Seòmar agus comataidhean

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

Criathragan Hide all filters

Displaying 256 questions Show Answers

Order by |

Question reference: S6O-00431

Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 17 November 2021
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 24 November 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what it is doing to help tackle the reported affordable housing crisis in Edinburgh.

Question reference: S6O-00253

Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 29 September 2021
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 7 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to ensure the future workforce can have access to vocational skills training, in light of the current staff shortages in certain sectors.

Question reference: S6T-00184

Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 27 September 2021
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 28 September 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to reports of staffing shortages at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital leading to health professionals warning about patient safety.

Question reference: S6O-00165

Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 08 September 2021
Current Status: Answered by Kevin Stewart on 16 September 2021

To ask the Scottish Government for what reason Scotland's Mental Health First Aid is reportedly not running any training courses at present.

Scotland’s Mental Health First Aid programme is delivered as a face-to-face training event. In order to comply with the Scottish Government’s COVID-19 guidance and to protect public health, the delivery of these training courses was paused by Public Health Scotland (PHS), which holds the licence for this training to operate in Scotland. A range of online resources was made available by PHS and NHS Education for Scotland throughout the pandemic. In recognition of the changing context, PHS is working to ensure that the delivery of the Mental Health First Aid programme can resume safely. These courses will restart in November 2021.

Question reference: S6W-02481

Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 August 2021
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 13 September 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to reimburse payments made by local authorities and assessment centres to the SQA for exam-related services that were not provided in academic year 2020-21.

Charges for National Qualifications have remained unchanged since 2012-13 despite changes in costs. While charges contribute towards the cost of awarding National Qualifications they do not cover the full costs. In addition, 2020 and 2021 late entry fees have been waived and there have been no charges for appeals. There are therefore no plans to reimburse National Qualifications payments.

For 2021, SQA estimates that the costs of providing certification for national qualifications was £41.7m, while income from local authorities, colleges and independent schools is expected to be £30.5m. The remaining cost is covered by SQA’s grant in aid budget from the Scottish Government.

Question reference: S6T-00139

Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 September 2021
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 7 September 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the use of face-to-face GP appointments.

Question reference: S6W-01821

Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 23 July 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 25 August 2021

To ask the Scottish Government how many Specialist Nurse Practitioners there are for (a) primary and (b) secondary breast cancer, and what the nurse-to-patient ratio is, both broken down by NHS board.

Question reference: S6W-02094

Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 06 August 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 25 August 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking, in addition to initiatives such as mobile vaccine buses and vaccinations at football stadiums and shopping centres, to encourage and incentivise younger people to get the COVID-19 vaccine, in light of reports that vaccine rollout statistics show a lower take-up rate amongst younger people.

The vaccination programme uptake in Scotland is highly successful overall with around 90% of the adult population (18+) having received their first dose - far beyond our planning assumption of 80% - and so far 73% have received their second dose.

To ensure good uptake amongst younger age groups the Scottish Government and NHS Scotland are undertaking a wide range of initiatives.

Drop in clinics are widely available for people who want a first vaccination or are 8 weeks or more from their second vaccination – regardless if they have an appointment in the system. Drop-in mobile centres are attending a range of sites such as football grounds, parks, workplaces and shopping centres.

Young people within the eligible Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) age cohorts will still also receive a scheduled invitation which they may attend if the time and date suits. A dedicated self-registration portal allows SMS notification to take account of the greater turnover of registered addresses amongst young people.

We continue to engage with young people in a variety of ways, including through social media outlets, to make sure they have access to the correct information on vaccines. To this end the Scottish Government has developed a comprehensive set of public information campaigns across TV, radio, print and online to disseminate quality information on vaccines and positive encouragement to take up vaccination invitations.

We are presently strengthening communications targeting the 18-29 age group, such as the Roll Up Your Sleeves campaign, to ensure we vaccinate as many people in this cohort as possible.

All NHS Boards have dedicated inclusion plans within the vaccination programme, outlining how they will actively offer vaccination to people who may face barriers in taking up the vaccine. Some examples of outreach include offering vaccinations in places of worship, in other community settings, providing concessionary bus travel to appointments and working with community leaders to promote uptake.

We are continuing to discuss a range of measures with universities and colleges to help ensure students get vaccinated as soon as possible before arriving on campus. We remain in regular dialogue with Universities Scotland and Colleges Scotland and have agreed with Health Boards and Higher and Further Education Institutions to appoint Single Points of Contacts in universities and colleges. Additionally, we are engaging with the Health Boards to support vaccine delivery for both international and home based students where there is local need, including the possibility of on-campus pop-up clinics.

Question reference: S6W-02098

Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 10 August 2021
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 25 August 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether the current service provider submitted a bid for the new contract for the provision of the Scottish National Standardised Assessments and, if so, whether the bid it submitted was higher or lower in value to the bid submitted by the provider that has been selected.

ACER UK Limited was one of three companies to submit a tender for the contract for phase two delivery of the national standardised assessments in Scotland – incorporating both the Scottish National Standardised Assessments and their Gaelic equivalent, the Measaidhean Coitcheann Niseanta airson Foghlam tron Ghidhlig.

ACER’s tender did not progress to the Price Analysis stage of the evaluation as it did not achieve the minimum requirements for the Quality Analysis stage. Cost comparisons with the successful tender cannot therefore be drawn.

Question reference: S6W-02099

Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 10 August 2021
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 25 August 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide details of the new contract for the provision of Scottish National Standardised Assessments, including details of any differences that exist between the new contract and the previous contract.

The new contract will see the continued provision of online assessments for children and young people in P1, P4, P7 and S3. The Specification of Requirements published as part of the Invitation to Tender identified the areas in which continuity of provision is required (general assessment principles, presentation policy and coverage; reports coverage; training coverage; branding), and highlighted some areas around which enhancements were sought. The primary difference between the phase 1 contracts and the phase 2 contract is that rather than continuing to deliver two online systems through two separate contracts, phase two will see the establishment of a single assessment platform, which will provide access to both the Scottish National Standardised Assessments (SNSA) and their Gaelic Medium Education equivalents, the Measaidhean Coitcheann Niseanta airson Foghlam tron Ghidhlig (MCNG).