- Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 15 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Andy Kerr on 10 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-10810 by Malcolm Chisholm on 30 September 2004, for which NHS boards is such information available and how many children in each such board were classified as clinically obese in each of the last five years, expressed also as a percentage of the child population in each board and showing the percentage change on a year-on-year basis.
Answer
Although the information is not available in the exact format requested I have provided the information that is readily available through the Information Services Division. This information has been provided in two tables that provide data on High Body Mass Index and the number of children that have been examined in each participating NHS board. The information is available from the Parliamentary Information Centre (Bib. number 34303). Further data have also been are published in the NHS Quality Improvement Scotland Report, Clinical Outcome Indicators, Clinical Outcomes Group, November 2003. This report shows that of 12-year-olds in Scotland, 33% were overweight, 18% obese and 10-11% severely obese.
- Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 15 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Andy Kerr on 10 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-10810 by Malcolm Chisholm on 30 September 2004, how it will obtain such information from NHS boards that have not submitted data.
Answer
The Scottish Executive will be producing guidance for the implementation as set out in the publication,
Health for All Children available on the website:
http://www.health- or-all-children.co.uk/which will provide NHS boards with the steps that will be introduced to monitorobesity in children and young people.
- Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Allan Wilson on 9 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-9053 by Lewis Macdonald on 28 June 2004, whether it has any plans to publish additional statistics in respect of energy usage and sources and, if so, what the most up-to-date figures are.
Answer
Statistics on energy usage and sources in Scotland are collected and published by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) in its energy trends website. DTI has a programme of work to produce energy statistics at sub-national level wherever practical and where data provided in confidence are not disclosed. As additional statistics become available, the Scottish Executive will publish summary information on the Scottish Executive’s Environment statistics website. The latest gas and electricity data published by the DTI was in December 2003 and the latest renewables and combined heat power figures were published in September 2004.
- Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 28 September 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Jim Wallace on 8 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive how many measures it has introduced since May 1999 which have the objective of increasing energy efficiency.
Answer
The Scottish Executive has introduced six major initiatives since 1999 which improve energy efficiency covering both the domestic and business sectors.
Central Heating Programme: provides free central heating, insulation, advice and other benefits to householders in the private and social rented sector.
Warm Deal: provides home insulation grants to low-income households and pensioners.
Scottish Projects Fund: supports specific projects which address domestic energy efficiency issues, for example, in the private rented sector which are unique to, or particularly important in Scotland, or which have a Scottish dimension.
Regional Business Manager Network: provides locally based access and support to business and the public sectors on resource efficiency issues.
Loan Action Scotland: provides interest-free loans to Small- and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) to fund capital investments which improve their energy efficiency.
Public Sector Energy Efficiency Initiative: a fund available to all Scottish local authorities, health boards and Scottish Water to implement capital investment and other measures which will reduce their carbon emissions and improve their efficiency.
In addition, the Scottish Executive has supported a number of smaller projects such as the Federation of Small Businesses toolkit. It also fully supports UK programmes, for example, by directly funding the Carbon Trust’s Energy Efficiency Programme in Scotland. It also takes full advantage of existing UK funding schemes including the Community Energy Programme which supports the introduction of district and community heating schemes.
- Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 01 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Hugh Henry on 8 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what the average waiting time is in each NHS board area for access to drug misuse treatment programmes.
Answer
This information is not held centrally. Average waiting times are not regarded as a particularly effective measure of the availability and efficiency of drugs services.
Our national initiative to improve the collection and monitoring of waiting times for drug services in Scotland will, therefore, provide the Executive and Drug Action Teams with details of the number of people who wait for less than one week, less than two weeks, and so on, for up to four different treatment and support interventions.
The national waiting times information framework for drugs services began in April 2004. The first information output will be available by the end of November 2004.
- Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 25 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 8 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what its long-term strategy is to address fuel poverty.
Answer
The information requested is given in The Scottish Fuel Poverty Statement published by the Scottish Executive in 2002, a copy of which is available in the Parliament’s Reference Centre (Bib. number 23335).
- Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 25 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 8 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what events, arranged as part of the United Kingdom’s EU presidency in 2005, are scheduled to take place in Scotland, differentiating between events that are finalised and those that are provisional, and what percentage this represents of all such events taking place within the UK.
Answer
Information was submitted to the European and External Relations Committee and discussed at their meeting on 26 October 2004. (See the Official Report at:
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/business/committees/europe/papers-04/eup04-17.pdf.Given that no definitive list of all such events taking place within the UK is currently available, it is not possible to provide a percentage figure.
- Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 25 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Jim Wallace on 8 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has any plans to establish targets for heat and fuel sourced by renewable energy.
Answer
We have no immediate plans to do so. The Executive will, however, work with UK colleagues in considering the contribution that biomass heat can make to the renewables agenda.
- Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 25 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Jim Wallace on 8 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has undertaken any studies into the potential for biomass energy within Scotland and potential economic and environmental benefits that could be derived as a result of using biomass energy production.
Answer
The Forum for Renewable Energy Development in Scotland has been tasked with preparing proposals for the development of biomass energy in Scotland, with particular reference to the use of wood fuel. The Group is considering both the potential for the sector and the economic and environmental benefits that might accrue. I expect that its report will be published before the end of the year.
- Asked by: Richard Lochhead, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 25 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Jim Wallace on 8 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive whether the funding promised for each Intermediary Technology Institute has been allocated in each year since such funding was announced and whether such funding will be allocated for each of the next three years.
Answer
This is an operational matter for Scottish Enterprise.
