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Questions and answers

Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for MSPs to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)
Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

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Question reference: S2W-03419

Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 13 October 2003
Current Status: Answered by Jim Wallace on 14 November 2003

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has been advised by any provider what the estimated cost of rolling out 100% broadband coverage, or as close to 100% coverage as possible, will be, and, if so, what that estimate was.

Question reference: S2W-03484

Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 October 2003
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 13 November 2003

To ask the Scottish Executive what the average waiting time is in each NHS board area for an appointment with a physiotherapist.

Question reference: S2W-03482

Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 October 2003
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 13 November 2003

To ask the Scottish Executive what the speech and language therapy budget is in each NHS board area expressed also on a per capita basis and as a ratio to the number of people registered as requiring such services.

Question reference: S2W-03480

Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 October 2003
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 13 November 2003

To ask the Scottish Executive what the average waiting time is in each NHS board area for an appointment to receive speech and language therapy.

Question reference: S2W-03486

Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 October 2003
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 13 November 2003

To ask the Scottish Executive what steps are being taken to increase the number of paediatric (a) nurses and (b) consultants in each NHS board area.

NHS boards are responsiblefor planning services in their areas and for securing the staff needed todeliver them. From September 1997 to March 2003, the number of qualified nursesworking within paediatrics rose by 32% from 1,457 to 1,916 (headcount). Thenumber of Paediatric Consultants has also risen from 102 at September 1997 to 121(headcount) at September 2002, an increase of 19%.

The Scottish Executive is promoting an integrated approach to workforce planning anddevelopment at local, regional and national levels and is investing £1.2million annually for three years, beginning in 2003-04, to improve workforceplanning and development across NHS Scotland. These new arrangements will helpdeliver on the partnership agreement commitments relating to increasing thecapacity of the NHSScotland workforce, specifically including nursing, midwiferyand consultant staff.

We aim to increase thenumber of consultants by 600 by 2006, and to attract 12,000 nurses and midwivesinto the NHS by 2007.

Additional help in areas ofrecruitment will also be provided by Careers for Health, with one of its aimsbeing to raise the profile of careers in the NHSScotland.

Work is, therefore, under wayto re-energise recruitment to the health service and to redesign jobs where newnursing and medical roles are identified.

Question reference: S2W-03479

Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 October 2003
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 12 November 2003

To ask the Scottish Executive how many orthodontic consultants are employed by each NHS board, expressed also per head of population.

The following table shows wholetime equivalent (WTE) and headcount of orthodontic consultants and thepopulation by NHS board area, correct at 30 September 2002. The population estimate is correct at 30 June 2002.

Orthodontic Consultants byNHS Board

	Orthodontic Consultants	Population	Rate per 100,000 of population
NHS Board	Headcount	WTE		Headcount	WTE
Argyll and Clyde	2	2.0	418,750	0.48	0.48
Ayrshire and Arran	2	2.0	367,060	0.54	0.54
Borders	-	-	107,400	-	-
Dumfries and Galloway	1	1.0	147,310	0.68	0.68
Fife	1	1.0	350,620	0.29	0.29
Forth Valley	3	2.3	279,370	1.07	0.82
Grampian	2	2.0	523,290	0.38	0.38
Greater Glasgow	6	4.5	866,080	0.69	0.52
Highland	2	2.0	208,140	0.96	0.96
Lanarkshire	3	3.0	552,910	0.54	0.54
Lothian	2	2.0	779,100	0.26	0.26
Orkney	-	-	19,210	-	-
Shetland	-	-	21,940	-	-
Tayside	3	1.9	387,420	0.77	0.49
Western Isles	-	-	26,200	-	-
Scotland	26	23.7	5,054,800	0.51	0.47

Sources: Medical and DentalCensus, ISD Scotland & GRO mid-year population estimates

The “Rates per 100,000population” should be treated with caution. The variability in rates betweenhealth boards can be partly explained by the small number of consultants eachrate is based on. Also, these rates do not take account of cross‑borderflows between health boards e.g. patients resident in one health board area mayreceive their orthodontic treatment in another health board.

