Chamber and committees

The Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills has met with –

The Royal College of Nurses - 11^th October 2017 –

The Deputy First Minister and the Chief Nursing Officer met with RCN officials.

Information Sharing Front Line Practitioners - 31^st October 2017

The Deputy First Minister met with front line Information Sharing Practitioners from NHS Dumfries and Galloway, NHS Tayside, Stirling Council, Edinburgh Young Carers, East Ayrshire Council and Dundee Council.

Currently there are no plans to connect Dumfries and Annan directly to the West Coast Main Line. However, the Scottish Government is committed to improving connectivity to promote sustainable economic growth and proposals will be considered subject to the Scottish Government’s investment priorities for the strategic transport network, which are supported by a robust business case, subject to affordability and other competing priorities.

In the first instance, promoters should contact the South West Scotland Regional Transport Partnership (SWestrans) to establish if the proposal fits with their local and regional transport strategies.

In line with recognised best practice our expenditure predictions are determined from our backlog models on a network basis. As the calculation of the maintenance backlog involves the analysis of the trunk road network as a whole, backlog figures are not available for individual routes.

The Children and Young People (Information Sharing) (Scotland) Bill Team have had a phone conversation with the Scottish Guidance Association on the 2 October 2017 – no notes of this conversation were taken.

Members of the Children and Young People (Information Sharing) (Scotland) Bill Team attended the National Child Protection Leadership Group, a Social Work Scotland / Scottish Government Strategic Workshop and a NHS Information Sharing Group Meeting.

DATIX reports are held locally by individual NHS Boards and the information is part of Staff Governance Reporting (primarily through Boards' Health & Safety Departments). NHSScotland Workforce data published by ISD Scotland on 6 December 2017, available at:

http://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Workforce/Publications/index.asp#2056

shows a record number of staff working in our health service, with an overall increase of 9.8 percentage points since September 2006.

This information is not held centrally.

This information is not held centrally.

95% of schools in Scotland have received Pupil Equity Funding in 2017-18.

Pupil Equity Funding (PEF) is additional to the core funding that local authorities receive. All schools could benefit, either directly or indirectly, as a result of the improved partnerships, increased resources, and opportunities for professional learning that Pupil Equity Funding provides.