mental health services.

The Scottish Government promotes evidence based practice for psychological therapies and has funded NHS Education for Scotland to publish the Matrix, which provides a summary of the information on the current evidence base for various therapeutic approaches and guidance and advice on psychological therapies services. The latest version of the Matrix was published in 2015 and includes a section on the range of treatments available.

The Matrix includes reference to individually tailored interventions drawn from a range of psychological models. The Matrix and the data tables this is based upon are available online at:

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Scotland’s world-leading drugs strategy, the Road to Recovery, focuses on the needs of the individual and provides a range of interventions where needed to support recovery. We are now in the third phase of Road to Recovery – ensuring quality is embedded across all services in Scotland, addressing variations in practice and identifying and addressing areas for improvement. Our strategy aims to ensure that those who need treatment get it as soon as possible and we have developed a set of Quality Principles for individuals accessing alcohol and drug services to ensure that people have access to the highest quality, person centred services to enable and support their recovery.

Prescribers of any medication, to anyone, are required to explain the rationale for prescribing, the benefits, and the side effects.

NICE clinical guidelines [CG28] cover depression in children and young people, and contain guidance on the use of antidepressants. Information about known-side effects of prescribed medication can be found on the website of the Medicines And Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, at .

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring all patients receive timely access to cancer tests and diagnostics. The funding identified in ‘Beating Cancer: Ambition and Action’ will ensure additional diagnostic, scope, imaging and treatment capacity is made available to everyone with a suspected and/or cancer diagnosis.

Our ‘Beating Cancer: Ambition and Action’ strategy and the accompanying £100 million investment over 5 years, serves as a blueprint for the future of cancer services in Scotland, improving the prevention, detection, diagnosis, treatment and aftercare of people affected by all cancers. This work links with our tobacco control strategy and the Prevention of Obesity Route Map as we know that smoking and obesity are two of the biggest risk factors for renal cancer.

Transport Scotland is developing a new ITS Strategy for the next ten years which will set out how we continue to efficiently use and develop technology solutions to enhance road capacity and operations on the Scottish Trunk Road Network. The strategy will support the objectives of the National Transport Strategy and the Strategic Road Safety Plan and will build on the active traffic management systems already in use, for example, as part of the Forth Replacement Crossing project.

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (UNCRPD) requires governments to take action to remove barriers to independent living and enable disabled people to enjoy real freedom, dignity and equality. It is the framework that the Scottish Government uses to improve the lives of disabled people and deliver change.

In 2015 we published a draft action plan for consultation setting out how we will implement the UNCRPD (2016 to 2020) which commits us to taking practical actions across all areas of Government to make changes for disabled people. We are strengthening and developing the plan on the basis of the consultation responses and will publish the final Disability Action Plan in December 2016.

As part of the draft plan the Scottish Government committed to consulting on the Scottish Law Commission’s review of Adults with Incapacity (AWI) legislation with particular reference to issues around deprivation of liberty and thereafter to carry out a scoping exercise in relation to a wider review of AWI legislation. That consultation has concluded and the Scottish Government is now actively engaging with service users and stakeholders to determine the focus for areas of reform.

During the passage of the Mental Health (Scotland) Act 2015, the UNCRPD was referenced for example through measures taken to strengthen the provisions in the Mental Health (Care and Treatment) (Scotland) Act 2003 which promote supported decision making such as advance statements and advocacy. The new Mental Health Strategy will be subject to an Equality Impact Assessment.