Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government’s decision-making throughout all COVID-19 vaccination programmes has been guided by the expert clinical advice of both the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) and the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).

Scotland has three representatives that attend the JCVI, including its COVID-19 committee and subcommittee; one co-opted member, an invited observer from Scottish Government and another invited observer from Public Health Scotland.

The MHRA’s pharmacovigilance process, alongside wider global data, identified reports of extremely rare adverse events of concurrent thrombosis and thrombocytopenia following vaccination with the first dose of the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine.

As reports of extremely rare adverse event of concurrent thrombosis (blood clots) and thrombocytopenia (low platelet count) following vaccination with the first dose of the AstraZeneca (AZ) COVID-19 vaccine emerged in spring 2021, both the MHRA and the JCVI met to assess the data and the relative balance of benefits and risks.

The minutes from the JCVI COVID-19 Committee on 16 March 2021 and 18 March 2021 show that there was discussion of the topic and that the MHRA was working with international and European colleagues to share data and assess the risk.

The JCVI met again on the 6 April and on 7 April and published advice for the four UK health departments recommending that for adults aged under 30 years of age, without underlying health conditions that put them at higher risk of severe COVID-19 disease, there should be a preference for an alternative to the AstraZeneca vaccine, if available.

The following day on 8 April, Scotland’s Chief Medical Officer (CMO) issued a letter to the Scottish system stating the changes in the use of AstraZeneca vaccine and advising that Health Boards should now offer those under 30 years of age, without underlying health conditions, an alternative to the AstraZeneca vaccine. We also amended our patient information leaflets to reflect this new advice.

The operation of e-gates at the UK Border is the responsibility of the UK Government. There is no role for the Scottish Government in the operational or policy matters relating to the UK Border.

The mental health and wellbeing of children and young people is a top priority for the Scottish Government.

We continue to provide £16 million a year to ensure that every secondary school has access to school counselling services. Our guidance makes clear that local authorities should consider how links between schools, and their local community health and social services, and relevant third-sector organisations can be made to ensure a holistic child-centred approach.

The Scottish Government is also providing local authorities with £15 million per annum to deliver community-based mental health and wellbeing supports and services for children and young people. Our supporting Framework for this funding advocates a whole-system approach and makes clear that community supports and services should work closely with schools to ensure that there are clear and streamlined pathways to support for children and young people, and that local partnerships should be explicit about how different services should work together.

It is a matter for local authorities to decide how services work together in individual areas.

Police Scotland implemented the THRIVE approach as part of the roll out of its Contact Assessment Model (CAM) across 2019/20. THRIVE is used to ensure a consistent response to an incident report by evaluating threat, harm, risk, investigation, vulnerability and engagement. That places the needs of the individual at the centre of the police’s decisions while ensuring that effective prioritisation is in place.

It is vitally important that the Chief Constable has the flexibility to develop her workforce in a way that responds to the challenges she faces by ensuring the right workforce mix. She confirmed to the Criminal Justice Committee on 20 December that the extra £75.7m of resource funding provided by Scottish Government in 2024-25 will enable Police Scotland to bring officer numbers up to around 16,500-16,600. With plans in place to bring in over 1000 new officers this financial year and around 320 having joined since March, she is bringing in the resources that will ensure that frontline policing is prioritised.

The objective of the Housing (Scotland) Bill as introduced to Parliament on 26 March 2024 is to deliver a package of reforms which will help ensure people have a safe, secure, and affordable place to live. If passed by Parliament, the Bill will enable the delivery of our commitments which include longer-term private sector rent controls; duties aimed at the prevention of homelessness; and supporting social rented sector tenants experiencing domestic abuse.

On the specific issue of properties being habitable and well ventilated, all rented homes in Scotland must already meet the minimum Tolerable Standard which includes elements that require housing to be free from damp and have adequate ventilation. Social rented homes are also required to meet the Scottish Housing Quality Standard.

If landlords fail to comply, tenants can escalate complaints to the Scottish Public Sector Ombudsman. In the private rented sector, landlords are required by law to comply with the Repairing Standard. Where the minimum standards are not being met, tenants can apply to the First Tier Tribunal (Housing and Property Chamber) for a determination.

The Hospital Based Complex Clinical Care guidance was introduced in Scotland on 1 June 2015 following a review of NHS continuing care. A key aim was to ensure that anyone who needs to be in hospital for a longer period of time is to get them well enough to return to whatever setting is most suitable for them in the community while ensuring that all health and social care needs are supported.

Ministers and Officials meet regularly with Health and Social Care Partnerships (HSCPs), NHS Boards, Local Authorities and CoSLA to discuss a wide range of activity, including performance and hospital discharges. The whole health and social care system is working hard to support people out of acute settings and back into the community when it is clinically safe to do so. This includes ensuring that everyone is discharged from hospital without delay, and we are working to improve discharge planning through our Discharge Without Delay Programme (DwD) which aims to improve the patient journey, from the initial point of a hospital stay, preventing any delays through early and effective planning.

While the challenge is highly complex, ever shifting and dynamic, the foundations of DwD are based on simple patient centred principles which aim to enhance discharge and prevent delay, through early and effective planning, limiting hospital stays to what is clinically and functionally essential, and getting patients home at the earliest, safest opportunity.

The Scottish Government has also developed statutory guidance for Health Boards, Local Authorities and Health and Social Care Partnerships on effective discharge planning and carer engagement, Summary - Carers (Scotland) Act 2016: statutory guidance - updated July 2021 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) . We have also funded Health Improvement Scotland to improve practice on carer involvement across health, with a focus on carer involvement in hospital discharge.

This data is not held centrally by the Scottish Government but VisitScotland’s data shows that footfall to iCentres has decreased significantly over several years. The decrease from 2019 to 2023 ranges from 16% to 57% across 25 locations.