Question reference: S2W-03477

Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 October 2003
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 12 November 2003

To ask the Scottish Executive how often, and for how long, on average, clinics dealing with tooth extractions under general anaesthetic are held in each NHS board area.

Question reference: S2W-03478

Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 October 2003
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 12 November 2003

To ask the Scottish Executive what the average waiting time is in each NHS board area for children awaiting a general anaesthetic for tooth extractions.

The specific information requestedis not available centrally. Information on waiting times is collectedretrospectively, and does not identify where a general anaesthetic has beenadministered.

The median waiting times forin-patient and day case treatment for tooth extractions in children, during theyear ended 30 June 2003, by NHS board area of residence, is given in the followingtable.

NHSScotland: Median WaitingTimes for In-patient and Day Case Treatment for Tooth Extraction in Children¹,by NHS Board Area of Residence. Year Ended 30 June 2003^P

NHS Board	Median Wait^P (days)
Argyll and Clyde	10
Ayrshire and Arran	10
Borders	4
Dumfries and Galloway	64
Fife	-²
Forth Valley	28
Grampian	-²
Greater Glasgow	18
Highland	13
Lanarkshire	20
Lothian	125
Orkney	-³
Shetland	-³
Tayside	16
Western Isles	-³
NHSScotland	15

Source: ISD Scotland, SMR01

^PProvisional

¹Childrenhave been identified as patients aged less than 17 years at date of admission.

²Informationnot shown due to unrepresentative incomplete data.

³Information not shown due to small numbers.

Question reference: S2W-03405

Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 10 October 2003
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 7 November 2003

To ask the Scottish Executive how many UK joint ministerial meetings have been attended by its ministers in each year since 1999, expressed also as a percentage of total joint ministerial meetings in each year.

The following table lists thenumber of UK Joint Ministerial Committee (JMC) meetings attended by Executive Ministersin each year since 1999, also expressed as a percentage of the total JMCmeetings for each year.

Year	Number of JMC Meetings	Number of Meetings Attended	Percentage of Meetings Attended %
1999*	1	1	100
2000	8	8	100
2001	4	3	75
2002	6	6	100
2003**	2	2	100
Total	21	20	95

Notes:

*July–December

**January–October

Question reference: S2W-03329

Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 October 2003
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 6 November 2003

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of NHS funding allocated using the Arbuthnott formula was allocated to each NHS board area for the current year and will be allocated for the next three years, expressed also on a per capita basis, and whether these percentages are likely to change as a result of any review of the Arbuthnott formula and, if so, in what way.

Details of Arbuthnott targetpercentages used to allocate NHS funding and per capita funding for 2003-04 areas follows:

NHS Board	2003-04 Arbuthnott Formula Target %	2003-04 Per Capita %
Argyll and Clyde	8.663	8.284
Ayrshire and Arran	7.775	7.262
Borders	2.214	2.125
Dumfries and Galloway	3.197	2.914
Fife	6.665	6.936
Forth Valley	5.298	5.527
Grampian	9.060	10.352
Greater Glasgow	18.685	17.134
Highland	4.545	4.118
Lanarkshire	10.626	10.938
Lothian	13.597	15.413
Orkney	0.417	0.380
Shetland	0.449	0.434
Tayside	8.020	7.664
Western Isles	0.790	0.518

Indicative allocations for2004-05 and 2005-06 have been calculated on the basis of 2003-04 Arbuthnotttarget percentages. No indicative allocations have yet been made for 2006-07.

The Arbuthnott targetpercentages for future years will increase or decrease due to annual updatingof the formula to take account of population movements and further updating of the formula. Firm allocations for 2004-05 and 2005-06 will be calculated on thebasis of the updated target percentages.