Chamber and committees

In line with current approved standard operating guidelines, all frontline officers are equipped with handcuffs, PAVA spray, a baton and body armour. Any changes to this is an operational matter for the Chief Constable who would take into account the latest risk and threat assessment. In addition, Police Scotland has published on its Intranet advice for officers on a range of safety issues.

The Scottish Government’s alcohol strategy, Changing Scotland's Relationship with Alcohol: A Framework for Action, is well regarded internationally and contains over 40 measures to tackle alcohol misuse. The Framework has been shown to have a positive impact including 2.6 per cent reduction in consumption due to the multi-buy discount ban; increased delivery of Alcohol Brief Interventions; legislation to ban irresponsible promotions and the introduction of a lower drink drive limit. There is no doubt, however, that a key factor in alcohol related harm is affordability which is why we are delighted with the judgment from the UK Supreme Court, confirming unanimously the legality of our minimum unit pricing policy in Scotland. We have set out an implementation timetable which will see the measure brought in on 1 May 2018.

The latest statistics for alcohol liver disease are showing a worrying rise in hospital stays for the fourth consecutive year. This highlights the need for continued action to reduce alcohol-related harm in Scotland. We are in the process of refreshing our Framework and will consider what further action to take to reduce alcohol-related harm.

The Scottish Government sets national direction of policy on mental health and provides funding to agencies, including NHS boards and local authorities, to support implementation of policy.

Care and treatment will be delivered in accordance with clinical and other relevant guidance and standards, for example SIGN guidelines for mental health and the standards for integrated care pathways for mental health. Developed through partnership and collaboration, Scotland’s new standards for health, social care and social work, formerly known as the National Care Standards, will also drive improvement in the experience of people who use care services. From 1 April 2018 the standards will be taken into account by the Care Inspectorate, Healthcare Improvement Scotland and other scrutiny bodies in relation to inspections, and registration, of health and care services.

Higher Educations Statistics Agency (HESA) statistics show us that three and a half years after graduating, former UK Domiciled students of Scottish universities are earning a median salary of £27,500 – which is the highest in the UK.

Boards are continuing to reduce their waiting times below the access standard for CAMHS services. Latest published figures for the quarter ending June 2017 show 13 of the 14 Boards in Scotland recorded an average waiting time within the 18 week standard with 8 of these recording an average wait of 9 weeks or lower (half the target wait time).

We want to see the waiting times standard being met consistently and have made a strategic investment of £54m running up until 2020 to improve mental health services. This has been designed as a comprehensive package and offers a new approach to improvement of mental health services. The package includes funding for capacity building within services, workforce recruitment and development through NES and funding for the mental health improvement team based within HIS to deliver sustained improvements, and ensure services are designed and delivered in the most efficient way.

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-12808 on 23 November 2017. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at:

Latest published figures for the quarter ending June 2017 show Health Boards reported an average waiting time equal to or lower than the 18 week standard with a number of these recording an average wait of 9 weeks of lower (half the target wait time).

We remain determined that we will hit our 90 per cent target and we will continue to work with Boards to make sure that happens right across Scotland and the Mental Health Access Improvement Support Team, based within Health Improvement Scotland are working in partnership with Boards to deliver sustained improvements, and ensure services are designed and delivered in the most efficient way.

Any violence or aggression against NHSScotland staff is unacceptable and we have policies in place to provide a continuously improving and safe working environment. We encourage NHSScotland Boards to commit to supporting appropriate action, including pursuing criminal prosecution where appropriate, against anyone who assaults a staff member.

Specific legislation is in place to protect clinical staff working both in our hospitals and in the community from harm. Additionally, the Staff Governance Standard for NHS Scotland commits all Boards to promoting the health and wellbeing of staff, patients and the wider community.

NHS Tayside have advised that they have locally implemented policies in place dealing with Aggression and Violence Management, and Lone Working. The Board also has plans to launch a public awareness campaign ‘Respect us’ in January 2018 reaffirming that acts of violence or aggression towards staff members will not be tolerated.

We are taking significant action to reduce waits for all patients including those waiting for cataract surgery. I recognise that some patients are experiencing long waits, which is why the Scottish Government announced at the end of August £150 million funding over the next 3 years to support reduction on hospital waiting times of which £50 million has been allocated to NHS Boards in the current year. I expect to see improvement in waiting time improvement for all parts of the patient journey including for cataract surgery between now and end of March next year.

I launched last week the new Access Collaborative Programme which is a different way to bring patients, clinicians, and other NHS staff together to look at ways patients can receive timely accessible care. The programme will reduce planned waiting times by improving communications between staff working in the community and in hospitals to identify the right clinician and treatment, and streamline patient care to minimise or eliminate unnecessary processes.

ScotRail is required through the Franchise Agreement to manage the delivery of rail services, to accommodate the anticipated increase in rail traffic around the Christmas holiday period.

Over this period, ScotRail will be providing four additional services on the Edinburgh to Glasgow route on Friday evenings/early Saturday mornings, each with six carriages, commencing 25 November. ScotRail will also be providing more carriages on rail services across Scotland on Friday evenings and across the day on Saturday and Sunday. This is equivalent to nearly 100,000 additional seats.

ScotRail will communicate the above to customers through the normal channels – website, press release, social media platforms etc.