Chamber and committees

The offence of stalking at section 39 of the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010 provides that a person (A) stalks another person (B) where A engages in a course of conduct (involving conduct on at least two separate occasions) which causes B to feel fear or alarm, where A either acts with the intention of causing B to feel fear or alarm or where A knew or ought to have known that engaging in the course of conduct would be likely to cause B to feel fear or alarm.

As such, the offence is capable of being committed by someone who sends unsolicited text messages on two or more occasions, if their course of behaviour was such that the victim suffered fear and alarm as a result of that conduct and the accused either intended to cause such fear and alarm or knew or ought to have known that the course of conduct in which they engaged would be likely to cause such fear or alarm.

Decisions concerning the investigation and prosecution of individual cases is a matter for the police and COPFS respectively, taking account of the particular facts and circumstances of the case.

The number of crimes of stalking at section 39 of the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010 recorded and cleared up by the police in each year since the offence came into force in December 2010 is set out in the following table:

A crime or offence is regarded as cleared up where there exists a sufficiency of evidence under Scots law to justify consideration of criminal proceedings, notwithstanding that a report is not submitted to the procurator fiscal because either: (i) by standing agreement with the procurator fiscal the police warn the accused due to the minor nature of the offence or (ii) reporting is inappropriate due to the non-age of the accused, death of the accused, or other similar circumstances.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the number of people arrested or the number of stalking cases investigated by the police.

The number of people prosecuted and convicted for the offence of stalking is set out in the following table:

(Where main charge)

There is no direct relationship between the number of crimes recorded by the police and the number of follow-up actions taken by other agencies within the criminal justice system and therefore care should be taken when comparing different data sources relating to the criminal justice system. For example, recorded crime statistics count crimes and offences at the time that they came to the attention of Police Scotland, while criminal proceedings statistics report on cases which have concluded in court. This means that a crime may be recorded by the police in one year and court proceedings concluded in a subsequent year. In addition, a person may be proceeded against for more than one crime involving more than one victim and there is the possibility that the crime recorded by the police may be altered in the course of judicial proceedings.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the number of people charged, as distinct from the number of people prosecuted, for stalking offences.

This information is not held centrally by the Scottish Government.

We know that GP recruitment and retention is an issue for some areas of Scotland. That’s why the groundbreaking new GP contract for Scotland – jointly designed and agreed with the British Medical Association – will help ensure that GPs are able to spend more time with patients and less time on bureaucracy. It will help reduce doctors’ overall workload and make general practice an even more attractive career prospect by allowing GPs to focus on the patients who need them most.

We have recently announced the commitment to increasing the number of GPs by at least 800 over ten years to ensure a sustainable service that meets increasing demand on our services. Our strategy to recruit and retain our existing GPs will be set out in part 3 of the national health and social care workforce plan to be published this month.

The ground breaking new GP contract for Scotland – jointly designed and agreed with the British Medical Association – will help ensure that GPs are able to spend more time with patients and less time on bureaucracy. It will help reduce doctors’ overall workload and make general practice an even more attractive career prospect by allowing GPs to focus on the patients who need them most.

Table 1: Reported GP hours worked, on average, each week for the In Hours period

We know that GP recruitment and retention is an issue for some areas of Scotland. That’s why the groundbreaking new GP contract for Scotland – jointly designed and agreed with the British Medical Association – will help ensure that GPs are able to spend more time with patients and less time on bureaucracy. It will help reduce doctors’ overall workload and make general practice an even more attractive career prospect by allowing GPs to focus on the patients who need them most.

We have recently announced the commitment to increasing the number of GPs by at least 800 over ten years to ensure a sustainable service that meets increasing demand on our services. Our strategy to recruit and retain our existing GPs will be set out in part 3 of the national health and social care workforce plan to be published shortly.

We know that GP recruitment and retention is an issue for some areas of Scotland. That’s why the ground breaking new GP contract for Scotland – jointly designed and agreed with the British Medical Association – will help ensure that GPs are able to spend more time with patients and less time on bureaucracy. It will help reduce doctors’ overall workload and make general practice an even more attractive career prospect by allowing GPs to focus on the patients who need them most.

We have recently announced the commitment to increasing the number of GPs by at least 800 over ten years to ensure a sustainable service that meets increasing demand on our services. Our strategy to recruit and retain our existing GPs will be set out in part 3 of the national health and social care workforce plan to be published this month.

Table 1: GP posts vacant for over 6 months reported by responding practices for year ending 31August 2017, by NHS Board area

Decisions on the application of a particular course of treatment are a matter for the responsible clinician, in conversation and agreement with the patient.

Regarding the use of Botox to treat migraines, this would be undertaken following a clinical assessment against the criteria detailed in Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN) guideline “SIGN 155: Pharmacological management of migraine”.

Under the Equality Act 2010, individual NHS Boards are responsible for ensuring that they make reasonable adjustments to meet the needs of people with disabilities. These adjustments include ensuring that NHS Boards communicate with people with sight loss in an accessible way. Responsibility for complying with the requirements of the Equality Act 2010 rests with individual organisations, including NHS Boards.

The support team for SCI-Diabetes is currently funded on a 3 year programme ending 31 March 2018. The funding level recognised a need to catch up on a development backlog due to a technology refresh. Moving forward, the same level of development is not anticipated and as such resources will need to be adjusted to take account of this. A final decision on resource levels and budget is still to be taken but it is envisaged that this will be a Business As Usual (BAM) model plus capacity for moderate development.

Abbott’s FreeStyle Libre flash glucose monitoring device was added to the Scottish Drug Tariff from 1 November 2017.

It is now for NHS Boards to consider inclusion on their local formulary and stipulate through guidance the sub-categories of patients for whom this product is recommended.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on the numbers of devices provided in each of the last 5 years.