Tag: Programme for Government

New fund to help keep Scotland’s families together

Fewer children and young people should end up in care, thanks to a £500 million fund to help support families to stay together. Announced as part of the latest Programme for Government, the Whole Family Wellbeing Fund will help families to overcome challenges before they reach crisis point.  

The fund aims to significantly reduce the number of children and young people in care by 2030 and will provide support on a range of issues, including:

  • child and adolescent mental health
  • child poverty
  • alcohol and drugs misuse
  • educational attainment

In 2020 the Scottish Government made a commitment to thousands of care experienced children and adults to Keep The Promise. This included ‘where children are safe in their families and feel loved they must stay – and families must be given support together to nurture that love and overcome the difficulties which get in the way’.

Deputy First Minister John Swinney said: “We want to create a Scotland where more children will only know care, compassion and love, and not a ‘care system’.

“The Whole Family Wellbeing Fund, backed by at least £500 million over this Parliamentary term, will help us to make this a reality and prevent families reaching crisis point.

“Our ambition is that, from 2030, we will be investing at least 5% of all community-based health and social care spend in preventative whole family support measures that will enable us to continue to Keep The Promise.

“This fund, focused on prevention, will enable the building of universal, holistic support services, available in communities across Scotland, giving families access to the help they need, where and when they need it.”

Chair of The Promise Scotland Fiona Duncan said: “The Whole Family Wellbeing Fund is welcome and The Promise Scotland looks forward to working with the Scottish Government and others to ensure it leads to more children and young people staying together with their families, wherever it is safe for them to do so, to feel loved, and to receive the help and support they need, when they need it.

“The Promise Scotland continues to work to ensure Scotland Keeps the Promise and work is on track to deliver the first part of the transformative route map by 2024. This funding is a step in the right direction towards ensuring we all Keep the Promise.” 

It was also announced in Programme for Government that as part of the work to Keep The Promise, young people who leave care will be able to access a new Care Experience Grant.

The £200 a year grant for 16 to 26 year olds, backed by annual investment of up to £10 million, recognises the financial disadvantages often experienced by those in care.

Lorna Slater MSP: Green agenda will benefit Edinburgh

Lothian MSP and Scottish Greens co-leader Lorna Slater has hailed the party’s influence on the Scottish Government programme for the year ahead.

The First Minister laid out an agenda heavily influenced by the Scottish Greens, in her first programme for government. This follows the historic cooperation agreement between the two parties.

The transformational programme will see the Greens in government for the first time; benefiting communities across Edinburgh by laying the foundations for a just transition to a low carbon economy, securing a new deal for tenants, increasing funding for home energy schemes and tackling fuel poverty.

Lothian MSP and Scottish Greens co-leader, Lorna Slater, said: “This is a historic programme for government that will deliver huge benefits for communities in Edinburgh.”

“The investment announced today will allow us to begin the work of improving the energy efficiency of public buildings, an important measure as we bid to tackle the climate emergency, end fuel poverty and reduce energy bills.

“This bold and ambitious programme for government paves the way for a just transition for workers by creating jobs too, as we move to a renewables powered future.

“I’m particularly proud of our new deal for tenants. This programme commits us to delivering a new strategy within the next year which will ensure stronger rights and include a system of rent controls to tackle the spiralling costs for those renting a home in Edinburgh.”

Additional £5.4 billion for NHS COVID-19 response in England over next six months

Includes £1 billion to help tackle COVID-19 backlogs, delivering routine surgery and treatments for patients

The NHS will receive an extra £5.4 billion over the next six months to support its response to COVID-19 and help tackle waiting lists, the Prime Minister and Health and Social Care Secretary Sajid Javid have announced.

The funding will immediately go towards supporting the NHS to manage the immediate pressures of the pandemic. This includes an extra £1 billion to help tackle the COVID-19 backlog, £2.8 billion to cover related costs such as enhanced infection control measures to keep staff and patients safe from the virus and £478 million to continue the hospital discharge programme, freeing up beds.

The additional £5.4 billion brings the government’s total investment to health services for COVID-19 so far this year to over £34 billion, with £2 billion in total for the NHS to tackle the elective backlog.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said: “The NHS was there for us during the pandemic – but treating Covid patients has created huge backlogs.

“This funding will go straight to the frontline, to provide more patients with the treatments they need but aren’t getting quickly enough.

