Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government has today published COVID-19: Scotland’s Strategic Framework. This new Strategic Framework sets out how we will work to suppress the virus and sets out our proposal to move to a strategic approach to outbreak management based on five levels of protection, each with graduated packages of measures to reduce transmission of the virus, that can be applied locally or nationally, according to the evolving patterns of infection and transmission. We will engage with Parliament on the detail of the framework, and put this to a debate and vote next week.

The measures currently in place are due to expire at 6 am on 26 October. In light of the clinical evidence and advice, we have judged that these measures are required for a short additional period, until a levels-based approach can be debated in Parliament and then implemented. Regulations will be made to extend the current measures for a further seven days which will give them a new expiry date of 6 am on Monday 2 November. We will continue to keep the various restrictions under review and will keep the Scottish Parliament updated.

The pandemic has been an extremely challenging time for dentistry and the Government recognises NHS contractor efforts, patience and resilience throughout the period. The Government is committed to ensuring that the needs of patients to be seen for NHS dental treatment can be met, in a way that supports the good efforts of the dental community to maintain the high standards of health and safety needed to minimise the threat from COVID-19.

NHS dental services will be able to return to the High Street dental setting from 1 November to provide patients with access to the full range of treatments for all NHS patients. The Government is clear that this is not business as usual but by making available a full range of treatments for NHS patients, this enables dentists and dental teams to provide a wider range of NHS care for their patients, prioritised by clinical judgement and in line with wider public health protection measures.

The Scottish Government is making available funding of £1.1 billion to support additional COVID pressures in 2020-21. This follows our detailed review of financial implications across the sector, and ensures that frontline health and care services continue to receive the support required throughout this pandemic.

Details of allocations for NHS Boards and Integration Authorities are set out in the following table:

Our health and care system continues to respond magnificently to the enormous challenges brought by the COVID-19 pandemic.

NHS Scotland has begun safely and incrementally resuming some services that have been suspended, delayed or deferred due to coronavirus, whilst continuing to protect emergency, urgent and maternity care, support for social care and continuing to maintain COVID-19 capacity and resilience; in line with Re-mobilise, Recover, Re-design: the Framework for NHS Scotland, published on 31 May.

The reality is coronavirus is likely to be with us for some time to come, and so many changes made in the coming weeks and months have to be measured against the need to keep the virus under control, continuing to protect the NHS and save lives. Health Boards and their planning partners will continue to work on safely resuming services whilst protecting COVID-19 capacity, as informed by the evidence, clinical priorities and associated national frameworks and guidance.

Nonetheless, I am mindful of the challenges that winter is likely to bring over the coming months, including seasonal flu and bad weather. I want to ensure that our health and care services are fully supported across winter, so NHS Scotland will remain on an emergency footing until at least 31 March 2021, at which point I will review the situation again.

As of 10 July, our delivery partner, Sustrans, has awarded a total of £29,603,681 to local authorities and statutory bodies through the Spaces for People programme. We are also considering repurposing a final amount of funding from the active travel budget for additional bids in the pipeline amounting to £8,647,487.

The fund is therefore now closed to further applications. However, I would urge local authorities to continue to discuss proposals for active travel infrastructure with Sustrans as other funding routes and programmes may be appropriate.

I would also like to remind local authorities that the Cycling, Walking and Safer Routes grant distributed to every local authority through the Local Government Settlement, was increased by £15 million pounds this year, to £23.9 million pounds in total and that too should be used for active travel infrastructure.

A breakdown of awards is shown at Table 1

Table 1 Spaces for People awards by Organisation

The Scottish Government has today published COVID-19: Scotland’s route map through and out of the crisis – Update on approach to physical distancing in light of advice from the Scottish Government COVID-19 Advisory Group which provides an update on the approach to physical distancing in Scotland as we move through Phase 2 and Phase 3 of the Route Map. This approach continues to be informed by evidence and has been updated in light of advice from the Scottish Government COVID-19 Advisory Group which has also been published today.

The publication also updates on the final stage of Phase 2 of Scotland’s Route Map. Continued progress in suppressing the virus, as measured by the latest data, means that we are able to confirm the indicative dates for the remainder of Phase 2, concerning relaxation of the 5 mile guidance on travel for leisure purposes, the re-opening of self-contained, self-catering accommodation and the re-opening of outdoor hospitality. Changes to allow children and young-people more opportunity to meet up are also set out.

We are no longer planning to introduce the Restricting Foods Promotions Bill in this Parliament.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact, including on the food and drink and retail industries and on consumer behaviour. It is not yet clear what its long term impact will be. It is important we understand this fully and that we assess the economic and equality impacts of our proposed measures post-pandemic.

Pausing the introduction of the Bill provides us with an opportunity to take stock. It enables us to take into account the impact of the COVID-19 lockdown, including on people’s diet and healthy weight. We will be able to consider fully whether a more wide-ranging Bill is required to tackle Scotland’s diet and weight problem after the pandemic.

Tackling poor diet and overweight is a public health priority and remains a priority for this government. We are taking wide-ranging action to help people make healthier eating choices. As set out in our 2018 Diet and Healthy Weight Delivery Plan, our ambition is to halve childhood obesity by 2030 and significantly reduce diet-related health inequalities.

We remain fully committed to restricting the promotion and marketing of foods high in fat, sugar or salt where they are sold to the public and will seek to progress this measure as soon as it is possible to do so. Work already underway to further improve the evidence base to underpin the proposals will continue. We will also continue to engage with the other administrations in the UK to explore the scope for the possible alignment of policy and legislation.

Coronavirus is a shared challenge and so it is critically important that the Scottish Government works closely with the other UK nations to slow its spread and boost our capacity to respond.

This has resulted in consideration of a number of mutual aid requests for PPE items.

11 million pieces of PPE have been authorised for use in the frontline in Scotland under the 4 Nations Agreement.

On 20 April we agreed to provide 1 million Type 11R Masks to Wales.

On 3 May we received a mutual aid request from England for eye protection items (of any volumes) which we were unable to provide due to low stock levels.

On 12 May we agreed to provide 2 million Type 11R Masks to England.

To note: The 1 million Type IIR masks issued to Wales - Wales returned 1.2million Type IIR masks. The 2 million Type IIR Masks issued to England - these have not yet been returned. SG is arranging for re-supply with DHSC.

Thanks to the significant efforts of National Services Scotland in sourcing and procuring PPE items, Scotland has been able to maintain supplies and meet demand during the COVID-19 outbreak. We, therefore, have not requested any formal mutual aid support from other UK nations.