Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government’s role is to set the strategic policy for the NHS in Scotland, NHS Boards are responsible for service delivery and treatment. All Health Boards should consider patient transport needs when they plan and deliver services and must ensure Patients have access to all information on any relevant patient transport (including community transport) and travel reimbursement entitlement.

Individual Boards are responsible for developing and applying their own policies, including determining eligibility and reimbursement rates, whilst ensuring patient care and safety.

A requirement has been placed within the NHS Territorial Boards annual delivery guidance to bring attention to the requirement for the Boards to consider transport to health for patients and ensure patients have access to information.

To date, four affordable homes were approved in Orkney under the demand-led Rural Affordable Homes for Key Workers Fund with no spend drawn down to date. We are currently working with local authorities to progress a number of proposals to support the delivery of more affordable homes for key workers through the fund. We are engaging closely with local authorities and others to promote the use of the fund and to bring forward proposals where there is an identified requirement.

The results from the 2022 Scottish House Condition Survey were published on 29 February 2024.

In 2022 the Scottish House Condition Survey asked the following new question on fire alarms: Has the dwelling satisfactory equipment for detecting fire and giving warning in the event of fire or suspected fire? Responses were recorded as a yes or no answer, and in order to be recorded as ‘yes’ a dwelling must have interlinked fire alarms installed meeting a number of criteria.

In 2022 around 7% of local authority dwellings (25,000) and 5% of housing association dwellings (13,000) were recorded as not having satisfactory equipment for detecting and warning in the event of fire (not necessarily due to alarms not being interlinked).

While all dwellings meeting the fire alarm criteria have interlinked fire alarms, there may be some dwellings recorded as having insufficient fire detection equipment that do have interlinked fire alarms but failed the fire alarm criteria due to other factors such as insufficient number of alarms, improperly powered alarms, or improper locations of alarms. However, due to the yes/no mode of question this number cannot be quantified from 2022 Scottish House Condition Survey data. From 2023 the question on fire alarms will provide details as to why a dwelling’s equipment for detecting a fire is unsatisfactory which will allow analysis in this area from 2025.

The Scottish Government has made a significant investment in residential rehabilitation services and associated aftercare as part of the £250 million investment into our National Mission to improve and save lives impacted by substance use. As part of this investment, we allocated a £5 million uplift in funding to Alcohol and Drug Partnerships (ADPs) across Scotland, to be spent on residential rehabilitation until the end of this parliament.

The Scottish Government has been clear that this funding must be distributed fairly, taking account of the many factors that influence the needs of particular areas and the costs of supplying local services. The ADP uplift, therefore, was and continues to be administered using the National Resource Allocation Formula, which is responsibility of the NHS Scotland Resource Allocation Committee (NRAC).

The NRAC formula remains the fairest method of distributing funding allocations across the country, and this was applied to the allocation for both East and South Ayrshire, taking into consideration the local requirements as appropriate.

Public Health Scotland published their interim Evaluation of the Scottish Government Residential Rehabilitation programme in February, where the best available evidence put the average cost estimate of a publicly funded residential rehabilitation placement in Scotland at £11,000 per person (in the first six months of financial year 2023-2024).

The Scottish Government provided a total of £2.1 million between Care and Repair (£1.1 million) and Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (£1 million) during 2021-22 to support those in greatest need or at greatest risk of fire, to meet the new standard.

An announcement was made on 22 January 2022 about the original funding for Care and Repair being doubled to just over £1.1 million to meet demand. All the money has been allocated and spent.

The Scottish Government does not hold this information.

Unlike the mainstream rental sector, people who live in accommodation tied to their employment do not have a tenancy agreement such as the Private Residential Tenancy. Instead their rental conditions are included as part of the individual terms of their employment.

No information is held by the Scottish Government on those living in tied accommodation in Scotland.

The information requested on what data we hold on any current physiotherapist vacancies across all NHS boards can be found on the TURAS NHS Education for Scotland workforce statistics site at: https://turasdata.nes.nhs.scot/data-and-reports/official-workforce-statistics/all-official-statistics-publications/05-march-2024-workforce/dashboards/nhs-scotland-workforce/?pageid=11224

Public Health Scotland (PHS) published a baseline report as part of their interim Evaluation of the Scottish Government Residential Rehabilitation programme in February, where the best available evidence suggested that referrals into residential rehabilitation have been increasing not only in East and South Ayrshire, but across the country since the beginning of the Scottish Government’s National Mission to improve and save lives impacted by substance use.

According to another recent PHS report, the upward trend in placements suggests that the Scottish Government is on track to hit its target of 1,000 people publicly funded to go to rehab by 2026.

The Scottish Government is finalising plans to provide more funding to facilitate this increase in areas where it is most needed. Further details on this will be made available in due course.

Further to the response in S6W-26724 which noted that the Scottish Government is reviewing the Competition & Markets Authority’s ‘Housing Markets Study’ published on 28 February 2024, a full response to relevant recommendations and options put forward by the Authority will be issued when the review process is complete.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-26852 on 2 May 2024. 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 .