Seòmar agus comataidhean

Part of my next question was going to be about how the brand-new national leadership development programme workstream that has been put in place fits in with and complements Project Lift, and whether there is a risk of duplication in connection with succession planning in the NHS in particular. However, from what you are saying, you do not really have any answer to that at this point.

It is important to know how we are handling leadership succession and so on, because good leadership is essential for the NHS.

Auditor General, I want to return to what you were saying about Covid. The virus is still with us, and it is still overwhelming some hospitals and taking up a huge amount of NHS time. How practical is it to bring in these programmes and try to make them work in the middle of what is still a crisis? Are we just asking too much? Should we put some programmes, such as the leadership initiatives, on hold until things are more stable?

Clearly, leadership will be key to managing our way through all that.

I will move on to another of our favourite areas: data, which seems to come up at every other meeting. In today’s context, I am interested in the collection of data on health and social care. It is acknowledged that there is poor data sharing and there are difficulties in accessing health records and so forth. To what timescale are the Scottish Government and COSLA working on the development of a data strategy for health and social care?

Just to make it clear in my mind, when we say that data has been recovered, does that mean that data that was encrypted has been decrypted or that the information has been rebuilt, perhaps using manual records?

At this moment, are there any services that you are not providing?

You have not said whether there are any services that you are not able to deliver at the moment.

I have one final question. I believe that you have established a figure of £17.9 million as the potential worst-case scenario for costs. Are you able to firm up on the cost to date and give a projection of the cost of the recovery and your responses?

Moving on to something that is a little less sensitive, I realise that these are early days yet for judging the success or failure of the investments, but I am going to ask you just the same. You indicated that you have £191 million invested in 13 projects or companies. How were those opportunities identified, and what selection criteria were used in the decision to invest?

Are you confident that you will have a new chief executive in place at the start of the financial year?

Arising from that, I suppose that there is a certain interest in what the cost of the recruitment will be.