Chamber and committees

Housing benefit policy is reserved to the UK Government. Our position is that only independence will provide the Scottish Government with effective control over welfare matters. However we have made our concerns about the impact of the UK Government’s under occupancy restrictions on fostering clear to the Department for Work and Pensions. We have also asked that kinship carers be recognised as a distinct group within the UK benefits system.

I refer the member to the answer to question S4W-05614 on 9 March 2012. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

It is for each Partnership to decide how to disburse Early Years and Reshaping Care Change Fund resources locally.

The Scottish Government is providing £900k over the period 2012-2015 to support the third sector to play a key role in the Reshaping care Change Fund programme. The Joint Improvement Team (JIT) has undertaken a mid-year review of 2012-13 Reshaping Care Change Plans, and will report its findings to the Delivery Group on Health and Community Care in due course.

The third sector is also a key partner in the Early Years and Early Intervention Change Fund - providing £272m over the period of the spending review. They are members of the Early Years Taskforce and partners in the Early Years Collaborative, launched on the 1 October, a multi-agency, local, quality improvement programme at a national scale.

Whilst all allocations of Early Years Change Fund resources will have some impact on the third sector, £15m for PlayTalkRead, Bookbug, Play and Communities and Families Fund between 2012-2015 will be allocated solely to the third sector.

Our Lead Clinician, on Chronic Pain and the National Chronic Pain Steering Group have been working with NHS National Services Division (NSD) to review the current provision of specialist residential pain management services. Options for the future provision of these services, including the potential for a service based in Scotland, will be considered at a meeting scheduled with NSD in early December.

I refer the member to the answer to question S4W-05615 on 9 March 2012. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

I refer the member to the answer to question S4W-09292 on 11 September 2012. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

I am advised that, as at 7 November, four patients have been treated by the national transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) service in Edinburgh. Patients have been referred by three NHS boards.

The national TAVI service expects to carry out around 50 TAVI procedures each year, and will continue to consider referrals from across Scotland.

The Care Inspectorate can cancel registration of a care service in a number of scenarios. It has the power to withdraw registration from care homes where it has served an Improvement Notice and this has not been complied with within the period specified in the Notice. It can also cancel registration of a service where the person providing the registered care service ceases to provide the service. Since1 April 2011, 1 registration of a care service was cancelled during the period 2011-12.

The recently published Benchmarking report on the provision of chronic pain services shows that 75% of the adult population now have access to pain management programmes. There are a small number of boards which do not currently have PMP’s in place.

The National Chronic Pain Steering Group is working with Boards to assist in the planning and development of services and encouraging Boards to work with stakeholders to provide services that meet the needs of their resident populations. This includes consideration of services provided by voluntary organisations, such as the self management courses run by the Pain Association Scotland.

Estimates of the numbers of adults and children usually resident in each Scottish health board area at 30 June 2011 are given in the following table.

Estimated Population of Scotland, mid-2011

Estimates of the population by sex and single year of age are published annually by National Records of Scotland and are available for NHS boards and other geographies on their website at:

http://www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/statistics/theme/population/estimates/index.html.