Asked by: Mochan, Carol (Scottish Labour - South Scotland)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what the timeline is for the introduction of the next phase of the Women’s Health Plan.
Answered by Minto, Jenni - Minister for Public Health and Women's Health
The next phase of the Women’s Health Plan is expected to be published in January 2026.
Asked by: Wishart, Beatrice (Scottish Liberal Democrats - Shetland Islands)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether an endometriosis diagnosis obtained outwith Scotland is recognised by NHS Scotland.
Answered by Minto, Jenni - Minister for Public Health and Women's Health
Clinical decisions on the care and treatment of individual patients are always matters of professional judgement for the responsible practitioner.
Asked by: Grant, Rhoda (Scottish Labour - Highlands and Islands)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government, in light of it withdrawing the Scottish Good Practice statement on myalgic enchephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) and adopting the NICE Guideline on the condition, how compliant specialist services for ME/CFS are to be instituted and monitored for NICE Clinical Guideline compliance across Scotland, and whether it will implement and fund the Delivery Plan elements that are within its devolved competence.
Answered by Minto, Jenni - Minister for Public Health and Women's Health
The provision of healthcare services is the responsibility of NHS boards. We expect all boards to ensure that their services are informed by current clinical best practice. In commissioning boards’ plans for the recently announced £4.5 million a year in funding for ME/CFS, long-COVID and other similar conditions, we have stressed the importance of ensuring that services are informed by current clinical best practice, such as National Institute for Excellence in Healthcare (NICE) guidelines NG:206 and NG:188- which are available to clinicians across the UK.
There are no devolved elements of the UK Government’s Delivery Plan on ME/CFS; it covers the population of England only. However, the UK Government shared anonymised responses to its public consultation on the draft Plan from stakeholders living in Scotland with the Scottish Government, and we are taking these views into account as we progress our ongoing work on ME/CFS.
Asked by: Leonard, Richard (Scottish Labour - Central Scotland)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will list the partners that Transport Scotland shared the initial specification with of the Clyde and Hebrides Ferry Services 3 (CHFS3) contract, as recorded in the 7 March 2025 minutes of the Ferries Community Board.
Answered by Hyslop, Fiona - Cabinet Secretary for Transport
Transport Scotland engaged with a number of partners on the development of the specification. This included sharing the draft specification with CalMac Ferries Ltd, in addition to discussing specific elements with CMAL, to ensure that operational and technical issues were appropriately addressed to reflect current practice.
Some elements of the specification were also shared and discussed with the Ferries Community Board, specifically regarding key performance indicators and the embedding of the Ferries Community Board in the specification. This input was invaluable to inform the suite of performance indicators, and the Ferries Community Board will continue to be engaged on strategic matters throughout the life of the contract to provide us with an independent community voice.
Asked by: Baker, Claire (Scottish Labour - Mid Scotland and Fife)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what steps are being taken to improve clinical training and pathways for diagnosing and managing migraine.
Answered by Minto, Jenni - Minister for Public Health and Women's Health
We recognise the distress and pain that migraines cause and we take the issue of migraine seriously.
The Centre for Sustainable Delivery launched the national headache pathway in October 2023, to improve care for migraines and headache across Scotland. The pathway is being implemented to aid with the diagnosis and management of headache disorders including migraine, offer guidance on management, and support health boards to aid their future planning.
Additionally, NES Pharmacy hosted a webinar in September 2024 to provide guidance to pharmacy staff on the assessment, support and management of people living with migraine in line with the Scottish National Headache Pathway.
Asked by: Balfour, Jeremy (Independent - Lothian)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the Public Health Scotland Scottish Stroke Improvement Programme report suggesting that, in the last year, on admission to hospital, only 56% of stroke patients in NHS Lothian received the most basic levels of care for the condition, which is known as "the stroke care bundle".
Answered by Minto, Jenni - Minister for Public Health and Women's Health
We expect NHS Health Boards, including NHS Lothian, to identify aspects of their stroke services which do not meet the Scottish Standards and to work to improve their standards of care locally.
Every NHS Board now has an accountable senior individual responsible for standards of stroke care. I met with these leads in October last year and will be meeting them again in November to review progress.
Asked by: Lennon, Monica (Scottish Labour - Central Scotland)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking in response to reports of poor broadband connectivity across Scotland, including in Lanarkshire, and when it anticipates that (a) householders and (b) small businesses will see meaningful improvements.
