Chamber and committees

ScotRail is committed to becoming a menopause friendly employer and has delivered “Let’s Talk about Menopause” training to its Executive Committee and eighty of its senior leaders.

ScotRail designed and delivered training for colleagues in ScotRail and the wider UK rail industry to celebrate World Menopause Month in October 2022 and has plans to offer Train the Trainer sessions with other ScotRail staff. ScotRail’s aim is then to roll out a programme of menopause awareness training across the organisation.

Applications for the Menopause Friendly Accreditation (MFA) are open four times each year and ScotRail’s Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Manager is currently in the process of collating evidence to submit with its audit survey which ScotRail intends to do by end February 2023.

We know that this is one of the toughest winters in the NHS’s 74-year history and long delays clearly demonstrate the challenge our Health Service is facing.

Delayed discharges continue to drive up A&E waits, which is why we are working with hospitals across Scotland, including Inverclyde Royal Hospital to ensure people leave hospital without delay, freeing up vital beds for those who need them most.

Our £50 million Urgent and Unscheduled Care Collaborative looks to drive down A&E waits through, Hospital at Home and our Out-patient Antimicrobial Therapy service which allows patients to be treated at home or in the community.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-13225 on 13 January 2023. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

There are regular meetings between Scottish Government officials and the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) representatives, covering a wide range of subjects. The last such meeting took place on 10 January 2023 when the MHRA Cross-UK Partnership group met. The purpose of the MHRA Cross-UK Partnership group is to ensure that officials from the devolved administrations are kept updated on key MHRA issues that may affect or involve them. At the last meeting, the MHRA Corporate Plan, its Post Implementation Review of the Human Medicines Regulations, and safety issues were discussed.

The Chief Pharmaceutical Officer is a member of the Sodium Valproate Implementation Working Group, which is supporting the safe introduction of new measures to further strengthen the safe prescribing of sodium valproate in clinical practice. The group last met on 6 January 2023.

A meeting took place on 9 December 2022 with the Chief Medical Officers and the Deputy Chief Medical Officers and the MHRA Chief Executive was invited as a guest. Dame June Raine attended briefly on 9 December and provided an informal update on sodium valproate.

The Scottish Government has had no discussions with the UK Government regarding any poor customer service processes and response times at the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency. No businesses have raised any concerns with the Scottish Government on this matter.

The Scottish Government continues to focus on tackling disparities in deprived areas by ensuring equitable access to cancer services through the actions in our National Cancer Plan. We recognise that the impact from the COVID-19 pandemic may have exacerbated inequalities within screening. A key Ministerial priority is reducing inequalities in access to and uptake of screening programmes. That is why we committed up to £2.45 million to the Screening Inequalities Fund to build a programme of evidence-based, sustainable and scalable projects that tackle inequalities in a systemic way.

Rapid Cancer Diagnostic Services (RCDS) have been established across three NHS Boards to date which have a key role in delivering earlier diagnosis and improving patient care. The First Minister recently announced an additional two RCDS’ are being developed.

Additionally, the development of national clinical management pathways through the Scottish Cancer Network will help reduce variation across Scotland, across the entirety of the pathway. In parallel, the first optimal cancer diagnostic pathway, led by the Centre for Sustainable Delivery (CfSD) was launched in December 2022, and is being funded by £3 million from the Scottish Government’s Detect Cancer Earlier (DCE) Programme.

The Scottish Government does not hold the data requested.

The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service is responsible for issuing Victim Notification Scheme packs. They have advised that the number of packs issued to eligible victims for 2021-2022 and from April 2022 to 16 Jan 2023 – the information held to date - is as follows:

• 2021-2022 - Total 1674
• 2022 to 16 January 2023 – Total 1788

Eligible victims can register for the scheme at any time. The Scottish Prison Service has advised that the numbers of victims who have opted to register for the scheme in the financial year 2021-22 and from 1 April 2022 to 31 December 2022 – the information held to date - are as follows:

• 2021-2022 – Total 400
• 1 April 2022 until 31 December 2022 – Total 356

The Scottish Government has discussed the use of the term Minor Attracted Person with Police Scotland following recent media coverage. Police Scotland has confirmed that it does not use the term and it is not used by its partners. The Scottish Government does not use this term and it is not used by Scottish public bodies.

Police Scotland has issued a statement which confirms that it does not use this term and explains the context to it being referred to in a June 2022 Police Scotland performance report.

I visited Inverclyde Royal Hospital on 4 July 2022. All Ministerial engagements, including visits, is routinely published on the Scottish Government website and can be found at: www.gov.scot/collections/ministerial-engagements-travel-and-gifts/ .

Local authorities are required, under the Housing (Scotland) Act 2001, to keep houses they let fit for human habitation and ensure that any repairs are carried out when they are needed.

Whilst it is for local authorities to determine how they use funds available to them, including to maintain housing stock, the Scottish Government has increased local government funding by more than £1 billion in 2022-23 and the 2023-24 Local Government settlement of over £13.2 billion represents an increase of £570.8 million or 4.5% since the Budget Act, which is a real terms increase of £160.6 million or 1.3%.

We work closely with social landlords in our shared ambition to provide quality, affordable social homes and continue to have constructive engagement with them on a range of matters.