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Since the start of the Perinatal and Infant Mental Health Programme Board we have invested over £18m in improvements to services and support for parents, infants and families across Scotland. This includes £5.5m for development of specialist Community Perinatal Mental Health services.

Funding levels for each Board have been primarily based on the gaps identified in Delivering Effective Services Report – Perinatal Mental Health Network Scotland and further shaped through discussions with each Board to ensure funding meets local need. As the we progress the programme of work, allocations are transitioning to an NRAC share which is the Scottish Resource Allocation formula used to distribute funding to NHS Boards.

Initial development funding was provided to two Health Boards in the North of Scotland in 2019-20. Funding was then rolled out to all mainland Boards in 2020/21 and all Boards received an allocation in 2021-22.

Following conclusion of the current Programme Board in March 2023, £8m per annum has been earmarked as recurring funding to Health Boards to support the sustainability of perinatal and infant mental health services across Scotland. This includes £5m specifically for specialist Community Perinatal Mental Health services.

Please see the following tables for a breakdown of funding allocated per Board for specialist Community Perinatal Mental Health services for the last 3 financial years.

One of the key pillars of the National Strategy for Economic Transformation is to strengthen Scotland’s position in new markets and industries to generate well-paid jobs and support a just transition to net zero. The Strategy sets out a range of actions to deliver on this vision. We are now developing sectoral and regional Just Transition Plans, which will identify relevant green industrial opportunities. Our first Just Transition Plan will be the Energy Strategy and Just Transition Plan, which is intended for publication in draft form in autumn 2022.

Work is also underway to strengthen our supply chains in the renewables energy sector. We're aware, for example, that Scotland’s developing hydrogen economy will require a strong domestic supply chain.

That's why the Scottish Government has announced a Hydrogen Supply Chain Event at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre on 22 September to help build on and explore the opportunities that exist within this emerging sector.

For Offshore Wind, applicants to the ScotWind leasing round were required to submit a Supply Chain Development Statement (SCDS) that sets out the level and location of supply chain impact throughout the lifetime of projects. These commitments amount to billions of pounds of investment to the Scottish supply chain. Initial projections show an average spend of £1.5bn in Scotland per project.

It has been agreed that some patients based in Tayside and receiving radiotherapy for breast cancer will have to travel for their treatment to their next nearest cancer centre, in Edinburgh, Glasgow or Aberdeen. Patients required to travel will be fully supported, with travel and accommodation costs covered by the Health Board.

NHS Tayside have been working closely with Oncology teams across all four Cancer Centres in Scotland to ensure that patients in need of treatment are prioritised appropriately. Discussions about mutual aid have taken place between Chief Executives and Medical Directors and the national oncology taskforce is looking at national approaches to the management of oncology.

The mutual aid provided has been agreed on the basis that there will be no adverse impact on patient care in NHS Grampian.

The information requested on Health Board admissions to Mother and Baby Units is not held centrally. However, Mother and Baby Units in NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde and NHS Lothian may have this data available through local data systems. Both Mother and Baby Units also participate in the Clinical Audit System referenced in S6W-08970 on 20 June 2022 which supports Mother and Baby Units in further developing and improving the provision they offer.

Additionally, the Scottish Government Perinatal and Infant Mental Health Programme Board is looking at this question as part of the work following the Mother and Baby Unit (MBU) Inpatient Provision Consultation which closed on 31 May 2022.

All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

The Scottish Government has a long standing commitment of improving Fair Work across Scotland. We are actively working with our partners in Local Government, COSLA, Trade Unions and the third and independent sectors to support and encourage Effective Voice within the Adult Social Care Sector. This includes ways we can support people to access Trade Union membership through an improved awareness and access of Trade Unions. It is the responsibility of Trade Unions to build their membership through their usual channels, and we are supportive of the efforts which Trade Unions are undertaking to do this’

Furthermore, we continue to support the Fair Work and Trade Union Modernisation Fund, committing to support unions in embedding the Fair Work Framework in Scotland’s workplaces. This funding has enabled unions to work proactively, and to build upon ongoing efforts, to tackle precarious work, and organising for Fair Work in less unionised sectors.

The Scottish Government takes the issue of Scotland’s declining populations of wild Atlantic salmon very seriously and is working to ensure the protection and recovery of this iconic species. In January 2022 the Scottish Government published the Wild Salmon Strategy which provides an overarching framework for the actions required to tackle the range of pressures affecting wild salmon. The Strategy can be accessed at Scottish Wild Salmon Strategy - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

A commitment made in the Strategy is to undertake a study to identify the socio-economic benefits arising from healthy wild Atlantic salmon populations and how these can be maximised through partnerships between the public, private and charitable sectors. Furthermore, this study will allow comparisons to be made between the current economic value of the recreational fisheries sector to past values.

The most recent socio-economic study was conducted in 2017 and showed that recreational fisheries in Scotland contributed £79.9m Gross Value Added and 4300 FTE jobs. It is important to note that, although this study was published in 2017, it was based on data from 2014/15 when coastal netting was still in place. It is anticipated that the subsequent prohibition on coastal netting is likely to have had an effect on the economic value.

Developing specialist Community Perinatal Mental Health teams across every Health Board has been a priority since the start of the Perinatal and Infant Mental Health Programme Board. Since 2019 we have invested over £5.5 million to establish specialist community perinatal mental health teams in every area of Scotland. This is in addition to investment in other specialist services such as infant mental health services and maternal and neonatal psychological interventions (MNPI).

To support Health Board areas to use this funding to develop local services, the Perinatal Mental Health Managed Clinical Network Scotland have developed a number of supporting resources. These include service development guides, care pathways and role descriptors.

We have also recruited a Perinatal and Infant Mental Health Service Development Advisor to work closely with Boards to support them in their implementation of specialist services.

Finalising the establishment of specialist perinatal mental health provision across all Health Boards in Scotland is a priority for the final year of the Programme Board. Every NHS Board area has an Executive Lead driving forward the programme of work and both strategic and implementation groups are also in place.

The Mother and Baby Unit (MBU) Inpatient Provision Consultation closed on 31 May 2022. While more detailed work on the outcomes of this consultation is underway, we are expecting NHS Grampian and NHS Forth Valley to enter into contractual agreements with a Mother and Baby Unit in line with the other territorial Health Boards.

The Perinatal and Infant Mental Health Programme Board and Perinatal Mental Health Managed Clinical Network Scotland will provide support to Boards in setting up these arrangements. We are in the process of meeting with MBU host Boards and NHS Forth Valley and NHS Grampian to discuss how to best ensure access for women and their infants.

Until these arrangements are in place, women residing within any Health Board area in Scotland are still able to access the specialist regional provision in a Mother and Baby Unit if clinically appropriate. Admission is based on clinical need rather than geography.

ScotRail’s Safety and Security team has been developing options relating to the current ban on consumption of alcohol on trains. I understand that the ScotRail Trains Ltd Board will consider these options shortly and will take account of the range of stakeholder views, including those of Trade Unions and any further representations that are made. I will then consider any recommendation ScotRail provides, giving due cognisance to staff and passenger safety.

Dr Church, the independent chair of the review, has advised that he intends to launch another round of stakeholder engagement for stakeholders by the end of July, running through to August or early September, during which he will be both seeking responses to specific questions and open to any further representations stakeholder may wish to make. This is in addition to the engagement already undertaken through the Call for Evidence for the review.