Answered by Lochhead, Richard - Minister for Business and Employment
All homes and businesses in Scotland should now be able to access a minimum of a superfast broadband connection, thanks to the three strands of activity that make up the Reaching 100% (R100) programme - the R100 contracts, our Scottish Broadband Voucher Scheme and ongoing commercial coverage. According to Ofcom figures, gigabit coverage in Scotland stands at 78% - up from just 59% in 2022. Ofcom figures also show North and South Lanarkshire as amongst the best served areas in Scotland for access to gigabit capable broadband – with 92% and 87% gigabit coverage respectively.
Digital infrastructure is essential for building a fairer, greener, and stronger economy, which is why over the last decade the Scottish Government has delivered over one million faster, more reliable broadband connections across the country - backed by over £1 billion of publicly driven investment. This is despite telecoms being wholly reserved to Westminster.
There is, however, more to be done. This is why we are playing a crucial role in the delivery of Project Gigabit in Scotland, having awarded new local and regional contracts earlier this year with further regional contracts in procurement, as well as managing delivery of the nationwide contract which was awarded by the UK Government to Openreach last year.
There will, however, remain premises which are beyond the reach of Project Gigabit procurements and are considered very hard to reach by the UK Government. Despite promises that an approach to connecting such premises would be forthcoming in 2022 and then again in 2023, we continue to await a clear proposal. We stand ready to work with the UK Government to develop a solution to connect those premises, ensuring that no one is left behind.
Asked by: Sweeney, Paul (Scottish Labour - Glasgow)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what studies have recently been carried out regarding the experiences of young people receiving person-centred child and adolescent mental health services (CAHMS).
Answered by Arthur, Tom - Minister for Social Care and Mental Wellbeing
Through implementation of the Supporting documents - Child And Adolescent Mental Health Services: national service specification - gov.scot. Health Boards are required to fully engage with children, young people and families, and to gather outcomes data against these standards including on the experiences of young people accessing support through CAMHS. Health Boards are also required to report on performance and governance as part of their responsibilities under the Specification.
The Scottish Government continues to work closely with all Health Boards to support implementation of the CAMHS specification and to improve the service provided to children, young people and families, as well as improve performance across CAMHS. We remain committed to supporting all Boards to meet the standard that 90% of patients start treatment within 18 weeks of referral. We continue to provide enhanced support to those Boards not on track to meet the standard, providing access to professional advice, ensuring they have robust improvement plans in place and monitoring their implementation.
Asked by: Clark, Katy (Scottish Labour - West Scotland)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will increase funding for the No Knives, Better Lives campaign, in light of the campaign having a reported 12% real-terms reduction in its funding since 2022-23.
Answered by Brown, Siobhian - Minister for Victims and Community Safety
Against a background of increased funding pressures, we have committed over £6 million to support delivery of a range of prevention and early intervention activities through the Violence Prevention Framework, since its publication in 2023. This investment supports a range of partners, who are working jointly to deliver on the priorities set out in the Framework. YouthLink Scotland’s No Knives, Better Lives programme itself has been financially supported with grant funding of over £5.7m since 2009, including almost £300k in 2025-26. This has allowed YouthLink Scotland to deliver social media messages about knife crime prevention as well as No Knives, Better Lives training sessions to 6,000 front line practitioners and 650 peer educators. This has enabled the programme to reach 165,000 young people across all 32 local authorities in Scotland.
Asked by: Sweeney, Paul (Scottish Labour - Glasgow)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with the General Dentist Council (GDC) and Dental Complaints Service (DCS) regarding the possibility of the organisations (a) capturing relevant practice-level data, in particular practice name, full address and company number where relevant, and (b) publishing anonymised, practice-linked complaint aggregates, with small-number suppression, in order to enable patients to have access to more information when choosing a private dental practice in Scotland.
Answered by Minto, Jenni - Minister for Public Health and Women's Health
The Scottish Government has held no talks with the General Dental Council (GDC) regarding the provision and publication of statistics relating to private dental clinics. Regulation of dentists is reserved to the UK parliament and the GDC is the independent statutory regulator for the dental team. It does not however regulate dental premises, with Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS) being the regulator of independent clinics in Scotland. Where available, HIS publishes inspection reports for independent clinics on its register.