Chamber and committees

With regard to the reasons behind the rationale for budget reprofiling, the exceptionally challenging financial conditions as outlined in the letter from DFM and Cabinet Secretary for Finance to the Convenor, regarding “Update on 2023 – 2024 In Year Budget Changes” on the 21 November 2023 advise these.

The financial pressures across public services, not just health care, are by far, the most challenging since devolution as a result of rising inflation, and the ongoing impact of Covid and Brexit.

It is therefore necessary to make very challenging decisions, including reprofiling budgets, across Government in order to meet our statutory requirement to deliver a balanced budget.

Our published delivery plan, linked here Care in the Digital Age: Delivery Plan 2023-24 – gov.scot (www.gov.scot), reflects our planned deliverables against the current budget which includes the agreed savings of £11.6m.

The Scottish Government is fully cooperating with both the UK and Scottish Covid-19 Inquiry and is in regular communication with Inquiry teams as required as both a core participant and a provider of material.

The Scottish Government is unable offer a running commentary on the conduct of the UK public inquiry which should be allowed to carry out its investigations and liaison with parties like the Scottish Government as it sees fit.

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that all people living with kidney disease in Scotland are able to access the best possible care and support, and benefit from healthcare services that are safe, effective and put people at the centre of their care.

We expect all NHS healthcare workers in Scotland to follow best practice when providing care for people with kidney disease and we continue to raise awareness of the symptoms, causes, diagnosis and prevention of kidney disease by providing and promoting information on chronic kidney disease for patients and their families on NHS Inform .

We also continue to support the work of the Scottish Renal Registry which promotes excellence in renal care in Scotland including audits on the delivery of renal replacement therapy. The most recent report from registry was published by Public Health Scotland in October 2023 and provides vital information for Health Boards, service managers and individual clinicians to help improve care and standards for people with chronic kidney disease.

The Scottish Government are not seeking to increase the number of plans for individual health conditions and are therefore not developing a national strategy to tackle chronic kidney disease. Rather, we are focussed on how we can best support Health Boards to deliver high quality, value-based, person-centred care for all people, irrespective of condition.

As part of the recently concluded information gathering exercise on the provision of stoma care and stoma specialist nurse coverage across Scotland's 14 territorial health boards, all boards supplied information on the stoma services that they provide, particularly with regard to care for stoma patients once they return home after their surgery. This information will be a key element of the consideration by the Scottish Executive Nurse Directors (SEND) of the results of the exercise.

As part of the recently concluded information gathering exercise on the provision of stoma care and stoma specialist nurse coverage across Scotland's 14 territorial health boards, all boards confirmed that their stoma patients had access to specialist nurse support, whether that be through stoma specialist nurses or other specialisms such as colorectal specialist nurses.

The results of this exercise will be presented to the Scottish Executive Nurse Directors (SEND) to identify any shortfalls and inconsistencies in the level of stoma specialist nursing care provided across the country and the actions that may be needed to address them.

The Scottish Government continues to progress work towards the elimination of cervical cancer in Scotland, in line with the targets set by the World Health Organisation (WHO). This work has included the introduction of a one-dose schedule of the HPV vaccine, increasing screening uptake and continued investment in treatment.

In March 2023, we provided funding to the University of Strathclyde to undertake a project modelling when Scotland might expect to eliminate cervical cancer. That work will help us set a target date for elimination of cervical cancer, and will require further work to improve uptake levels of both the vaccination and screening programmes. To support this we continue to provide £1 million annually to tackle unequal uptake across cancer screening programmes, and this summer, launched the Equity in Screening Strategy, which seeks systemic solutions to inequalities across all programmes. In addition we have provided £456,000 to Jo’s Trust for a project identifying barriers that prevent specific groups attending cervical screening. This learning will be embedded across the screening programme.

Our inclusive vaccination programme is designed to help reduce inequalities in uptake of vaccinations. On 27 th November 2023, Public Health Scotland (PHS) launched a campaign to raise awareness of the vaccines offered in secondary school, including HPV to help boost uptake.

The Scottish Government first established the Covid Inquiries Information Governance Division in July 2021 to support the Scottish Government in promptly responding to requests for information from the both the UK and Scottish Covid-19 Inquiry.

The division then became the Covid Inquires Response Directorate in February 2022 and is part of Director General Corporate. I have portfolio responsibility for the Covid Inquiries response.

I refer the member to the answer to S6W-22410 on 7 November. In addition to the action outlined in the answer, our priority is to do everything we can to help those worst affected by the Cost Crisis which is why, having doubled the Fuel Insecurity Fund last year to £20 million, we have done what we can this year and tripled it to £30 million.