Questions and answers

Question reference: S5W-34867

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 29 January 2021
Current Status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 23 February 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what guidance it has given to NHS boards in relation to administering COVID-19 vaccinations to (a) (i) short- and (ii) long-term hospital in-patients and (b) hospital in-patients who have multiple conditions and are considered to be within a high-risk group.

The Chief Medical Officer, Dr Gregor Smith wrote a letter to all Health Boards on 5 February in which he advised all Health boards should seek to vaccinate those within eligible JCVI priority cohorts who are in hospital prior to discharge, where that cohort is currently receiving vaccination in the community.

Care should be taken to check records for previous history of COVID-19 vaccination, confirmation of vaccine should be provided and steps taken to enable a second dose as appropriate.

Question reference: S5W-34866

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 29 January 2021
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 11 February 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what it is doing to monitor the (a) accessibility and (b) availability of GP appointments during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Scottish Government does not monitor the accessibility and availability of GP appointments as GP practices are responsible for their own patient appointment and consultation arrangements.

GPs practices follow the advice in Health Protection Scotland's guidance: Novel coronavirus (COVID-19) Guidance for primary care - Management of patients in primary care .

The guidance does allow for face-to-face consultations where that is clinically appropriate, but GP practices are advised to make every effort to triage all patients by telephone to avoid patients presenting at the practice unnecessarily.

Question reference: S5O-04956

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 January 2021
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 27 January 2021

To ask the Scottish Government how its Fair Work agenda can help it to take a collaborative and partnership approach to working with workers and trade unions during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Question reference: S5W-33964

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 10 December 2020
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 14 January 2021

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-32952 by Jeane Freeman on 12 November 2020, whether it will request that Public Health Scotland publishes the occupation and sector data collected during interviews, broken down by Standard Industrial Classification.

Scottish Government officials continue to work closely with Public Health Scotland to develop the range of statistics that are published. However, Public Health Scotland is an independent statistics producer, so make the decision on which data they publish. Public Health Scotland continuously review the data they publish; the contact tracing data currently collected on occupations does not allow Standard Industrial Classification to be derived. While not an SIC group, "Cases reporting an occupation in the Education and Childcare sector" are published in Public Health Scotland's weekly statistical report.

Question reference: S5W-34061

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 15 December 2020
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 12 January 2021

To ask the Scottish Government when each of the groups listed on the webpage, gov.scot/groups/, last met.

Question reference: S5W-33927

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 10 December 2020
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 7 January 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what weighting it plans to place on the requirement for potential contractors for the social security advocacy service to have experience of (a) directly delivering an advocacy service and (b) delivering an advocacy service in Scotland.

We are currently engaging with relevant stakeholders prior to the re-tendering process to ensure we consider and include the requirements they feel potential contractors should be able to demonstrate in order to be appointed to run the social security advocacy service.

This will help us in achieving our goal of creating a high quality, human-rights based service focussed on the needs of the client.

Question reference: S5W-33688

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 03 December 2020
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 7 January 2021

To ask the Scottish Government further to the answers to questions S5W-29524 and S5W-33108 by Jeane Freeman on 26 August and 20 November 2020 respectively, what further funding for hospices for loss of income during the subsequent financial quarters has been allocated, and when it will allocate the remaining funding.

As always we are open to further discussions on support.

On the 29 June, I wrote to Scottish Hospices to confirm that their funding requests related to loss of income during the first financial quarter of 2020 would be met in full. In total £10.1m was provided to Scottish Hospices for this purpose.

It is important to reflect that this funding was provided on a one off basis to account for loss of income at the beginning of the pandemic, and that we expect the existing commissioning arrangements between hospices and Integration Authorities to be maintained going forward.

Question reference: S5W-33692

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 03 December 2020
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 7 January 2021

To ask the Scottish Government. further to the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport on 28 April 2020 (Official Report, c.18), whether the Treasury provided an updated final consequential funding figure associated with the announcement of funding for hospice work and, if so, what this was and whether it has been allocated.

On the 8 April the UK Government announced a support package of £750m to support front line community support charities during the COVID-19 outbreak. £360m of this fund was set aside to provide direct support to key organisations that deliver health and social care services which included an estimated £200m for hospices.

As the consequential funding associated with hospices has been included as part of a larger funding package, to date, the UK Treasury has not been able to advise on a final consequential funding figure specifically for hospices.

£10.1m was provided to Scottish Hospices earlier this year to meet in full their funding requests for loss of income in the first financial quarter of 2020.

Question reference: S5W-33928

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 09 December 2020
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 23 December 2020

To ask the Scottish Government how many people have used the interim social security advocacy service, and how many requests to use, or referrals to, the service have been made.

Nobody has used the interim social security advocacy service as of yet, and we have received no requests or referrals for the service.

The Coronavirus pandemic impacted on the rollout of disability benefits which led to the termination of the original tendering process for the comprehensive service. The interim advocacy service was introduced to ensure that there was a provision available for existing benefits, even although we anticipated the level of demand for the service would be low.

Question reference: S5W-33929

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 09 December 2020
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 23 December 2020

To ask the Scottish Government how many advocacy providers have fulfilled requests to use, or referrals to, the interim social security advocacy service, and who these providers were.

No providers have fulfilled requests to use, or referrals to, the interim advocacy social security service.

The Coronavirus pandemic impacted on the rollout of disability benefits which led to the termination of the original tendering process for the comprehensive service. The interim advocacy service was introduced to ensure that there was a provision available for existing benefits, even although we anticipated the level of demand for the service would be low.

Chamber and committees