This year we have increased the Scottish Police Authority (SPA) budget to £1.64 billion, an increase of £90 million compared to the published 2024-25 budget, to support police capacity and capability. It is for the Chief Constable, under the scrutiny of the SPA, to allocate resources to meet her priorities, as outlined in the Police Scotland three year plan.

The Scottish Government is working closely with the SPA and Police Scotland to understand their 2026-27 budget requirements. The 2026-27 Scottish Budget will be published on 13 January 2026.

This year NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is being supported with an initial resource budget of £3,123.5 million, along with capital allocations of £41.26 million for maintaining the NHS estate and replacing and upgrading equipment.

Boards are expected to make the best use of these resources, to ensure that patients continue to receive a high standard of care.

In addition, we are supportive of NHS GG&C developing a design for the façade of Inverclyde Royal Hospital and Scottish Government will make a decision on funding when a design is complete and full costs are known.

We are currently working with all NHS Health Boards to develop a whole system NHS infrastructure plan to inform long-term investment priorities across Scotland – this includes NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde.

The following table shows how many drug- related and alcohol-related hospital stays were recorded in Inverclyde in each of the last five years.

Number of drug-related and alcohol-related hospital stays, Inverclyde

This Scottish Government does not hold this information. The member may wish to contact the Health Board directly who may be able to help.

The Scottish Government does not hold information for what the “average ambulance response time is in Inverclyde”.

However, the median response time in Greater Glasgow and Clyde to Purple coded incidents was 07:48 minutes (08:06 nationally) and Red coded incidents was 09:49 minutes (09:57 nationally).

Public Health Scotland (PHS) publishes statistics on the number of waits for patients on waiting lists for planned care in the Stage of Treatment (SoT) Waiting Times publication. Patients may appear more than once if they are waiting for multiple appointments or admissions, so the statistics shown do not reflect the actual number of individuals involved. Further information about SoT Waiting Times can be found on the PHS website.

Table 1 presents the number of ongoing waits at 31 October 2025. The figures reflect waits for residents within the Inverclyde council area awaiting a new outpatient appointment or an inpatient/day case admission in dentistry-related specialties at any hospital in Scotland.

More detailed information on the treatment or procedure(s) that is planned or undertaken for a patient will be held locally by NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde or the health board of treatment responsible for the patient’s wait.

Table 1: Number of ongoing waits for a new outpatient appointment or inpatient or day case admission at 31 October 2025, Inverclyde council area

The 2025-26 Budget has allocated nearly £2.2 billion for social care and integration, representing an increase of over £1.2 billion since 2021-22. This goes almost £350 million beyond the Scottish Government’s original commitment to increase social care funding by 25% (£840 million) over the lifetime of the Parliament.

We have a clear plan to reduce delayed discharge and are investing more than £220 million to tackle waiting list backlogs, improve capacity and remove blockages that are keeping some patients in hospital longer than they need to be. This includes an initial allocation of over £20m to support Greater Glasgow and Clyde NHS’s whole system plan to improve patient flow.

Alongside the record investment committed, we are also working with local system leaders to support their health and social care improvement reforms – rebalancing care towards community, rehabilitation and prevention based services like Hospital at Home that help improve patient outcomes and prevent further hospital care.

The Scottish Government does not hold information on how long patients wait for a GP appointment.

Most general practices in Scotland are run by independent contractors who are responsible for their own appointment arrangements.

This information is not held centrally. Statistics on the number of people waiting for CAMHS and Psychological Therapies are available from Public Health Scotland as they have associated Standards that 90% of patients should start treatment within 18 weeks. These are not published at HSCP level but data at Health Board level are published. These can be found at the following links:

Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) waiting times - Quarter ending September 2025 - Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) waiting times - Publications - Public Health Scotland.

Psychological therapies waiting times - Quarter ending September 2025 - Psychological therapies waiting times - Publications - Public Health Scotland.

The Scottish Government is committed to enabling individuals/workers at all stages of their careers to retrain and enhance their capabilities in artificial intelligence (AI) and information technology. This commitment is delivered through a comprehensive suite of interventions, including funding administered by Skills Development Scotland, strategic investment in colleges and universities, the expansion of digital apprenticeships, and targeted support for data and AI skills development through initiatives such as The Data Lab.

As set out in the Programme for Government 2025-26, the Scottish Government will establish AI Scotland — a national transformation programme underpinned by collaboration across businesses, academia, government, and public bodies. A central component of this programme is the development of a national AI adoption framework for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). This will focus on building delivery capacity, assessing and addressing AI-related skills requirements, and strengthening Scotland’s AI talent pipeline to facilitate workforce reskilling and adaptation as AI technologies reshape employment and the wider economy.