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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: S5W-00254

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 May 2016
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 6 June 2016

To ask the Scottish Government which directorate is the sponsor for Citizens Advice Scotland.

Question reference: S5W-00260

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 May 2016
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 6 June 2016

To ask the Scottish Government what information it has on how much Citizens Advice Scotland has spent on terminating the contract of its most recent chief executive.

Question reference: S5W-00259

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 May 2016
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 6 June 2016

To ask the Scottish Government whether it believes that the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator should investigate Citizens Advice Scotland following allegations about the use of the development fund.

Question reference: S5W-00258

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 May 2016
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 6 June 2016

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has any concerns about the governance arrangements at Citizens Advice Scotland, in light of repeated governance reviews following the departure of a number of chief executives.

Question reference: S5W-00225

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 May 2016
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 6 June 2016

To ask the Scottish Government what action it can take to combat nuisance calls.

The UK Government is responsible for the regulation of nuisance calls, and is therefore best placed to take direct action to tackle this issue. However, the Scottish Government is determined to make the most of our new consumer powers to take positive steps to reduce the impact nuisance calls have on the lives of people in Scotland. That is why we will be holding a nuisance calls summit early in summer 2016, which will bring leading industry, regulatory and consumer experts together to develop a range of effective ways to protect consumers and reduce the impact of unwanted calls.

Question reference: S5W-00257

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 May 2016
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 6 June 2016

To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on whether funding of Citizens Advice Scotland should be transferred from the UK Government.

We fully support the transfer of funding to the Scottish Government for consumer advocacy and advice activities undertaken by Citizens Advice Scotland, which arises as a consequence of the devolution of powers under the Scotland Act 2016. Core funding for Citizens Advice Scotland is provided by the UK Government through the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and there are currently no plans to change this.

Question reference: S5W-00255

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 May 2016
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 6 June 2016

To ask the Scottish Government how much funding it provides to Citizens Advice Scotland each year; for what purpose, and what monitoring arrangements are in place.

The Scottish Government provided Citizens Advice Scotland with funding of over £2.6 million in 2015-16 to support a wide range of projects delivered by Citizens Advice Scotland and Citizens Advice Bureaux in areas such as welfare, health care and managing finances. Monitoring arrangements are put in place as part of the grant awards to provide regular progress and financial reports to the Scottish Government.

Question reference: S5W-00169

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 20 May 2016
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 2 June 2016

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will extend the New Medicines Fund to include the provision of the drug, Kalydeco, for two to five-year-olds.

The scope of the Scottish Government’s New Medicines Fund already includes licensed ultra-orphan drugs. However it would be in the best interests of people in Scotland for the manufacturer of this drug to put forward a resubmission to the Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) at a reduced price.

The independence of SMC means that the Scottish Government has no role in taking individual decisions on particular proposals or drugs.

Question reference: S5W-00170

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 20 May 2016
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 2 June 2016

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will meet the Cystic Fibrosis Trust to discuss its proposal to have the drug, Orkambi, available to patients with funding from the New Medicines Fund.

In Scotland we have a clear route for new drugs to be appraised through the Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC). The independence of SMC decisions on individual drugs is well established. The Scottish Government has made clear to the manufacturer of this drug that a resubmission needs to be made to the SMC at a reduced price. The SMC process requires submissions to be made by pharmaceutical companies rather than patient groups. It also allows for pharmaceutical companies to propose a commercial arrangement to improve the cost-effectiveness of a medicine to the Patient Access Scheme Assessment Group.

While the efforts of the Cystic Fibrosis Trust in exploring ways forward is welcome, any proposal for a commercial arrangement needs to be made by the pharmaceutical company to the Patient Access Scheme Assessment Group. The independence of SMC means that the Scottish Government has no role in taking individual decisions on particular proposals or drugs.

Question reference: S4W-30774

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 10 March 2016
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 24 March 2016

To ask the Scottish Government whether it considers that the standards set by the UK Statistics Authority relating to official statistics were satisfied by the Scottish Government’s publication and subsequent revisions to the report, Government Expenditure & Revenue Scotland 2014-15.

As with all national statistics, Government Expenditure & Revenue Scotland (GERS) is regularly reviewed by the UK Statistics Authority to ensure that it meets the standards set out in the Code of Practice for Official Statistics. The last review was completed in 2014 and concluded that GERS complied with the code of practice, and was therefore readily accessible, produced according to sound methods and managed impartially and objectively in the public interest.