The Scottish Government recognises the impact long delays in call answering times at NHS 24 could have on A&E attendances. NHS 24 is focussed on ensuring that patients receive the correct advice immediately without a requirement to be placed in a queue, in line with what extensive patient engagement has told the Service. Although this means patients may sometimes have to wait longer for their call to be answered, over 95% of calls are closed first time with patients getting appropriate support and advice without any requirement to be placed in a queue for a call back. This not only helps callers with a reduced journey time through NHS 24 but also hastens any onward referral to local services within NHS Boards reducing pressure across the system.

There are significant pressures residing across all areas of the system, including the NHS 24 111 service and, as a result, we have increased funding for the service by over £20m. This is supporting additional recruitment of call handlers and clinicians, including the addition of two new call centres in Dundee and Glasgow to help facilitate the increase in demand generated by the redesign of urgent care programme.

Furthermore, our new Urgent and Unscheduled Care Collaborative programme, supported by £50 million, will support the implementation of a range of measures to reduce A&E waiting times and improve patient experience, including alternatives to hospital-based treatment.

Scottish Government's Chief Scientist Office (CSO), through NHS Research Scotland, supports clinical research infrastructure that allows Health Boards, researchers, clinicians and industry to improve the quality, efficiency, coordination and impact of clinical research, supporting a broad range of clinical research studies. CSO's approach to funding does not focus on directly commissioning or funding specific research areas, instead providing broad-based support through investments in key infrastructure and wide-remit research grant and fellowship schemes.

The Scottish Government position is that pesticides should be authorised on a case by case basis where the available scientific evidence shows they do not pose unacceptable risks to human health, animals and the environment. An emergency authorisation for the use of the herbicide product Asulox has been approved for bracken control in 2022 in limited and controlled circumstances.

There is a need to move away from the use of emergency authorisations as the solution and look into more sustainable, long-term alternatives to Asulox. Officials have been instructed to begin talks with the other UK administrations and the Health and Safety Executive, to further engage stakeholders and those working on alternative solutions, to ensure we have more sustainable forms of bracken control going forward.

The childcare workforce has grown overall as a result of the ELC expansion, with the latest data showing an increase of 26% between 2016 and 2020. The Scottish Social Services Council’s Stability Index (i.e. the proportion of staff who have been retained from the previous year) shows a Stability Index of 78.9% for the day care of children workforce, broadly similar to the overall Index of 80.8% for social services.

Throughout the ELC expansion the Scottish Government has taken a range of actions with partners to support recruitment and retention across all parts of the childcare sector. Those include: working with skills bodies and training providers to increase enrolments on training courses by 25.6% between 2017 and 2020; delivery of a national recruitment campaign, attracting high quality individuals to all parts of the sector; and enabling payment of the Real Living Wage to staff delivering funded hours.

Near patient International Normalised Ratio (INR) testing is currently not routinely available on the NHS. However, INR testing is available through primary care settings for those who require it. Individual NHS Boards are responsible for providing services that work best with the needs of their populations.

Scottish Government is aware that NHS Dumfries & Galloway has experienced challenges with the delivery of GP services in Dumfries & Galloway including Lockerbie and Moffat.

NHS Dumfries & Galloway is working with the new contractors in Lockerbie and Moffat to stabilise and improve GP services there.

Community ownership is an important aim of the Scottish Government, where there are numerous examples of communities thriving after being given the opportunity to own and manage their own assets. This leads to better local outcomes, which focus on local needs.

The proposed community buyout of a portion of Langholm Moor, by The Langholm Initiative is an ambitious project. The group intend to use the land to regenerate the landscape and revitalise the local community through the creation of a nature reserve which will boost local tourism, providing new employment, training and housing opportunities for the local community.

The project is an example of what communities are capable of, given the right support, which is why the Scottish Government, through the Scottish Land Fund, has already awarded the community group a grant of £1m.

The Scottish Government, Scottish Forestry and NatureScot have worked with a range of partners to support and develop the South of Scotland Golden Eagle Project, including Scottish Land & Estates, RSPB Scotland, and The Southern Uplands Partnership and Scottish Power Renewables.

The Scottish Government has provided grant funding of £146,367.49 to the Project under the LEADER 2014-2020 Programme and £36,988 towards the satellite tracking of the golden eagles. NatureScot has also provided £43,300 funding and is actively involved in supporting all elements of the project work. The project has funding in place until Autumn 2023.

Other sources of public funding include:

Scottish Forestry (FCS)   £32,000

South of Scotland Enterprise £31,300

Scottish Borders Council £1,000

Section 70 of the Education (Scotland) Act 1980 provides that any interested party can make a complaint to the Scottish Ministers that a responsible body has failed to discharge a statutory duty relating to education.

Following investigation of the complaint, Scottish Ministers may make an order declaring the responsible body to be in default of the duty and requiring them to discharge the duty by a specified date.

Information about the number and outcome of section 70 complaints since 2011 can be found at: Section 70 Complaints and Outcomes: FOI release - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

Scottish Government support for PAS enables community groups across the country access to planning advice on a wide range of matters which may be of concern to them, including wind farm developments.

The experience of Reporters who hold inquiries in relation to planning cases is that they regularly find the evidence given by community groups and other unrepresented groups to be well presented and relevant to the case and is almost always relevant to the Reporter’s considerations. The insight provided by such groups or individuals is often of great assistance to Reporters in gauging the likely acceptability or otherwise of local impacts.