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Measures to reduce delayed discharges in the first wave of the pandemic from December 2019 to April 2020 were effective in the short term. Can you outline what those measures were? Given that delayed discharge continues to be a huge problem, what do you believe needs to be done now to achieve a longer-term solution to it?

Paragraph 14 of the Auditor General’s report states that a

“SEPA staff member received a system alert at midnight on the morning of the 24 December 2020”

and that they

“were unable to reach the key senior management contact to escalate the issue at this point.”

The Auditor General has told us that SEPA reviewed its immediate response protocols following the cyberattack. Are you able to give us a brief outline of the changes that have been made as a result of the review?

On workforce issues, which you mentioned earlier, paragraph 20 of the report refers to the 2021 Royal College of Nursing employment survey, which

“found that 40 per cent of staff are working beyond their contracted hours on most shifts ... 67 per cent ... were too busy to provide the level of care they would like and 72 per cent ... were under too much pressure at work.”

What steps is the Scottish Government taking to address those issues?

Good morning. I am looking specifically at funding for apprenticeships. Paragraph 14 of the report states that, in October 2019,

“The Scottish Government instructed SDS and the SFC to implement a new model for funding and delivering foundation apprenticeships and graduate apprenticeships in response to the removal of European structural funding.”

Paragraph 14 goes on to explain that funding for 2021-22 was

“intended to come largely from the SFC’s further and higher education budgets and partly from SDS’s budget.”

The report highlights that work on that instruction stalled as a result of Covid-19, although it has now resumed and supports the Scottish Government’s skills alignment priority. The report, however, highlights that sustainable funding for foundation apprenticeships and graduate apprenticeships remains uncertain from 2022-23 onwards. Can you tell us what the Scottish Government’s plans are for funding foundation and graduate apprenticeships from 2022-23 onwards?

Are you doing any work on timescales to try to speed things up? One of the things the pandemic showed us was that we could basically turn things on very quickly, remove the red tape and get the desired outcomes that we needed. Are we putting in timescales that mean that the skills that we need will be delivered when we need them and it will not be like the report that we are talking about, which follows a review that has been going on for four years? Are we doing things in a timely way?

This week and last week, all MSPs have been out looking at apprenticeships and seeing how that is a great pathway for kids as an alternative to going to university. I hope that there will be core funding for apprenticeships in the future.

Paragraph 1 of the report explains that Scotland’s labour market

“faces a combination of skills gaps, skills shortages and skills underutilisation.”

It goes on to highlight particular gaps

“in social care and demand for new skills in digital and responding to the climate emergency.”

How are you and your partners addressing the skills gaps?

Paragraph 28 states that

“over two-thirds of Integration Authorities”

were

“unable to achieve a balanced budget without additional funding from partners in 2018/19.”

Paragraph 28 also highlights that the introduction of free personal and nursing care resulted in the development of

“eligibility criteria to manage the demand for services.”

That has led to local variations in response to financial pressures across Scotland.

Can you provide some further detail on the local variations that exist with regard to the eligibility criteria for free personal and nursing care, and say to what extent you believe that there is a postcode lottery for that care?

The briefing clearly states that Scotland’s ageing population will inevitably result in an increasing demand for social care services and resources, and paragraph 25 outlines that it is predicted that, by 2038, nearly 25 per cent of the population

“will be over the age of 65”.

To what extent is the increased funding from the Scottish Government over the current parliamentary session likely to meet the needs of the growing ageing population in Scotland?

I think that I caught that. You mentioned national insurance contributions, the increase in which is set to provide an extra £1.1 billion to Scotland. Has any work been undertaken to establish what proportion of that funding will go towards social care?

That is no problem.

I was going to ask what is required to shift the delivery of social care services to a preventative approach, but you have covered change and reform. Has anything been done on the relative cost effectiveness of investing in preventative care as opposed to paying for support only when someone is at crisis point?