Chamber and committees

Questions and answers

Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for MSPs to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)
Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

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Question reference: S2W-10630

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 September 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 29 September 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive what the year-on-year increase in the recruitment of (a) consultants, (b) doctors and (c) nurses in the NHS will be over the next five years.

Question reference: S2W-10629

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 14 September 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 28 September 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive in which clinical areas there are consultant shortages and what the scale of such shortages is.

Vacancies in any staff group are a normal part of staff turnover. One indication of shortage areas can be derived from hard to fill posts which have been vacant for six months or more.

Table B11 on the ISD Scotland website (www.isdscotland.org/workforce)contains such information by each specialty. It is currently correct to 30 September 2003.

The Scottish Executive has a Partnership Agreement commitment to increase the number of NHS consultants by 600 by 2006.

Question reference: S2W-10632

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 14 September 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 28 September 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-9983 by Malcolm Chisholm on 9 September 2004, what (a) national and (b) local cost pressures have been identified by NHS Argyll and Clyde that are not covered by its allocations from the Executive for 2003-04 and 2004-05.

The Executive issues an overall allocation to NHS boards which aims to give each board its fair share of the resources available nationally. Allocations are not made in relation to specific local or national cost pressures. Instead NHS boards are expected to manage within the overall allocations available supplemented by any other sources of funding.

Given this position, it is not possible to identify specific national or local cost pressures which are not covered by allocations from the Executive. However, as stated in the answer given to question S2W-9983 the basic uplift provided to NHS boards in 2003-04 and 2004-05 is expected to cover all national cost pressures.

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/webapp/search_wa.

Question reference: S2W-10631

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 14 September 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 28 September 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive what action is being taken to reduce the waiting list for audiology treatment in the Lomond Division of NHS Argyll and Clyde.

Whilst local action is a matter for NHS Argyll and Clyde, the Executive is committed to modernising and improving audiology services across NHSScotland. We are investing almost £20 million over the five-year period 2002-03 to 2006-07 to ensure NHS boards are equipped with the necessary facilities, equipment, staff and hearing aids to provide a modernised service.

Each NHS board has its own action plan for modernisation and has therefore reached different stages in the modernisation process.

Question reference: S2W-10168

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 01 September 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 28 September 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive how many rotas covering junior doctors in NHS Argyll and Clyde are compliant with the EU Working Time Directive, broken down by speciality.

We do not hold rota information for junior doctors in training. However, the following table provides details of NHS Argyll and Clyde’s assessment of the number of junior doctors in training who are compliant with the requirements of the Working Time Regulations (WTR), as at 1 August 2004. I hope you find this information useful.

Analysis by Speciality – Argyll and Clyde

Specialty	Number of Doctors in Training¹
WTR Compliant at 16-06-04⁴	Expected to be WTR Compliant at 01-/08-04^2,4	Total
Accident and Emergency	24	24	24
Anaesthetics	10	20	20
General Medicine	48	50	55
Geriatrics	0	5	5
Paediatrics	13	13	13
Obstetrics and Gynaecology	21	21	21
General Psychiatry	9	26	26
ENT Surgery	4	4	4
General Surgery	25	42	46
Ophthalmology	2	2	2
Trauma and Orthopaedic Surgery	0	8	14
Unknown³	5	5	5
Totals	161	220	235
Percentages	68.5%	93.6%	100.0%

Notes:

1. These figures do not include GP Registrars.

2. Figures are board predictions for the number of doctors in training expected to be WTR compliant at 1 August 2004.

3. An unknown rota occurs where the return has provided insufficient information to distinguish which of the above specialities apply.

4. Compliance with the European Working Time Regulations includes working no longer than 58 hours per week, taking a minimum 11 hours rest in a 24 hour period, and receiving four weeks' paid annual leave.

Question reference: S2W-10169

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 01 September 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 28 September 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive how many rotas covering junior doctors in NHS Argyll and Clyde are not compliant with the EU Working Time Directive, broken down by speciality.

We do not hold rota information for doctors in training. However, the following table provides details of NHS Aygyll and Clyde’s assessment of the number of doctors, broken down by specialities who are non-compliant with the requirements of the Working Time Regulations (WTR), as at 1 August 2004. I hope you find this information useful.

Analysis by Speciality – Argyll and Clyde

Specialty	Number of Doctors in Training¹
WTR Non-Compliant at 16-06-04⁴	Expected to be WTR Non-Compliant at 01-08-04²^,4	Total
AandE	0	0	24
Anaesthetics	10	0	20
General Medicine	7	5	55
Geriatrics	5	0	5
Paediatrics	0	0	13
Obstetrics and Gynaecology	0	0	21
General Psychiatry	17	0	26
ENT Surgery	0	0	4
General Surgery	21	4	46
Ophthalmology	0	0	2
Trauma and Orthopaedic Surgery	14	6	14
Unknown³	0	0	5
Totals	74	15	235
Percentages	31.5%	6.4%	100%

Notes:

1. These figures do not include GP Registrars.

2. Figures are board predictions for the number of doctors in training expected to be WTR non-compliant at 1 August 2004.

3. An unknown rota occurs where the return has provided insufficient information to distinguish which of the above specialties apply.

Question reference: S2W-10172

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 31 August 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 28 September 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive what savings have been identified by NHS Argyll and Clyde for 2004-05, broken down also into individual operating divisions and (a) indicating monetary value, (b) shown as a percentage of (i) NHS Argyll and Clyde’s total budget and (ii) the operating division’s budget and (c) shown as a proportion of the population for each division.

NHS Argyll and Clyde have set a savings target of £14 million for 2004-05. These are “real” savings and are in addition to withdrawing all discretionary “developments” from the Local Health Plan.

The savings per division as a percentage of the board’s unified budget allocation are as follows:

	Total Savings (£000)	Budget (%)
Greater Renfrewshire	4,400	0.8
Lomond and Argyll	4,200	0.8
Inverclyde	5,400	1.0
Total	14,000	2.6

The total savings per division cannot be shown as a percentage of each operating division’s budget or as a proportion of the population for each division as this information is not held centrally by the department.

Question reference: S2W-10171

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 31 August 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 28 September 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive which operating divisions of NHS Argyll and Clyde did not meet the budget they were set for 2003-04 and what the level of overspend was in each case.

Question reference: S2W-10170

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 31 August 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 28 September 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive which operating divisions of NHS Argyll and Clyde met the budget they were set for 2003-04.

Question reference: S2W-10165

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 30 August 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 28 September 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive how many people have been transferred from the Vale of Leven, Dumbarton and Helensburgh to receive emergency treatment at a hospital outwith NHS Argyll and Clyde boundaries in the last year.