The Scottish Government does not hold official estimates of current and projected spend on stroke in NHS Scotland. The allocation of spend is determined by territorial Health Boards and where appropriate, Integrated Joint Boards.

Our Health and Social Care Delivery Plan published in December 2016 sets out our aim to provide Scotland with high quality services with a focus on prevention, early intervention and supported self-management. Our programme of health and social care integration aims to ensure that those who use services get the right care and support whatever their needs, at any point in their care journey.

The plan sits alongside our National Clinical Strategy, which evidenced the need to change the way services are delivered in order to continue to meet the healthcare needs of our population, setting out the framework for developing health services in Scotland for the next 10-20 years, including stroke care.

Our Stroke Improvement Plan (2014) sets out a comprehensive programme for further reducing the number of deaths from stroke and improving stroke treatment care across the whole patient pathway. This includes Priority 7; Transition to the Community and Priority 8; Supported Self-Management and Living with Stroke that encompasses rehabilitation.

Scotland's approach continues to be to promote best clinical practice based on current evidence as outlined by Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN) guidelines including SIGN guidelines 108; Management of Patients with Stroke or TIA and 118; Management of Patients with Stroke: Rehabilitation, prevention and management of complications, and discharge planning.

Our Stroke Improvement Plan (2014) sets out a comprehensive programme for further reducing the number of deaths from stroke and improving stroke treatment care.

The Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN) and the National Institute for Health and Care are Excellence (NICE) make recommendations based on best available evidence and recommend use of intermittent pneumatic compression (IPC) to reduce the risk of Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT) in immobile stroke patients. For these reasons, the appropriate provision of IPC was recognised within Priority 3 of the Scottish Government's Stroke Improvement Plan.

Since 2014, the Scottish Stroke Care Audit (SSCA) has been collecting and reporting information on the use of IPC in stroke units to monitor the proportion of patients who are unable to walk on admission who are offered IPC. In 2016, the number of people offered IPC was 43%, a significant increase from the 2015 figure of 30%.

However, it is recognised that there remains variation across Scotland and through the Scottish Stroke Care Improvement Programme we are encouraging local Quality Improvement projects to optimise the use of IPC in stroke units and several national workshops have been run to encourage appropriate use of IPC.

All stroke units in Scotland have access to the equipment and on line training in its use is available through the Stroke Training and Awareness Resources (STARS) website;(www.stroketraining.org).

The decision to locate the Social Security Agency’s central functions in Dundee and Glasgow was taken following the completion of a detailed and robust analytical exercise. The exercise methodology - which followed a multi-criteria analysis approach - and the results have been published and can be accessed by following the following link: https://beta.gov.scot/publications/central-functions-social-security-agency-location-analysis-phase-1-phase/.

As the report highlights, the suitability of each local authority area for agency’s central functions was considered against a number of factors, including the ability to recruit a sufficient number of staff and within the timescale required to ensure delivery of the 11 benefits with the lifetime of this parliament, scope to contribute to inclusive growth, opportunities for regeneration, and the role that the location could enable the central functions to play in the local delivery.

The Scottish Health Protection Network (SHPN), comprising Health Protection Scotland (HPS) and all the NHS Health Boards, as well as Local Authorities and other agencies with a responsibility for public health, formed a Lyme disease group as a subgroup of the Gastrointestinal Infections and Zoonoses (GIZ) group at the beginning of 2016. The group has produced new public-facing materials, in the form of an information leaflet and an infographic poster, explaining the risks from ticks and tick borne diseases and highlighting simple steps people can take to avoid infection. The group has also launched the Outdoor bugs and germs pages on NHS Inform (https://www.nhsinform.scot/bugs-and-germs), bringing together in once place, for the first time, comprehensive advice on how to avoid infection from bugs and germs. Scottish Government officials, along with members of the SHPN GIZ group are currently planning greater and sustained promotion of these materials commencing in Spring 2018.

Lyme disease has also featured on the programme of the NHS Health Protection Symposium held in December 2016, which was open to all members of the SHPN, and the symposium was attended by a group of individuals from different sectors and regions of Scotland. Through February and March, evening meetings for Community Pharmacy Groups featuring Lyme disease were presented by members of the group in 5 Health Boards and in August 2017, a Lyme disease one-day symposium was held in Benbecula, organised by the local Health Protection team in partnership with SHPN.

The ongoing work of the group seeks to improve surveillance of Lyme disease in Scotland. This will give us a better estimate of the burden of disease and the impact of our efforts to raise awareness about its avoidance.

I welcome the commitment of authorities and individuals in the Northern Alliance, and I met with Alliance representatives on the 25th of January this year, to hear more about their positive work to improve the education experiences of children and young people in their area.

The Scottish Government has not undertaken a formal assessment of the Northern Alliance. Rather, we have committed to working with the Alliance and other inter-authority education partnerships in Scotland, as we take forward the detailed development of Regional Improvement Collaboratives in partnership with local government.

The responsibility for managing parking in public charging bays is a matter for the charging bay host, usually the local authority. Currently 18 out of the 32 Local authorities now enforce the Decriminalised Parking Enforcement (DPE) regime, which allows them to issue Penalty Charge Notices (PCNs) to motorists. Police Scotland continue to undertake targeted enforcement where there are specific local issues and a local authority has requested support. Where parking is dangerous or causes significant obstruction, Police Scotland will task police officers to resolve the issue using the appropriate enforcement activity, including parking tickets, other direct measures or prosecution reports. Future improvements will be sought by taking findings from the recent ‘Improved parking in Scotland’ consultation which asked for views on the best approach for managing parking and incorporating them into provisions for the new Government Transport Bill.

The National Framework of Local Incentives for Electric Vehicles, developed in conjunction with local authorities and other key stakeholders, explores the introduction of local measures to encourage people to switch to EVs, and parking is one of the four key policy areas addressed. As part of the Transport Scotland grant funding conditions, hosts are advised that all ChargePlace Scotland electric vehicle charge points must have clear markings on charging bays to indicate that they are for the sole use of electric vehicles.

As detailed in last week’s Programme for Government announcement, in order to lead the way on electric vehicles, we plan to expand our electric charging infrastructure between now and 2022, whether in rural, urban or domestic settings. We will set out detailed plans over the coming months.

The Scottish Government collects data on the number of General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) registered teachers that are working in centres providing funded ELC, in its annual ELC census. This data is published in mid-December as part of the release of the Summary Statistics for Schools in Scotland National Statistics publication. The most up to date data are published in Table 8 in the Excel file on the Scottish Government’s website here:

http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Children/Pubs-Pre-SchoolEducation/ELCAdditionalTables2016

New data on the number of teachers working in centres providing funded ELC in 2017 will be collected during the ELC census week (18 and 22 September). This data will be published on 12 December 2017, again as part of the Summary Statistics for Schools in Scotland National Statistics publication.

The Scottish Government does not hold this information.