Chamber and committees

NHS Boards are responsible for providing services to meet the assessed needs of their resident populations, taking into account relevant frameworks and guidance and within their annual allocations. Limited data on the provision and frequency of Oncotype DX is held by Scottish Government, which is summarised in the following table.

Oncotype DX provision and frequency information by NHS Board held by Scottish Government

The UK Government confirmed on 11 th October 2018 that £557 million will be made available for less established renewable technologies to bid for in Contract for Difference (CfD) auctions. Developers will compete for this funding in CfD auctions to be held at regular 2 year intervals between Spring 2019 and 2025.

The CfD is funded through levies on electricity suppliers, and distributed to developers of renewable generators through competitive bids in to the CfD auction. It therefore does not generate any revenue for the UK Government that would then be redistributed via Barnett consequentials.

The CfD mechanism was introduced as part of the UK Government’s Electricity Market reform. It incentivises investment in low carbon generation by providing greater certainty and stability through reducing exposure to volatile wholesale prices, while protecting consumers from paying higher support costs when the electricity price is high. The UK Government recently announced that Remote Island Wind will be eligible to compete for CfDs in these auctions for the first time.

Generators who are successful at auction enter a contract with the Low Carbon Contracts Company Ltd (LCCC) – a private company, wholly owned by the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change. Payments are then made either by LCCC to the generators, or vice versa, depending on whether the pre-agreed price for the electricity produced (the ‘strike price’) is greater or less than the average market price for electricity at the relevant point in time (the ‘reference price’).

The Scottish Government recognises the pivotal role that culture and creativity plays in people’s lives across Scotland and, whilst it does not directly fund drama groups or festivals through local authorities, it provides funding to Creative Scotland to support Scotland’s largest cultural festivals and its theatres:

• Over £21m since 2008 through the EXPO fund, with £6m of that in the past 3 years. Since last year the EXPO Fund has been opened to Celtic Connections in Glasgow.
• In addition 2018-19 will be the first year of the Platform for Excellence programme (PLaCE) to support proposals for strategic development activity across Edinburgh’s festivals, which include looking at ways in which to widen the benefits and reach of the Edinburgh Festivals to the rest of Scotland. Scottish Government will contribute an additional £5 million over the next 5 years to PLaCE.
• The Edinburgh Festival’s The Network Effect Report, published in July of this year, found that the Edinburgh Festivals create a ‘halo effect’ bringing global recognition of Scotland as a home for culture which gives both cultural organisations and audiences pride and confidence across the whole of the country.
• Through Creative Scotland’s Regular Funding Network we have also provided over £22m in the past 3 years to theatres that support drama initiatives and encourage engagement in education, learning and outreach activities.
• Creative Scotland and Event Scotland also support cultural festivals and festivals more generally.

The Scottish Government continues to support cultural activities across Scotland with an increase of almost 10% culture funding this year despite UK Government cuts.

The Scottish Government provides over £70 million funding per year, to support NHS Boards and Integrated Joint Boards, for use by Alcohol and Drug Partnerships that work with external partners to provide alcohol and drug services. The Scottish Government also provides data, evidence and performance indicators to support this work. This support includes regularly updated information and intelligence about problem alcohol and drug use and their consequences.

By way of guidance, the Scottish Government and CoSLA set out a framework in 2009 for local partnerships on alcohol and drugs. Further guidance is provided through Scotland’s alcohol and drug strategies.

NHS Boards receive a baseline budget from the Scottish Government to provide health services for their local population. A proportion of this funding will be used to support alcohol and drug addiction services.

We have invested over £746 million to tackle problem drug and alcohol use since 2008. This financial year we have provided a further £20 million (per annum for the lifetime of this Parliament) to improve the provision and quality of services for those with substance misuse issues.

The total financial resource available to services in any given year will be significantly higher than the Scottish Government’s funding and includes contributions from NHS and other statutory partners across a range of provision.

Neighbour notification is not a requirement of building standards legislation. As such the Building Standards Compliance and Fire Safety review consultation makes no reference to this.

Whilst neighbour notification is a requirement regarding applications for planning permission, there are no monetary thresholds in that regard. There are no plans at present for changes to the planning requirements for neighbour notification.

I assume the member is referring to child welfare reporters, appointed by the courts to report on the welfare of the child in cases under section 11 of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995 on matters such as parental responsibilities and rights, contact and residence. The Scottish Government has recently consulted on a review of the 1995 Act: https://consult.gov.scot/family-law/children-scotland-act/ Paragraphs 2.54 to 2.75 discussed Child Welfare Reporters, including training, and question 4 asked about the best future arrangements for child welfare reporters. We are currently analysing the responses to the consultation, before deciding on next steps. Programme for Government 2018-19 confirmed that a Family Law Bill will be introduced in 2018-19: https://beta.gov.scot/programme-for-government/

Appropriate leadership is in place in all 22 of our NHS Boards. Every Board currently has a chief executive, with two operating on an interim basis. The recruitment process for one of those posts is underway, whilst arrangements to recruit to the other post will begin early in 2019. There are a further five Boards that will be changing their chief executives in the next six months. Of these, two have already appointed successful candidates and the recruitment processes for the remaining three are underway.

The National Health and Social Care Workforce Plan was published in three Parts between June 2017 and April 2018. The next iteration of this work is the production of a fully integrated health and social care workforce plan by the end of this year. This will be published annually thereafter and will be subject to Parliamentary scrutiny.

Ramp metering equipment, which controls traffic flow onto the motorway from the Queensferry junction roundabout, has recently been installed as part of Intelligent Transport Systems measures and will become operational in the near future. An aim of this is to ease congestion at the junction.

Transport Scotland will be undertaking an evaluation of the Forth Replacement Crossing Project, one, three and five years after motorway opening in line with Scottish Trunk Road Infrastructure Project Evaluation, against both the transport planning objectives and wider evaluation criteria. In addition, Transport Scotland is undertaking an evaluation of performance one month after motorway regulations came into effect. These evaluations will consider pre-opening and post-opening traffic data.

Following evaluation, Transport Scotland will consider whether any further measures are necessary at the Queensferry Junction.