“We will continue to make sure our NHS has what it needs to bust the Covid backlogs and help the health service build back better from the worst pandemic in a century.”

Health and Social Care Secretary Sajid Javid said: “The NHS has been phenomenal as it has faced one of the biggest challenges in its history.

“Today’s additional £5.4 billion funding over the next 6 months is critical to ensuring the health service has what it needs to manage the ongoing pandemic and helping to tackle waiting lists.

“We know waiting lists will get worse before they get better as people come forward for help, and I want to reassure you the NHS is open, and we are doing what we can to support the NHS to deliver routine operations and treatment to patients across the country.”

Amanda Pritchard, NHS chief executive, said: “This funding provides welcome certainty for the NHS, which has pulled out all the stops to restore services, while caring for thousands of seriously ill Covid patients requiring hospital treatment during the toughest summer on record.

“This additional investment will enable the NHS to deliver more checks, scans and procedures as well as helping to deal with the ongoing costs and pressures of the pandemic as the NHS heads in to winter.”

The UK Government has been clear that the NHS will ‘get what it needs’ to recover its usual services and deliver quality care to patients.

The waiting list for routine operations and treatments such as hip replacements and eye cataract surgery could potentially increase to as high as 13 million. While today’s extra £1 billion funding will go some way to help reduce this number, waiting lists will rise before they improve as more people who didn’t seek care over the pandemic come forward.

£478 million of this new funding has been dedicated to continue the hospital discharge programme so staff can ensure patients leave hospital as quickly and as safely as possible, with the right community or at-home support.

This will free up thousands of extra beds and staff time to help the NHS recover services. The government has also invested £500 million in capital funding for extra theatre capacity and productivity-boosting technology, to increase the number of surgeries able to take place.

This funding is for England only. The devolved administrations will receive up to £1 billion in Barnett consequentials in 2021-22. The final amount will be confirmed and allocated at Supplementary Estimates 2021-22.

On top of this funding, the NHS recently launched a £160 million initiative to tackle waiting lists. This is looking to accelerate the recovery of routine treatments and operations by trialling new ways of working, including a high-volume cataract service, one stop testing facilities where people can get tests done quickly and efficiently, to speed up the time to treatment, greater access to specialist advice for GPs and pop-up clinics so patients can be seen and discharged closer to home.

The UK government is ‘committed to delivering the greatest hospital building programme in a generation with 40 new hospitals by 2030’, backed by an initial £3.7 billion.

Yesterday’s announcement is in addition to the £3 billion announced at Spending Review 2020 to support the NHS.

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon is expected to announce a further £2.5 billion increase in NHS spending in Scotland when she lays out her Programme for Government later today.

Programme for Government: Record investment to ‘transform’ Scotland’s NHS

FM to confirm £2.5 billion increase in spending

Record investment to ensure Scotland’s NHS is ready to meet changing patient demands and the impact of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic will be at the heart of the 2021/22 Programme for Government (PFG) this week.

The PfG will confirm plans to introduce an unprecedented increase in frontline health spending of 20% over the current Parliament.

The first rise will be confirmed in the 2022/23 budget being published later this year and will provide additional funding of at least £2.5 billion by 2026/27.

The PfG will be set out by First Minister Nicola Sturgeon in the Scottish Parliament tomorrow (Tuesday 7 September), and will also include measures to drive a green, fair economic recovery, create a land of opportunity for our children and young people, and achieve a just transition to net zero.

It will also confirm plans to introduce legislation in the coming year to establish a new National Care Service in Scotland by the end of the current Parliament, transforming the way health and social care services are provided. 

The First Minister said: “We owe our health and social care services, and the extraordinary staff who kept them running in the toughest of years, our immense gratitude.

“As we emerge from the pandemic, we will strengthen and improve our health and social care system so that everyone gets the care they need, while recognising and repaying the efforts of staff given the toll the pandemic has had on them.

“We are already investing record amounts in out NHS, but this 20% increase will help transform the way we deliver services and ensure the system is ready to meet the challenges which still lie ahead.

“Our recent NHS recovery plan set out measures to establish a network of cancer diagnostic centres, refurbish NHS facilities across Scotland and make unprecedented investment in mental health services.

“The creation of a National Care Service will also mark the biggest reform of health and social care since the creation of the NHS and will help ensure every patient’s care journey is focused on the individual.

