Chamber and committees

There is emerging evidence on the use of transcatheter aortic valve implantation, and as agreed at the time of the original decision, I have asked for a further review to be carried out to assess whether this most up to date research provides more robust evidence about the clinical and cost effectiveness of the treatment.

NHS Scotland’s National Planning Forum (NPF) has asked the Scottish Health Technologies Group to provide support to this review. The scope of this review will be to consider the latest published research. This will enable further consideration of its current recommendation on the clinical and cost effectiveness of the treatment. Clinicians from Scottish cardiac centres will also be involved.

The NPF will agree a timescale for this work when it next meets on 1 July 2011.

Scottish Government officials worked with Moray Council, Highlands and Islands Enterprise and other key partners to develop the economic case for retaining the RAF presence at Lossiemouth. This work had cross party political support. The document can be found at:

http://www.moraytaskforce.com/facts-and-figures.html.

Scotland’s ancient Roman sites form part of our rich heritage which is a key asset in our drive to boost tourism and meet industry growth ambitions. Partners are currently looking for opportunities to capitalise on rural heritage tourism by building on a recent report commissioned by Scottish Enterprise entitled Valuing Rural Heritage.

Decisions regarding the provision of NHS services are a matter for NHS boards.

In the case of medicines, all NHS boards have arrangements for clinically-led consideration of Scottish Medicines Consortium “not recommended” medicines for individual patients, including medicines to treat rare diseases. The process for such consideration is known as Individual Patient Treatment Requests and clinicians remain responsible for clinical decisions regarding the care of individual patients.

Information on the number of NHS patients who have received healthcare services through private arrangements under the guidance in document CMO(2009)3 is not held centrally.

Information on the number of NHS patients who have received healthcare services through private arrangements under the guidance in document CMO(2009)3 is not held centrally.

Scottish Government officials worked with Fife Council, Scottish Enterprise and other key partners to develop the RAF Leuchars economic case. This work had cross party political support. The document can be accessed on Fife Council’s website at:

http://www.fifedirect.org.uk/index.cfm

The Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) operates independently from the Scottish Government. Details about the nature of the SMC processes are available at:

http://www.scottishmedicines.org.uk.

The First Minister most recently met with the Secretary of State for Defence in Glasgow on Thursday 26 May 2011. At that meeting the First Minister highlighted the disproportionate nature of any additional RAF withdrawal from Scotland following the decision to close RAF Kinloss and set out on behalf of the Residents Action Force Leuchars and the Moray Task Force the strategic defence, economic and social arguments for the continuation of both of Scotland's remaining RAF bases.

Scottish Government officials have also been in regular contact with the Ministry of Defence regarding the ongoing UK Strategic Defence and Security Review, including making continued and joint representations on behalf of both RAF Leuchars and RAF Lossiemouth.

Our road improvement priorities were set out in the Draft Budget published in November 2010, and brought into effect by the Scottish Parliament’s approval to the Budget Bill on 9 February 2011. The Draft Budget document can be found on the Scottish Government website at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2010/11/17091127/8.