Seòmar agus comataidhean

I refer the Member to the answer to question S5W-24637 on 2 September 2019. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at:http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx

The Royal Hospital for Children and Young People is part of the Scottish Government’s Non-Profit Distributing (NPD) programme. Of the £139m of annual Benefits delivered by the Scottish Futures Trust (SFT) during 2017-18, approximately 12% was attributed to the NPD programme but is not broken down by project. SFT’s Statement of Benefits is subject to an independent, external review undertaken by Grant Thornton.

This reflects the advantages of SFT providing procuring authorities with a centralised support function. It includes the development, roll-out and management of the NPD standard form contract documents across the ten projects, as well as delivering project assurance processes at key milestones during the development and procurement stages of the NPD projects. It also takes into consideration the provision of commercial and financial expertise provided to procuring authorities that attracted value-for-money finance for their projects, which included securing over £750m funding from the European Investment Bank across the NPD programme.

NHS Lothian’s local prescribing formulary includes evidence-based antibiotic guidelines for hospital and community-based prescribing. They will always give a first line treatment and an alternative for those with a penicillin allergy. The guidelines for NHS Lothian can be found at:

http://intranet.lothian.scot.nhs.uk/Directory/amt/Pages/
Antimicrobial%20Management%20Home%20Page.aspx .

It is for NHS Boards to put in place local prescribing formularies which are based on a range of issues including the general population, prevalence, clinical decisions and appropriateness for the patient concerned.

Ultimately, prescribing decisions are matters for each GP or prescribing clinician in consultation with the patient, taking into account the individual circumstances, including any allergies and treatment needs.

All health boards in Scotland have local antibiotic guidelines for hospital and community prescribing and these include alternative treatments for patients with a recorded penicillin allergy for all types of infection. Since 2009, following guidance from the Scottish Antimicrobial Prescribing Group, all Health Board guidance has been based on an evidence based template developed and maintained by Public Health England and recently merged with NICE guidance on Antimicrobial Prescribing:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/managing-common-infections-guidance-for-primary-care

Local antibiotic guidelines are reviewed and updated where required every 3 years (or sooner if necessary) and approved by Health Board Antimicrobial Management Teams, sub-groups of their Area Drug and Therapeutics Committees and are available electronically in all GP practices clinical systems.

Under the terms of Non-Profit Distributing (NPD) contracts, the unitary charges become payable when the contractor has met its obligations and the procuring authorities “take the keys” to the facility. This is the contract completion date. For buildings, this date will generally be before the procuring authority takes occupation or is delivering services (i.e. becoming operational). This is an essential part of the project where an authority would be required to fit out the facility with for example, equipment and move staff into the facility as well as aligning the opening of a facility with for example, a new College term. This element does not form part of the NPD contract and the time required for this type of activity varies from project to project.

In addition, NPD projects can sometimes have more than one phase so it would be normal for example, to hand over part of a campus or a section of road once completed, with the associated unitary charge payments being adjusted to reflect this.

The following table includes those NPD contracts from 2007 onwards and information relating to the date that the associated unitary charge payments commenced and the date that the facility was opened for use (i.e. operational). The table also includes further information, which provides details of activity between the date unitary charge payments commenced and the date the facility opened for use. Details on all the associated NPD unitary charge payments can be found at the following web links:

www.gov.scot/publications/NPD-hub-projects

www.gov.scot/publications/NPD-projects-pre-November-2010

The Scottish Government received the 2018-23 noise action plan from Edinburgh Airport on 18 th December 2018. This was formally adopted by Scottish Ministers on 17 January 2019 and then published on the European Commission’s website, where all of the noise action plans for Scotland can be viewed.

Thought Field Therapy is not included as an evidence based treatment in standard UK clinical guidelines. In particular, it is not included in “The Psychological Matrix” (2015) which is a comprehensive guide to delivering psychological therapies in Scotland.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on current medical research, or ongoing medical trials. We expect NHS services to consider all credible options of improving treatment for patients.

Since the Scottish Government became aware of the SMC’s now announced decision not to recommend Orkambi® or Symkevi® for routine availability on the NHS, officials have held a number of meetings with the SMC, with the manufacturer and with other interested parties. The purpose of these meetings has been to seek to develop the principles of a solution that can make possible the widest availability of these medicines, wherever clinically appropriate. Further meetings are planned and work continues as a matter of urgency.

The SMC considered in relation to the two applications that it did not consider the cost to be justified in light of the continuing uncertainty about clinical effectiveness. The SMC takes decisions independently of the Scottish Government.

As outlined in the Tackling Child Poverty Deliver Plan First Annual Progress Report, £4.9 million has currently been committed for 2019-20 from the Tackling Child Poverty Fund. Anticipated investment is set out in the following table:

The following table incudes Scottish public sector contracts awarded to Multiplex through the Public Contracts Scotland web portal. Brookfield is the parent company of Multiplex.