“Recovery from COVID-19 across all of society is the Scottish Government’s first and most pressing priority and I am determined that this Programme for Government will allow our health service to continue managing COVID-19 and our longer term population health challenges.”

Primary care funding will go up by 25% over the course of this parliament, with half of all frontline health spending invested in community health services.

The PfG will also confirm plans to invest £29 million to provide an additional 78,000 diagnostic procedures, as well as increasing inpatient and day case activity by 10% in 2022/23 and outpatient activity by 10% by 2025/26.

The first £50 million, of the planned £250 million increased investment to tackle the drugs death emergency, will also be provided.

‘Unashamedly Ambitious’

First Minister sets out priorities for Government

Scotland’s recovery from the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic will be driven by an ambitious programme to build a modern, high-tech economy while staying true to enduring values of fairness and compassion, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said yesterday.

Outlining her priorities for Government to Parliament, she added that tackling the pandemic remained the immediate priority but people in Scotland should have the right to decide their future when the current crisis has passed.

In addition to vaccinating all adults in Scotland, the Government’s plan for its first hundred days includes publishing a NHS Recovery Plan to achieve a 10% increase in inpatient, day case, and outpatient activity for those who had treatment or care postponed due to COVID-19.

The First Minister also announced the completion of a £12 million investment to take the East Ayrshire Community Hospital into full NHS ownership, as part of the Government’s plan to invest £10 billion in the NHS estate over the next five years.

Consultation on legislation to establish a National Care Service will also begin in the first hundred days with the aim of introducing legislation in the first year of Parliament, and the service to be operational by the end of this parliament, as one of its most important and enduring legacies.

Continuing the Government’s focus on education and young people, from August all three and four-year-olds, and many two-year-olds, will be eligible for more than 1,100 hours of free childcare a year and free healthy breakfasts and lunches will also be made available to all primary 4 children in Scotland as a further step towards extension to all primary school children.

Recognising the importance of economic recovery, the First Minister said that the Government would continue its support for specific business sectors such as food and tourism, and establish a Rural Entrepreneur Fund to support Scotland’s rural economy.

Ahead of COP26 this year in Glasgow the Government will publish an indicative national defined contribution – setting out how Scotland will become a net-zero nation by 2045 – and introduce legislation to make bus travel free for people under the age of 22.

The First Minister said that that she looked forward to working across the Chamber, and believed this Parliament would be “the most important in our devolved history”.

Speaking in the Chamber the First Minister said: “The plans I have set out today are unashamedly ambitious. We will tackle the COVID crisis as our immediate priority. We will lead by example in addressing the climate crisis. We will create a National Care Service, to match the post-war National Health Service. We will widen opportunities for young people.

“We will build a modern, high-tech economy, while staying true to enduring values of fairness and compassion. We will seek a better politics. And we will put Scotland’s future in Scotland’s hands.

“Our programme is rooted in today’s reality. But it also shows the way to a brighter tomorrow.”

Priorities of Government statement – 26 May 2021

Actions to be taken in the first 100 days include:

• completing the vaccination of all adults, subject to supply

• establishing a cross-party steering group on COVID recovery to bring people together in pursuit of the strongest possible recovery

• implementing a 4% average pay rise for NHS workers, including full back pay

• opening three fast track cancer diagnostic centres in Ayrshire & Arran, Fife, and Dumfries & Galloway

• publishing an NHS Recovery plan to meet the Government’s ambition of increasing inpatient, day case, and outpatient activity by 10%

• investing £45 million through local partnerships to provide training and employer recruitment incentives

• funding colleges to deliver around 5,000 more short, industry-focussed courses to help young people train for jobs in key industries

• launching the £10 million ‘Scotland Loves Local’ programme to support local businesses and back Scotland Loves Local loyalty card schemes

• funding councils to increase teacher numbers by 1,000 and classroom assistants by 500 – as part of a commitment to 3,500 additional teachers and classroom assistants over the Parliamentary term

• completing the roll-out of 1,140 hours of free, high quality early learning and childcare, and beginning work on extending wrap around childcare

• publishing Scotland’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) towards the global goal of delivering the Paris Agreement

• paying £100 as part of the £520 support for low-income families – the equivalent of the Scottish Child Payment

• legislating to give carers an extra Coronavirus payment of £460 – a double payment of their Carer’s Allowance Supplement in December 2021.

