Seòmar agus comataidhean

The requested information on how many people were diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS), broken down by NHS board is not held centrally.

The Scottish Multiple Sclerosis Register provides information on new diagnoses of MS. The latest publication of the register shows 450 new patients with a confirmed diagnosis of MS were added to the MS Register in 2020.

Prioritisation within the Scottish Government’s COVID-19 vaccination programme is based upon the clinical risk of developing severe disease with COVID-19. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advises on clinical prioritisation for vaccination. Priority groups 1-9 incorporate the highest clinical risk groups and each group cohort is invited to receive vaccination accordingly.

As per guidance outlined within the Green Book, Chapter 14a, children and young people aged 12-15 years with poorly controlled asthma that requires continuous or repeated use of systemic steroids or with previous exacerbations requiring hospital admission, are included as a high risk group within chronic respiratory disease.

For full details please see p19-23: COVID-19: the green book, chapter 14a - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) .

The Louisa Jordan was always intended to be a temporary facility to provide additional capacity at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Due to the effectiveness of efforts to suppress the virus, hospitalisations were reduced, NHS capacity was maintained, and NHS Louisa Jordan did not have to be used as a Covid hospital. If NHS Louisa Jordan were reopened, it would mean the disruptive reassignment of NHS staff from other critical NHS sites, which are already at high capacity.

The Scottish Government did not receive advance notice of the Home Office decision to accommodate asylum seekers in hotels in Scotland. I wrote to the Home Secretary on 21 October to raise concerns about the lack of advance engagement on this matter and on the suitability of using hotels to accommodate people seeking asylum. Officials have subsequently had engagement with Home Office officials on this issue.

Scottish Government and COSLA have regular discussions about a range of asylum matters including the use of hotels.

The Scottish Government supports the development of new electricity power stations with Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) such as the proposal for a new station at Peterhead. This has the potential to ensure that a net zero electricity system in Scottish remains resilient and secure.

The Scottish Government is supportive of CCUS, an industrial scale decarbonisation system with the potential to make a big impact on achieving Scotland’s emissions targets. The advice from the Climate Change Committee describes CCUS as a “necessity, not an option” to achieve net zero emissions.

The First Minister has not visited any care homes during the COVID-19 pandemic to listen to the views of residents, but has closely monitored the situation in care homes throughout, discussing developments frequently with officials and Ministers.

The Scottish Government have not made contact with the Australian Government for advice regarding an apology for historical adoption practices.

This five-fold increase refers only to primary pupils and the proportion of pupils absent for over 50% of the time remains very small at 1% of all primary pupils. The wider context is that in 2020-21 over 41% of pupils had attendance rates over 95%. It should be further noted that 2020-21 daily management information are not directly comparable to the 2018-19 National Statistics due to differences in collection methods, quality assurance undertaken and COVID-19 related school closures in 2020-21.

To ensure schools and local authorities are able to best support pupils’ education the Government has committed almost £500m funding during 2020-21 and 2021-22 to support education recovery, and we continue to prioritise support for children and young people in the continued navigation of the pandemic. We are investing £260m to recruit additional teachers, including £20m for tutoring and mentoring to help children and families, along with £90 million to support local authorities in implementing protection measures to ensure schools are safe, open and welcoming.

We also delivered £25m in 2020-21 for over 72,000 devices and more than 14,000 connectivity packages have been distributed to learners across Scotland and we remain committed to ensuring every child has access to a device and connectivity by the end of this Parliament.

Furthermore, record investment of £215 million in the Scottish Attainment Challenge this year, including a £20 million Pupil Equity Funding premium, is providing additional support for children and young people who need it most.

With the support of £1 billion over this parliamentary term, the refreshed Scottish Attainment Challenge programme will support continued empowerment of school leaders through Pupil Equity Funding and a clearer and funded strategic role for all 32 local authorities. This will enable local authorities and schools to implement local, evidence based approaches to supporting children and young people impacted by poverty.

The number of households in each local authority that are experiencing fuel poverty is published annually in the Scottish House Condition Survey (SHCS) local authority tables.

The latest published set of tables for 2017-2019 is available at:

Scottish House Condition Survey: Local Authority Analysis 2017-2019 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) .

Local Authority figures are based on a 3-year pooled sample to allow sufficient sample sizes to produce results on each local authority. The figures in the table show number of fuel poor households, and the fuel poverty rate, based on the last 10 years for South Lanarkshire, North Lanarkshire, and Falkirk.

Wearing a helmet is a matter of personal choice, not a requirement.

The wearing of cycle helmets is covered by the Highway Code and is a matter reserved to the UK Government. It recommends wearing a cycle helmet which conforms to current regulations, is the correct size and securely fastened, if cyclists choose to do so.

The Scottish Government is committed to improving the safety of all vulnerable road users through a variety of means including the building of safe, high quality active travel infrastructure, providing training and encouraging good road user behaviour with mutual respect.