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The Scottish Government will continue to work with health boards to ensure, as far as possible, that support for energy costs is available to those who require it.

Some patients already receive support for costs associated with home haemodialysis and the use of oxygen equipment. We have now written to all NHS territorial Boards to understand what support with fuel costs is available to patients using life-saving equipment.

We have already pledged almost £3 billion in this financial year towards helping families and households face the increased cost of living. This includes the provision of services and financial support not available elsewhere in the UK to help reduce every day costs and increase incomes.

The Scottish Government continues to prioritise funding for health, providing increases year on year and funding of £18 billion in 2022-23, as set out in the Scottish Budget.

However, the scale of the financial challenge across the Scottish Government and health and social care is unprecedented, as a result of rising inflation and energy costs and the ongoing impacts of Covid and Brexit.

The UK Government’s Autumn statement provided no additional funding this year to support health and social care in addressing these challenges or to support fair pay deals, with the funding outlined over the coming two years falling massively short of the combined impact of Covid pressures, energy costs and inflation.

It is vital that further funding is provided by the UK Government to address the backlog in care caused by Covid and to help our NHS and social care staff deal with the cost of living crisis

We have revisited the NCS financial memorandum assumptions and, based on a revised recruitment profile and revised investment in data and digital work, £15 million of funding in 2022-23 has been reprioritised. We are taking time to get this right, ensuring engagement through events such as the Forum and launch of the Lived Experience Expert Panel. As a result some costs that would have been expected in this financial year will not occur.

Funding of £18 billion is provided for health and social care in 2022-23.

As set out in the Emergency Budget Review (2 November), in common with the overall Scottish Budget, the Health and Social Care budget is facing unpreceded challenges as a result of inflation and the ongoing impacts of Covid and Brexit.

It has therefore been essential to review health and social care spending, with £400 million reprioritised and fully retained within the Portfolio, to ensure that it is directed where it is needed most, including supporting enhanced pay offers.

All of the £830.6 million allocated to Additional Support for Social Care in the 2022-23 budget has been included in the block grant allocation provided to local authorities. The Scottish Government’s policy towards local authorities’ spending is to allow local authorities the financial freedom to operate independently and the information requested on spend would therefore require to be requested from local authorities.

The requested information on how many whole time equivalent radiographers who were fully qualified to undertake MRI scans working in the NHS in the financial year (a) 2018-19, (b) 2019-20, (c) 2020-21, (d) 2021-22 and 2022-23 to date, broken down by NHS board is not centrally available.

Information on how many whole time equivalent Radiographers (Diagnosis and Therapy) working in the NHS since 2012, broken down by NHS Board can be found in the following link: NHSScotland workforce | Turas Data Intelligence

The most recent estimate for whole time equivalent of GPs can be found in the General Practice Workforce Survey 2019 , published by Public Health Scotland in October 2021. This estimated that there were 3,613 GP whole time equivalents (WTE) in Scotland in 2019. This is an increase from an estimated 3,520 WTE in 2017, with 8 sessions per week equating to one WTE.

The latest data on GP WTE is scheduled to be published by Public Health Scotland, they have pre-announced publication of this analysis report for 29 November.

Junior Doctors are a valuable part of the NHS Scotland workforce. The Scottish Government has implemented a 4.5% pay uplift this year which is in line with the independent DDRB recommendations.

The Scottish Government has been working with BMA and NHS Employers to take forward the Expert Working Group recommendation and key priorities within the BMA Wellbeing report. A Joint Statement on Junior Doctor Health and Wellbeing was agreed between all parties on 1 June 2022 and work is now underway to implement this important work.

NHS 24 will have recruited an additional 41.81 Whole Time Equivalent (WTE) staff by 1 December 2022. These additional posts support the recruitment priorities set out in the Winter Resilience Plan.

The following table shows the breakdown by role of the total number of WTE staff joining NHS 24 through to 1 December 2022. The role of Call Operator was re-created in September 2022 to supplement NHS 24's call handling capacity.

Junior Doctors are a valuable part of the NHS Scotland workforce. The Scottish Government has implemented a 4.5% pay uplift this year which is in line with the independent DDRB recommendations. The Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care is aware of Junior Doctors concerns in relation to this pay award and wishes to ensure fairness across the NHS pay system.

The Scottish Government has been working with BMA and NHS Employers to take forward the Expert Working Group recommendation and key priorities within the BMA Wellbeing report. A Joint Statement on Junior Doctor Health and Wellbeing was agreed between all parties on 1 June 2022 and work is now underway to implement this important work.