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Questions and answers

Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for MSPs to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)
Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

Find out more about parliamentary questions

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Question reference: S6W-26424

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 22 March 2024
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 17 April 2024

To ask the Scottish Government when (a) the First Minister and (b) any other member of the Scottish Government (i) last met and (ii) will next meet with any representative of Scotland's defence industry.

Scottish Ministers continue to have a positive relationship with the defence industries, and regularly engage with both individual companies and the wider trade associations.

Ministers last engaged with defence industry representatives on 6 March 2024, when I attended Space-Comm Expo at the invitation of ADS Group.

The Chair of the Aerospace and Defence Industry Leadership Group is also a standing member of the Industry Leadership Group (ILG) Chairs’ Roundtable discussions that take place quarterly and was last chaired by the former Cabinet Secretary for Wellbeing Economy, Fair Work and Energy.

The next ILG Chairs Roundtable discussion is scheduled to take place in early May and will be co-chaired by the Cabinet Secretary for Wellbeing Economy, Net Zero and Energy.

Question reference: S6F-02979

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 25 March 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 28 March 2024

To ask the First Minister what action the Scottish Government plans to take following the publication of the University of Stirling study highlighting the reported risk of crumb rubber infill on artificial pitches.

Question reference: S6W-26102

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 March 2024
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 20 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what the anticipated returns are of the £200,000 that it has reportedly spent on psychological testing for civil servants.

The recruitment and promotion of Senior Civil Servants must include a robust selection process. Standards for hiring Senior Civil Servants (SCS) are set by UK Cabinet Office. These include the use of additional forms of assessment including psychological assessment, which have supplemented interviews for SCS for over 10 years. Academic research suggests that interviews alone are a poor predictor of future job performance, and supplementing interviews with other forms of assessments, including psychological, strengthens hiring decisions.

A Prior Information Notice was published on 13 February 2024 to inform the market of our intention to issue an Invitation to Tender for a new assessment contract for Senior Civil Service recruitment and promotion. The Tender is yet to be published and a new contract will be awarded, after all bids are assessed for quality of service and value for money, later in 2024. In the last 12 months, the current provider of psychometric assessments to the Scottish Government assessed 125 candidates for 30 SCS recruitment and promotion campaigns, at a cost of £165,401. This is in line with equivalent Cabinet Office contracts per SCS Campaign.

Question reference: S6W-25928

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 04 March 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 18 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to allocate funding in its 2024-25 Budget to support stroke services, including the (a) delivery of the Stroke Improvement Plan, (b) further development of a national thrombectomy service and (c) development of stroke policy.

Question reference: S6O-03250

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 March 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 21 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body what steps it will take to ensure that any protests and demonstrations that disrupt the ability of MSPs, staff and the public to access the Scottish Parliament are fully investigated, with any findings and lessons learnt available to MSPs.

Question reference: S6W-25565

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 15 February 2024
Current Status: Answered by Joe FitzPatrick on 13 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the status of the Verity House Agreement.

The Scottish Government remain fully committed to the Verity House Agreement. Since the signing of the Verity House Agreement in June last year good progress has been made, and there are a number of positive examples of collaborative working between central and local government.

The Scottish Government is committed to an open and regular dialogue with Local government and are willing to meet at any time when any matters of concern arise. The level of engagement between our two spheres of government has never been so high.

The Scottish Government and COSLA meet regularly through a number of different forums under the Verity House Agreement to discuss progress towards our three shared priorities.

Question reference: S6W-25833

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 27 February 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 11 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what percentage of strokes are currently missed by the FAST (Face, Arms, Speech, Time) test in hospital settings.

Question reference: S6W-25301

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 February 2024
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 4 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what objectives it set for any funding that it provided to Inclusion Glasgow since 2019.

Question reference: S6W-25296

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 February 2024
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 4 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what objectives it set for any funding that it has provided to the North East Edinburgh Counselling Service since 2019.

Question reference: S6W-24913

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 29 January 2024
Current Status: Answered by Emma Roddick on 28 February 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what objectives it set for any funding that it has provided to the Milngavie Old Peoples Welfare Committee since 2019.