Edinburgh Airport chief: dark days ahead

An open letter to Humza Yousaf

Dear Cabinet Secretary,

The First Minister has said at her daily press briefings and in the Chamber that any life lost to Covid-19 is the loss of someone’s loved one and should rightfully be recognised as such.

Protecting public health has rightfully been the focus of the government’s strategy and we have always been clear that we understand the need to do that and have supported that work which is absolutely paramount at any time, not just during a pandemic.  Airports and their process have safety at their core.

However, absolutely paramount at any time is also a strong economy, one that allows government to protect livelihoods, improve the lives of people and further Scotland’s ambitions and credentials at home and abroad.

Last night (02/09/20) I listened to your comments on STV and was dismayed to hear you say that although you were concerned about the impact of Covid-19 and quarantine on the aviation industry, “We can bring the economy back to life, we just can’t bring people back to life.”

Cabinet Secretary, I am sorry that you felt that such a comparison was appropriate. No-one in aviation has advocated trading lives for the economy, and it is unhelpful to be using anyone’s loss to make a political point that side-steps or ignores our open request for engagement in seeking better policies.

In all our engagement with your Government, we have agreed that health measures must be what we build policy around. It has never been in question because business aside, we are human beings first and foremost and we know the true cost of Covid-19.

But this isn’t a binary choice as you have seemed to suggest. It is not a choice between public health or the economy. It is not a choice because we need to do both if Scotland is to rebound and recover.

The First Minister’s Programme for Government this week made promises on jobs, especially the jobs guarantee for young people. That is an ambitious policy planning for Scotland’s future and that is to be commended but, and I’m sorry to be so blunt, you can’t guarantee anyone access to jobs that don’t exist. A strong economy will be key to this and is exactly why the Scottish Government needs to support businesses in sustaining and creating jobs if such promises are to come to fruition.

As an airport, we are a facilitator of many things, from business and tourism to education, research and culture, and all these things are drivers of economic activity. But we’re also one business in Scotland’s economy and there are many more who want to help and who want support from the government to get the recovery started.

Yes, rates relief your Government has put in place has of course been welcome, something we have said in public and in private. And yes, we know that it isn’t available in England or Wales. But what is and isn’t available in other parts of the UK is not our concern – saving Scotland’s aviation and travel industry and rebuilding our economy is.

A quarantine policy that is a travel ban in all but name makes this incredibly difficult, if not impossible. It is ineffective and unworkable as your own figures show and it is having a damning impact on a range of industries. If this is the path the Scottish Government is to continue down then there are some incredibly dark days ahead. I only have to look at my own business to see the real impact it is having. Saying goodbye to 250 colleagues through no fault of their own was one of the toughest experiences in my career. I don’t want others to have to do the same.

If we are to live with Covid-19 for months and years to come then this is simply not a sustainable approach. We need a robust testing regime that protects public health and provides confidence and reassurance to those who need and wish to travel.

We have to manage and mitigate the risk in the best way possible, and that simply has to be a dual approach with balanced attention given to health and prosperity.

Decisions taken now will have an enduring impact on the many quality jobs our industry supports up and down the country, and – if those are too cautious and short-sighted decisions, will significantly undermine the county’s future connectivity and competitiveness.

We are ready, willing and able to help design better systems and processes to protect the health of passengers and staff. We and our colleagues at AGS have spoken with the National Clinical Director, Jason Leitch to explore how best to partner with the Scottish Government on testing. We’re hopeful that our ideas are being listened to and we have a tentative path forward.

We have great respect for the First Minister’s leadership through this health crisis. However, we urge you to make good her words in recognising that the economic emergency is of equal importance to the health crisis.

The aviation and travel industries are not too big to fail. If the Scottish Government position remains as it stands, you are putting tens of thousands of jobs at risk in aviation the next few months alone. The knock-on risks to our tourism sector are even more profound and we would hope you might reflect carefully on our concerns and respond accordingly.

We urge you to reconsider your approach and work with us to find a way to protect public health and rebuild our economy. It is in Scotland’s best interest to do both.

Regards,

Gordon Dewar

Chief Executive, Edinburgh Airport

FM outlines “a clear vision of the kind of country we want to be”

A major reform of mental health services, investment in infrastructure and legislation to underpin a Scottish National Investment Bank are at the forefront of the Scottish Government’s priorities for the year ahead. Continue reading FM outlines “a clear vision of the kind of country we want to be”