To consider the impacts of the proposal through a collaborative process
- To identify the health, wellbeing and equality impacts of a proposal using a structured health and equity impact checklist.
- To discuss potential health impacts as a group rather than an individual officer determining all potential impacts which is unlikely to provide a representative or accurate picture.
- To draw different areas of experience and knowledge and consider diverse perspectives.
- To reach a more informed understanding of the potential positive, negative and uncertain health and equity impacts of a proposed development.
- To promote collaboration and relationship building with key partners and stakeholders.
To inform other impact assessments
- The CHIA process does not replace existing local authority impact assessment processes but should help to gather some of the information needed to inform them (e.g. Equality Impact Assessment, Fairer Scotland Duty) and highlight potential impacts for different populations.
- The health and equity impact checklist highlights which duties or impact assessments are relevant to different population groups and health determinants, which will help you to identify issues to consider when completing a range of other assessments, not just Health Impact Assessment.
To fill gaps left by other impact assessments
- Assessments typically used in capital investment projects (e.g., Equality Impact Assessment; Environmental Impact Assessments; Sustainability Impact Assessment; Scottish Transport Appraisal Guidance (STAG) and more), do not cover the direct and indirect health impacts of a proposal in detail.
- Supports an in-depth consideration of health as well as equalities impacts.
To identify potential objections prior to full business case submission
- Prevent delay: the process of discussing potential negative health impacts in the CHIA screening workshop will help to identify any serious impacts that may delay the progress of the development if amendments are not made.
- Enables early identification of potential health impacts to ensure mitigation can be considered as the appropriate stage.
To achieve better alignment with strategic needs of funding stream
- 'Making the Case for Health and Equity', makes clear the interrelationship between health and equity and economic development.
- Information in 'Making the Case for Health and Equity' will help business case preparation, outlining how the proposed development aligns with strategic health and equity requirements of the funding stream.
To support decision making at different stages of a project
- The CHIA process can be initiated at any point in a project lifecycle (Strategic Business Case; Outline Business Case; Full Business Case).
- Projects have health, economic, equalities and social impacts at each stage of development.
- Ideally, the CHIA process would be started as early as possible (e.g. to inform SBC) to influence key decisions. However, it can also inform OBC or FBC, as long as decisions can still be influenced.
- Conducting a workshop at different stages of the project or referring back to the health impact checklist can help projects at the design, procurement or operational stages to identify whether any changes to the development may create new health impacts that require attention.
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