Chamber and committees

The consultation paper on the delivery of court services in the Peebles area is currently being finalised and should be issued by the end of September. It will be circulated to a wide range of bodies and individuals who have expressed an interest in this topic, including the judiciary, local magistrates, court users such as local solicitors as well as statutory authorities such as Borders Council, Lothian and Borders Police and the Procurator Fiscal Service. Copies of the consultation paper will also be sent to local members of the Scottish and UK Parliament. In addition copies will be made available at the Sheriff Clerk's office in Peebles and Selkirk for the public.The duration of the consultation period will be a minimum of 12 weeks from date of issue. The paper will contain statistical information on the wide range of business transacted at the court in addition to information on court sitting times.

The information requested is not held centrally. I refer the member to the answer given to question S1W-28957 today. All answers to written PQs are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/search_wa.

The Executive has been aware of the issues relating to constraints on water and waste water infrastructure for some time. A number of meetings were held earlier this year with representatives of the house building industry, the then water authorities, representatives of local authorities, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency and the Water Industry Commissioner, to explore the way forward.In the first instance, however, this is an operational matter for Scottish Water. I am aware that they have been undertaking a significant amount of work in past months following the meetings referred to, to review their whole investment programme. This work has been necessary to inform them better about the investment required to ease such constraints across Scotland, and about its prioritisation.When this work is completed, I understand that Scottish Water intend to arrange meetings with local authorities to discuss their findings.

The Cryptosporidium Directions required Scottish Water to carry out a risk assessment on all its supplies and introduced sampling appropriate to the assessed risk. The Drinking Water Quality Regulator (DWQR) audits the requirements of the directions annually. Following the recent events in Glasgow and Edinburgh I have asked the DWQR to carry out a review of the detailed workings of the directions. The outcome of this review will be available in about two months. In the meantime, my initial assessment is that the investment priorities for 2002-06 given in the Quality and Standards paper published in August 2001 were broadly correct.

Yes. The Scottish Court Service will be consulting with Lothian and Borders Police on the options for future provision of court services in Peebles.

Provision of a police station at Peebles is a matter for Lothian and Borders Police. I am not aware of any proposals for upgrading or refurbishing the police station at Peebles nor of any plans for building a combined police station and courthouse at Peebles. No combined police station and courthouse have been built elsewhere in Scotland in recent years.

I have asked Tony Cameron, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service to respond. His response is as follows:The readily available information is shown in the following table.

Date	Staff in Post	%Age
1 April 1999	250	102
1 August 1999	247	100
1 December 1999	246	99
1 April 2000	246	99
1 August 2000	248	100
1 December 2000	245	99
1 April 2001	239	97
1 August 2001	244	99
1 December 2001	254	99
1 April 2002	278	107
1 August 2002	269	103

I have asked Tony Cameron, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service to respond. His response is as follows:Well defined support systems are in existence within the prison to identify and support those with mental health needs. This includes the assessment of all admissions by a Registered Mental Health Nurse and four sessions per week contracted psychiatric provision (supplemented by registrars). Extensive links exist with mental health teams in the community and locally a co-ordinated mental health referral/multidisciplinary team approach is in place.

I am aware that there is a need for increased dialysis clinics, and provision of increased support services in the Borders.I am pleased to learn that the capacity to treat such patients in the Borders will increase from early October, and that a full Review of Renal Service in the Borders is about to take place. The review will report to Borders NHS Board in time to feed into the 2004-05 financial plan. An initial meeting is to take place in early October.

I have asked Tony Cameron, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS) to respond. His response is as follows:The increased pressures on Cornton Vale have been caused by numbers rising markedly above the available capacity of the establishment.Procedures are in place which identify women with serious medical conditions and exclude them from cell sharing. Access times to toilet facilities are being monitored during patrol periods and an additional member of staff has recently been allocated to the night shift to cope with increased demand. The SPS have announced the conversion of Darroch Hall at HM Prison Greenock to house women prisoners. This will ease overcrowding at Cornton Vale. This will be in addition to the creation of an open prison facility in the SPS houses adjacent to Cornton Vale which will also help ease pressures.