Chamber and committees

The information requested is not held centrally.

The budget of NHS Quality Improvement Scotland for 2003-04 is £10.231 million.

Our recent White Paper Partnership for Care focuses on listening to patients and involving the public and communities, and on improving the quality of health care. Our proposals involve a range of interventions that may be necessary to ensure that adequate standards and performance are maintained by the NHS in Scotland. These are set out in Chapter 4 of the health white paper Partnership for Care. These include actions by NHS Quality Improvement Scotland to investigate serious service failures and make clear recommendations for remedial action, and action by the Executive to require NHS boards to make immediate changes to remedy serious concerns about patient safety and service quality.NHS Quality Improvement Scotland is a body independent of government and the NHS. It was established on 1 January 2003. The purpose of NHS Quality Improvement Scotland is to improve the quality of health care in Scotland by setting standards and monitoring performance. Standards are reviewed by teams including patients and professionals and NHS organisations are expected to meet the standards laid down by NHS Quality Improvement Scotland. The white paper makes clear that the Executive has arrangements for escalating intervention to address service failures within the NHS. The Executive will also review its powers of intervention and bring forward legislation, if necessary, to ensure that effective mechanisms are in place for the delivery of national standards and priorities.

A consultation paper on A new public involvement structure for NHSScotland was launched on 4 March and includes proposals for how the Scottish Health Council might operate nationally and locally. Copies of the consultation paper are available in the Parliament's Reference Centre (Bib. number 26830).

The budget for the new Scottish Health Council has not yet been determined. However, local health councils received core funding of £1,979,000 from the Scottish Executive in financial year 2002-03.

Improving Health in Scotland - the Challenge was launched today at the third Healthy Scotland Convention held in Edinburgh. I also refer the member to the answer given to question S1W-34705 today. 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.

The overall financial effect of the integration of the Health Education Board for Scotland and the Public Health Institute of Scotland will be cost neutral.

The Executive issued a resource pack with information on occupational health to approximately 77,000 small and medium-sized enterprises in December 2001. This includes guidance on the development of workplace drug and alcohol policies.Scotland's Health at Work (SHAW) provides free policy advice and guidance to help and support organisations to develop health promoting workplaces. SHAW will receive funding of £750,000 in 2003-04 and is targeted with doubling the participation of small- and medium-sized enterprises within its scheme.

Full details about projects funded by the Health Improvement Fund across Scotland, between 2000-01 and 2003-04, is given in the Investment Report Putting the Pieces in Place. This is available from the Parliament's Reference Centre (Bib. number 19606) or from the Scottish Executive website www.scotland.gov.uk.

Information, Management and Technology Strategies are agreed at NHS health board level together with associated local investment plans, which will include provision for systems such as hospital appointments systems. The Health Department intends to investigate with the service new ways of making appointments which will bring a closer involvement for the patient in the appointment process and may involve the use of contact centres for hospitals.