This information is not held centrally by the Scottish Government. The use of GP phone and video call consultations is a local decision made by NHS Boards and their contractors. Once the new GMS Contract is introduced GP practices will provide agreed information on consultation rates, consultation types, health care professional being consulted and complexity within consultations. This will be done using the Scottish Primary Care Information Resource (SPIRE) electronic extraction unless the practice wishes to collect the information itself.

A number of potential savings in upfront costs incurred in year one have been identified in 2018-19. These savings include procurement fees, legal advice and contract start-up costs. This was year one spend only, and will not be carried through into future years.

Procurement for Year 2 is currently underway

While expenditure for the Baby Box comes from the Health Budget line, this work, together with other health-funded interventions supporting families with very young children, contributes directly to the ambitions articulated in the Education and Skills portfolio.

As previously stated, the Scottish Government is planning on allocating additional funds to support these plans and the current estimate is that NHS Lothian will require an additional £15 million to deliver this project. This estimate is based on advice received direct from NHS Lothian, following an extensive process to prioritise service requirements against available capital funding. The Scottish Government will continue to engage direct with NHS Lothian and additional funding assumptions will be updated as their plans develop.

Scottish mental health and incapacity legislation is based on rights and principles. Our mental health legislation promotes patients’ rights and provides safeguards which include that any function should be carried out for the maximum benefit of the patient, with the minimum necessary restriction on the freedom of the patient and having regard to the views of the patient.

Our legislation is compliant with the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) and has never been found, in part or in whole, by the European Court of Human Rights to be incompatible with the Convention. In addition, the Human Rights Act 1998 ensures that every public authority in Scotland is obliged to act compatibly with the Convention and enables human rights cases to be taken in domestic courts.

We have recently implemented the Mental Health (Scotland) Act 2015 and are undertaking a range of work through the Mental Health Strategy to move forward Scottish mental health and incapacity legislation.

During the passage of the 2015 Act, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities was influential. For example, measures were taken to strengthen the provisions in the existing 2003 Act. These promote supported decision making so that users are able to exercise their capacity. This includes:

• more autonomy for patients in the right to have a named person (often a relative or friend);

• promoting the right to make an advance statement setting out what treatments they would or would not like to be given; and

• promoting the right to support from an independent advocate.

The Scottish Government is working with partners including the Mental Welfare Commission, the Office of the Public Guardian and professional and human rights bodies to develop changes to the Adults with Incapacity Act (2000) in relation to deprivation of liberty, and to assess compliance with UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. A full public consultation on reform of the Adults with Incapacity legislation has just been launched.

We have also commenced the review to consider how the provisions of the 2003 Act fulfil the needs of people with learning disability and autism.

The insolvency of the Dunne Group reinforced the importance of professional contract and supplier management during the delivery of key contracts and, as part of that, the need to monitor for any changes in the financial health of suppliers. It was this approach that helped identify Carillion as a risk at the first profit warning in July 2017. As a result of that warning, and contract management discussions with Carillion, the Scottish Government worked with a number of public bodies who may have been potentially impacted, to offer assistance and discuss contingencies during the late summer and autumn of 2017. These same procedures will help to secure and protect public services if another key supplier becomes insolvent. In addition, The Scottish Government works with colleagues across the rest of the UK to monitor the financial health of key suppliers.

In the week ending 10 December 2017 NHS Lothian experienced a range of challenges that impacted on A&E performance across the Board, including the Royal Infirmary Edinburgh. For instance the level of attendances increased across the Board, in fact during the week ending 10 December the level of attendances were amongst the highest seen since weekly reporting began almost three years ago. In the week ending 17 December the board saw its highest level in any one week.

The Scottish Government is working closely with the local teams across NHS Lothian, including partnerships, to support improvements in relation to A&E waiting time performance and the reduction of delayed discharges. We are working with the hospital to enhance existing processes at the front door to support the timely flow of patients through the A&E department and additional capacity has been opened in community hospitals to support discharges. We will continue to work with the Board to support the required improvements.

I will refer the member back to my response on 8 January. But for absolute clarity, I instructed NHS Lothian to carry out a full investigation across the three acute hospitals, despite the allegation being made against St Johns hospital. The news release, which I cleared, was in response to the news release issued on 17 November by NHS Lothian in relation to reporting practices surrounding waiting times targets at St Johns hospital.

A short life working group on hepatitis C case finding will report this summer in 2018. The group are considering best practice and innovative approaches to finding undiagnosed patients. It is anticipated that recommendations to improve case finding in a variety of settings will be made by the group.

In line with the NHSScotland National Uniform Policy hospital/facility laundries should be used to launder uniforms where they are available. Information is not held centrally in relation to the number of uniforms routinely laundered by staff at home.

Where hospital laundry facilities are not available, used uniforms should be laundered at home in accordance with the Home Laundering Guidelines, issued alongside the National Uniform Policy. There is no evidence to suggest that home laundering is a less effective method of laundering used uniform.