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Local authorities have public liability insurance cover for the extent of their own legal liability across all the services, including education, for which they are responsible. Consideration of insurance cover beyond that would be a matter for individual local authorities or for other parties involved in the provision of the activities referred to.

The information of the landscaping costs are as follows:

Category	£ million
Construction	7.7
Fees	1.9
Land acquisition	0.3
Risk and Inflation	1.8
Muster Room	0.5
VAT	2.0
Total	14.2

The SPCB and the Holyrood Project Group consider opportunities for cost savings on an on-going basis across the whole project, including savings for the landscaping development. Decisions to implement cost saving measures are taken whenever the quality of the finished product and the integrity of the architects' design concepts will not be materially compromised and are balanced against the impact on other works packages and any programme implications. The cost savings information is not collated in the detailed manner requested, and no separate exercise is being undertaken.

Treatment and disposal of municipal waste is the responsibility of the local authority, in this case Highland Council. The council is preparing a public private partnership (PPP) scheme as a long-term sustainable waste management solution which will be in accordance with the agreed Area Waste Plan. However, the council has informed the Executive of their intention to arrange for interim disposal of municipal waste, which is currently disposed of at Longman landfill site, in a landfill near Peterhead. The council has assessed that for this waste, traffic will amount to some 15 articulated vehicles per day.

The FSAS have advised me that the following table details all research they have carried out or commissioned into amnesic shellfish poisoning. Food Standards Agency Scotland Research into ASP

Date	Title	Purpose	Total Cost (£000)
December 2001 to July 2002	Measurement of ASP in King Scallops processed in Scotland	This study was designed to establish the acceptable and proportionate levels of end product testing for whole, roe-on and roe-off scallops in the tiered system.	154
January 2000 to September 2003	Phytoplankton study	Project initiated to investigate the relationship between phyoplankton and levels of ASP PSP and DSP.	450

The Scottish Executive does not hold details of people employed in the scallop industry. There are currently 191 Scottish vessels licensed to fish for scallops, of which 102 have caught scallops in 2002 and 51 have caught scallops only.

Food Standards Agency Scotland (FSAS) advise me that they wrote to the Commission on 15 October to ask their thoughts on how a review of the 4.6mg/kg trigger level could be pursued. The FSAS will be happy to provide data on scallops and mussels, should the relevant European scientific committees request it.

Negotiations on Trade Contracts for the new Scottish Parliament building at Holyrood are carried out on a commercially confidential basis and it would not be appropriate to name publicly those contractors who have yet to provide a Performance Bond, particularly as most contracts in this category have only recently been awarded. The Convener of the Holyrood Progress Group has informed me that there are currently no claims under consideration relating to those Trade Contracts where a Performance Bond is no longer required.

The SPCB regards the amount of fees paid to individual consultants as commercially confidential. Publication of such information by the Parliament would generally be considered as something that might impede fair competition between them and their competitors and/or prejudice the consultants', or the Parliament's, future negotiating position. Disclosure would also be in breach of the individual tender agreements between the Parliament and the consultants, which were agreed on a commercially confidential basis and could not be made without the agreement of the firms involved. I understand from the Convener of the Holyrood Progress Group that the Auditor General was required to obtain the specific approval of the respective consultants before authority for publication of the figures was given under the particular circumstances. The Parliament would not normally release such information unilaterally and that is only proper. It is the case that certain elements of fee agreements are still under discussion, however, once outstanding negotiations have been concluded and subject to clearance with the Parliament's legal office, we would expect to secure the agreement of the consultants involved and make these details available.

The Convener of the Holyrood Progress Group has confirmed that no estimates for such an outcome are available at this stage, and as was reported to the Finance Committee at their meeting on 8 October 2002, once the position on programme is more certain, any financial implications will be reported to the committee.

No.