Chamber and committees

The latest official statistics publication on respite care in Scotland was published on 28 October 2014. This shows that the Scottish Government has achieved its manifesto commitment of maintaining an extra 10,000 respite weeks, relative to 2007-08.

Since 2011, the Voluntary Sector Short Breaks Fund, administered by Shared Care Scotland and the Family Fund has distributed more than £10 million to third sector organisations, with the aim of increasing the availability and choice of short breaks to support carers and those they care for.

The NHS Board Carer Information Strategy funding of nearly £34 million from 2008 to 2016 is, amongst other things, funding the third sector to provide short breaks. This is helping to build and sustain more creative community-based approaches to delivering short breaks provision to meet the needs of carers and service users.

The Carers (Scotland) Bill will place a duty on local authorities to provide support to carers who must consider, in particular, whether the support should include a break from caring. The Bill will also place a duty on local authorities to prepare and publish short breaks services statements. This will help ensure that carers have more information about short breaks services that are available in their area.

In July 2014 the Scottish Government commissioned Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) to develop a learning and development framework for foster carers in Scotland. A large scoping exercise was undertaken to capture existing qualifications and learning and development opportunities already available to foster carers and to seek foster carer and foster care agency views about what the content of a learning and development framework for foster carers in Scotland should include.

The findings of the scoping study have been used by SSSC to develop a draft technical standard which will form the basis for further discussion with its strategic group. The next stage of work will be to develop a comprehensive communications strategy and engage fully with the sector through a series of events. In the meantime a more detailed update can be found at: http://www.gov.scot/Topics/People/Young-People/protecting/lac/foster-care-review

The Scottish Government undertook research on foster care allowances which compared methodologies used across the UK on how levels of fostering allowances were reached. It recommended that further research into minimum income standards be undertaken to examine what additional costs there are in caring for children living in foster care in Scotland. We plan to take forward this work in the wider context of both foster and kinship care.

A recent legal challenge to Scottish local authorities by the Equality and Human Rights Commission about the need for parity to be reached between children living in kinship and foster care has meant that we need to plan a course of action. We will soon be inviting representation from across the sector on to a steering group to represent the needs of children and young people in those care settings.

The Scottish Government recognises the need for all children and young people, including those who are in care, to live in a safe, secure, permanent, nurturing home. Regrettably, we know that too many children and young people in care experience drift and delay leading to multiple placements.

The Scottish Government is working with the Centre for Excellence for Looked After Children in Scotland to deliver our Permanence and Care Excellence (PACE) programme, which brings together partners including local authorities, children’s hearings, health, education and the courts to look at how they can improve systems and practice to deliver permanence more quickly for looked after children and young people. PACE uses improvement methodology to identify and test changes to get rid of drift and delay in the system. It is currently working in Aberdeen City, Renfrewshire and Aberdeenshire and aims to expand to a further four areas in 2015-16.

In response to a recommendation of the national review of foster care the Scottish Government agreed to develop a learning and development strategy that will provide the opportunity for foster carers to work towards a more structured framework of training that also recognises the skills and experience gained by foster carers.

The Scottish Government funded a recruitment seminar held in Glasgow during Foster Care Fortnight in 2013 which was run in partnership with Glasgow City Council and The Fostering Network (TFN). In response to requests from attendees, a quarterly national recruitment and retention forum, hosted by TFN, was established to share good practice and experiences in recruitment and retention.

The Scottish Government is committed to working with its delivery agencies and local authorities to ensure that there are opportunities for young people throughout Scotland’s islands, supporting businesses, social enterprises and community organisations in those areas to grow and create jobs. We are investing in key infrastructure in the islands, such as superfast broadband, to ensure those areas are attractive places to live and work.

We also fund a number of youth employment initiatives and programmes, including Modern Apprenticeships, Community Jobs Scotland and the Employability Fund, which are being delivered in the Highlands and Islands. Programmes such as Community Jobs Scotland are not only about providing paid training opportunities to young people in their local communities but also ensuring that the opportunity is of benefit to the local community.

In addition to the support through these programmes, in 2014 Skills Development Scotland developed a Skills Investment Plan for the Highlands and Islands to help meet current and future skills needs. A key strand of this work was around supporting the retention of young people in the area, including the islands. We are supporting a wide range of learning opportunities for young people, including through the University of the Highlands and Islands.

Examples of specific action on the smaller islands in Orkney, include support for: employment creation and retention in businesses on Westray and Flotta; island development trusts, using turbine income to fund youth activities and training, on Westray; and investing in ground-breaking infrastructure developments such as the EMEC hydrogen electrolyser plan on Eday.

The Beauly to Denny transmission line is on track to become fully energised by November 2015. It will not operate at its full capacity initially as other circuits on the east coast will reach their full capacity before Beauly to Denny.

Network reinforcement requirements are kept under continual review, based on current future energy scenarios there are no immediate plans to upgrade the Beauly to Denny circuit.

The Scottish Government and its public and private sector partners are investing over £410 million in the Digital Scotland Superfast Broadband (DSSB) programme to deliver fibre broadband to 85% premises by 2015-16 and 95% by 2017-18. Significant benefits are being delivered to Orkney where no commercial rollout was planned. Whilst the programme is not currently scheduled to roll out in Stronsay, delivery in Westray is expected later in 2015.

Furthermore, we are currently assessing options around a second phase of broadband funding which has the potential to further extend coverage across Orkney. We expect to announce decisions around this phase later in 2015.

Complementing the DSSB programme, Community Broadband Scotland is actively engaged with a number of community groups in Orkney – including some from the outer north isles – with a view to developing and delivering an aggregated broadband solution to areas ultimately outwith the scope of DSSB.

The management and deployment of air ambulance services is an operational matter for the Scottish Ambulance Service which it contracts out to a specialist provider.

The service recently completed a re-procurement programme of its air ambulance services which involved consulting with a range of stakeholders including the public in remote and rural localities. The contract was awarded to Gama Aviation in partnership with Bond Air Services Ltd and runs from 2013 to 2020 providing both rotary and fixed wing air ambulance services throughout Scotland. The present contractual model includes two fixed wing aircraft, one based in Aberdeen and the other in Glasgow, and two helicopters, one based in Inverness and the other in Glasgow.