Seòmar agus comataidhean

Occupational Health and Safety Minimum Dataset information was collected nationally for the first time during September to December 2001 and covers the period 2000-01. Sickness absence levels form part of the data. Collection of the 2001-02 data is currently on-going. Quality assurance of the 2000-01 data has started and once completed will be made available through the Information and Statistics Division of the Common Services Agency.

The gross revenue expenditure figures for 2000-01 and 2001-02, together with the planned expenditure for 2001-02 is given in the following table:

Health Board	Gross Expenditure 2000-01 (£000)	Planned Expenditure 2001-02 (£000)	Gross Expenditure 2001-02 (£000)
Argyll and Clyde	438,561	468,244	468,318
Ayrshire and Arran	370,589	400,163	395,127
Borders	113,119	115,825	115,622
Dumfries and Galloway	156,728	169,189	167,607
Fife	323,611	346,575	344,385
Forth Valley	266,322	286,097	284,918
Grampian	487,347	521,630	519,793
Greater Glasgow	985,787	1,075,526	1,067,854
Highland	214,108	237,387	236,531
Lanarkshire	510,611	579,903	577,236
Lothian	732,214	814,168	803,875
Orkney	24,403	26,706	26,378
Shetland	28,807	30,798	30,505
Tayside	428,342	476,511	472,360
Western Isles	43,101	45,649	45,082
Scottish Totals	5,123,650	5,594,370	5,555,591

These response times concern the performance of the emergency ambulance service following the introduction of priority-based dispatch. This system was introduced into the south east of Scotland from 1 August 2002 and is scheduled to be rolled out across Scotland by 2004. The information requested is not yet available. Officials in the Scottish Executive Health Department are currently in discussion with the Scottish Ambulance Service about the frequency to which performance information should be published. In the past, such information has been published once a year by the service in its annual report.

I refer the member to the answer given to question S1W-29329 on 27 September 2002. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at: http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/search_wa.Full results of the Audit Scotland/ISD survey will be available later this year. In addition, proposals are being developed for implementation by NHSScotland for the collection of information on nurse-led activity. It is too soon to say when the first results from this new information collection will become available.

The setting of fees within the maxima specified in the Fees Order is an operational matter for the Care Commission. In setting fees, the Regulation of Care (Scotland) Act requires the commission to have regard to its reasonable expenses in carrying out its functions under the act.

NHS boards are given a unified budget to enable them to meet the health care needs of their resident populations. There is no specific prescribing element uplift in the unified budget. It is for each individual NHS board to decide how much money to allocate to their prescribing budget.The Arbuthnott formula, which has a prescribing element, has informed NHS board allocations for financial years 2001-02 and 2002-03. On average each NHS board received a 6.5% increase in 2001-02 and a 7.2% increase in 2002-03. This was made up of a minimum increase for each NHS board of 5.5% in 2001-02 and 6.8% in 2002-03 and additional money for those NHS boards where their Arbuthnott shares were greater than their actual shares.

No specific allocations are made for staff budgets. Staff costs are met from the overall sums allocated to NHS boards to enable them to meet the health care needs of their resident populations. Therefore, information on funding allocation by workforce group is not available centrally.

Separation distances are in place around the GM crops to minimise the dispersal of pollen to adjacent crops. The distances deployed in the farm-scale evaluations are based upon decades of experience in conventional agriculture where they have proved extremely effective at delivering high levels of seed purity.

Crops grown outwith the separation distance around a GM crop do not come within the scope of the legislation regulating GM releases. Growers, whether they are the farmer involved in the trial or neighbouring landowners, are at liberty to do what they wish with these crops. Before a GM crop is approved for release, the possible consequences of pollen flow from the crop is assessed carefully. Approval would not be granted if there was considered to be a safety threat to neighbouring crops or to human health.

No. Such tests do not form part of the protocols applicable to the farm-scale evaluations and would only serve to confirm what is already known about the behaviour of pollen from these crops. The possibility of tiny quantities of pollen from the GM crop travelling outwith the trial crop is recognised and the potential consequences are addressed as part of the risk assessment process which is undertaken prior to the granting of approval. Our expert advisers are clear that pollen from the GM crops that have approval for release poses no greater safety threat than pollen from the equivalent conventional crop. Experience of the operation of separation distances suggests that any GM presence beyond this distance will be extremely small.