Background checks on Ukrainian refugees and their access to medical facilities and education: FOI release

Information requested

Q1a “What measures has the Scottish Executive taken to ensure that all staff and all people who have access to the refugees whilst boarded on the car ferry have cleared background checks to ensure their suitability?”

Q1b “How many with access to the refugees have passed the Executive's own Protecting Vulnerable Groups (PVG) scheme and how many have failed?”

Q1c “How many of these with this access have had one of the other schemes – basic, standard, enhanced, etc and what percentage of the total number of those with refugee access have been subject to each scheme?”

Q1d “If there are non UK staff or others with access to the car ferry and therefore refugees, how many have had no form of background check or investigation?”

Q1e “How many requests to international governments (eg: Estonia) has been submitted by the Scottish Executive and how many satisfactorily completed replies have been received – as of today’s date?”

Q2 “How many people with access to the refugees have had no form of any background checks?”

Q3 “(a) The total number of pupil spaces available in Edinburgh schools and (b) the total number of child or young person refugees that will require any form of education.”

Q4 “The patient capacity of GP practices in Edinburgh expressed as a single figure.”

Q5 “The patient capacity of GP practices in Leith expressed as a single figure.”

Q6 “The patient capacity of NHS dentists in Leith and Edinburgh expressed as a single figure.”

Response

In response to Q1a, Q1b, Q1c, Q1d and Q2:
Staff or volunteers who are resident in Scotland will have the Protecting Vulnerable Groups (PVG) scheme level deemed appropriate for their role by their agency.

Agencies providing services aboard the M/S Victoria will be responsible for their own background and Disclosure Checks on their staff.

Staff are working on the ship to accommodate our guests, in the same manner any employee who works in similar setting, such as a hotel, would be bound to these checks.

In response to Q1e:
This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.

This is because under the current constitutional arrangements in the United Kingdom the application process for all immigration routes is fully reserved to the UK Government and is dealt with by the Home Office.

In response to Q3a and Q3b:
a) Data regarding school level statistics on school estates, including capacity is available from: https://www.gov.scot/publications/school-estates-statistics/, with relevant data on Edinburgh schools’ capacity contained within the latest statistics, ‘School estates dataset 2021’, table 8, column T.

Under section 25(1) of FOISA, we do not have to give you information which is already reasonably accessible to you. If, however, you do not have internet access to obtain this information from the website(s) listed, then please contact me again and I will send you a paper copy.

b) All children arriving from Ukraine should have access to appropriate education and early learning and childcare services. Local authorities are responsible for the delivery of education and are working hard to ensure they meet the educational and other needs of children arriving into Scotland from Ukraine.

In response to Q4 and Q5:
This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.

The Scottish Government does not have the information you have asked for because there is no extant means of establishing the patient capacity of GP practices. Practice capacity will vary depending on the number of GPs working in a practice (and other staff working in or supporting the practice), the commitments those GPs (and other staff etc.) will have made to the practice, the physical constraints of the practice building and infrastructure, and the nature of the demand posed by the patients of those practices (e.g. some patient lists will require more time set aside for house calls, immediate care, same day appointments etc. than others which limits capacity).

All of these factors could change on a daily basis.

The Public Health Scotland website provides the names and addresses of all GP practices in Scotland with the ability to filter them for the City of Edinburgh, and further information can be requested directly from practices.

In response to Q6:
This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.

The Scottish Government does not have the information you have asked for because the Scottish Government is not responsible for maintaining the patient capacity records of NHS dentists, which will be held by individual practices.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.