Chamber and committees

It is for local authorities to determine the charges for community care services, following the appropriate regulations and guidance. Only the resources of the person receiving the services should be taken into account by the local authority within the financial assessment for charging purposes.

The charging rules aim to ensure that people receiving services are only asked to contribute what is reasonable for them to pay towards the costs, taking account of their resources and other financial responsibilities.

COSLA guidance to local authorities on charging for non-residential services encourages them to take account of the possible financial impact on spouses, and dependents, when setting reasonable charges for the individual receiving services.

With regards to residential services, the rule that allowed local authorities to seek a contribution from the spouse or parent of a care home resident, the liable relative rule, was repealed in October 2007. Under the care home charging rules, local authorities have discretion to disregard the value of a property, under certain circumstances, if a former carer continues to live there.

Under the concordat, the Scottish Government is providing local government with £34.9 billion over the next three years, an increase of 13.1% across the period. Significant controls and flexibilities have been devolved to better enable local authorities to respond to local needs and priorities. This includes the need to meet local training requirements to ensure that they have a range of suitably qualified staff in place to support all pupils.

Through the continuing professional development (CPD) framework, the Scottish Government fully expects all teachers to be able to recognise and know how to support pupils with additional support needs, including those with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Additionally, a national CPD team is in place to support a network of local authority CPD co-ordinators to help share best practice. The team has particular expertise in additional support needs.

Following talks with the Scottish Government, the General Teaching Council for Scotland has now added five new areas to their professional recognition framework, one of which is Additional Support Needs - Autism.

The Scottish Government is also undertaking a number of other initiatives to help ensure that trainee teachers, qualified teachers and support staff receive the necessary training to ensure that they have the necessary knowledge and confidence to work with all children, including those with ASD. For example:

The Scottish Teacher Education Committee (STEC) Action Plan “ Framework for Inclusion, a two year action plan to take forward inclusive education in Initial Teacher Education and Continuous Professional Development.

The Scottish Government will soon publish The Autism Toolbox, an autism resource for Scottish local authorities and schools. The toolbox will draw on a range of practice experience, literature and research to support education authorities, and school staff to develop innovative and individualised approaches to teaching pupils with ASD.

Officials met with representatives of Mindroom to discuss their survey on 21 November 2008. During the meeting Mindroom advised that they are not publishing the evidence on which they base the claim in their Policy Agenda that one in six children in Scotland are affected by a recognised learning difficulty. The Scottish Government can therefore not comment on that claim.

Officials have advised Mindroom that they would welcome further discussions with them as their business proposals develop.

I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-17986 on 28 November 2008. 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/Apps2/Business/PQA/Default.aspx.

The Scottish Government is taking a significant number of steps to help support children with dyslexia including the following:

We are developing The Early Years Framework with COSLA, which is about moving from intervention when a crisis happens towards prevention, building resilience and providing the right level of support before problems materialise. The framework will also highlight the need for high quality pre-school and early education provision and support. We are looking to publish the Early Years Framework later this year.

We are supporting the Scottish Teacher Education Committee (STEC) Action Plan “ Framework for Inclusion, a two year action plan to take forward inclusive education in Initial Teacher Education and Continuous Professional Development.

We are currently in discussions with Dyslexia Scotland to undertake work to identify and provide advice on the most effective assessment tools/techniques that would help teachers plan appropriate programmes of support for the learner.

We launched and disseminated last year, the Scottish Government funded University of Edinburgh interactive training DVD to promote dyslexia awareness in secondary schools and help facilitate the transition from primary to secondary school.

Curriculum for Excellence identifies literacy skills as a key theme across the curriculum with all teachers having a role in promoting language and literacy development; it also puts the learner at the heart of everything that we do.

Finally, I would be happy to meet with Ms Baillie to discuss this issue in more detail.

The identification of children with learning difficulties can happen at different stages of a child''s life. Therefore, a number of systems exist to identify and support these children.

Health for All Children (Hall 4) guidance was issued in 2005 and introduced a core programme of screening, surveillance and health promotion activity for every child. The universal core programme of contacts forms the basis of a holistic assessment enabling health professionals to identify the nature of any additional support required on the basis of need.

The Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004 places duties on education authorities to ensure that the additional support needs of all children and young people are addressed. Education authorities are required to identify, meet and keep under review the additional support needs of all pupils.

Through the continuing professional development (CPD) framework, the Scottish Government fully expects all teachers to be able to recognise and know how to support pupils with additional support needs. Teachers should know where to go for specialist support and advice with regard to the educational provision for pupils to ensure that the appropriate assessments, interventions and strategies can be put in place. There is no single best approach.

Later this year the Scottish Government will publish an early years framework in partnership with COSLA (Convention of Scottish Local Authorities). Within the context of the concordat it will be for local authorities and their community planning partners to deliver the outcome that our children have the best start in life and are ready to succeed. It will also highlight the need for high quality pre-school and early school education provision and support.

The Scottish Government is committed to making its information available to all, including disabled people. Public bodies have responsibilities under the Disability Discrimination Act to make reasonable adjustments to enable access to services. Under the Disability Equality Duty, they are also required to have due regard to the need to promote equality for disabled people. We take our duties under the Disability Discrimination Act and Disability Equality Duty seriously, and expect other organisations and public bodies to do so too.

We are currently providing the Scottish Accessible Information Forum (SAIF) with funding of £80,021 per year until March 2011.

This funding will allow SAIF to continue to carry through the recommendations of Enabling Information, a report on improving access and raising standards in information services for disabled people and their carers in Scotland, one of the conclusions of the Scottish Working Group on Information Services for People with Disabilities.

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While there is no central source of data specifically on the number of accessible houses built in Scotland there is information on the number of houses built by local authorities and Registered Social Landlords. As all Scottish Government funded new build is required to comply with Housing for Varying Needs standards this provides some information on the number of new housing which is accessible.

Information on new build in Scotland can be found at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Housing-Regeneration/HSfS/NewBuild.

There is a requirement for Scottish Government funded new build to comply with Housing for Varying Needs standards, which ensures the housing can continue to meet the changing needs of it occupants. This builds upon the concept of barrier free principles, which state that housing and its environment should meet the needs of almost everyone.

More information can be found in the Scottish Government''s Disability Equality Scheme which can be found at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2008/05/22092418/0.

I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-18129 on 27 November 2008. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament''s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search