- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 August 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Ross Finnie on 24 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive what input affected interests will have before any regulations on the arrangements for the transportation of cattle and, in particular, the use of slatted courts as cattle housing, are brought into force.
Answer
Consultation with interested parties will be undertaken before any regulations on the arrangement for the transport of cattle or changes to the regulations on cattle housing are brought into force.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 August 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Mike Watson on 24 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive whether any financial assistance has been provided by VisitScotland to promote the Loch Ness Marathon on 29 September 2002; whether any recommendation was made that VisitScotland should finance the marketing costs of the marathon; what response was made by VisitScotland to any such recommendation, and whether any assistance has been provided to promote the marketing of the marathon by VisitScotland
Answer
This is an operational matter for VisitScotland.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 29 August 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Peter Peacock on 24 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive which local authorities benefit from a special allowance for rural and island transport needs under their capital funding allocations and how much was paid to each such local authority in each of the last five years.
Answer
The single allocation formula contains special allowances to recognise the special transport circumstance of remote/rural areas. A top-slice (10%) of the roads and transport element of the formula is distributed to island authorities or those authorities containing large island areas to reflect the needs in relation to ferry services, and to rural local authorities to reflect increased needs for bridge strengthening and forest roads. The amount for special transport needs is built into the authority's unhypothecated single allocation. It is not specifically identified for special transport needs. It is entirely up to the local authorities to determine how they spend their allocation across the range of their capital programmes (excluding council housing).The top slice is distributed as follows:
| Council | Percentage |
| Argyll and Bute | 1.25 |
| Dumfries and Galloway | 1.5 |
| Eilean Siar | 2.75 |
| Highland | 3.0 |
| Orkney | 0.5 |
| Scottish Borders | 1.0 |
| Total | 10.0 |
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 29 August 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Peter Peacock on 24 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive whether the formula for calculating the special allowance for rural and island transport needs gives sufficient recognition of the costs of providing transport services in these areas and what plans it has to increase the allowance for rural and island local authorities in future years or to review the funding formula.
Answer
The single capital allocation formula measures the relative need to spend of each local authority based on statistical indicators for the main capital programmes (excluding council-owned housing) and the total resources made available for local authority capital spending. It is up to each local authority how it spends its total capital resources including any locally-raised resources for example the proceeds of asset sales. There are no plans to review the special transport needs element of the formula. Rural and islands authorities also benefit from revenue grant from the Rural Transport Fund and have received additional capital allocations from the Public Transport Fund. The final round of such allocations will be made in October. Future arrangements for supporting local transport infrastructure projects will be announced in the autumn.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 29 August 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Peter Peacock on 24 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has any plans to alter the system for making local authority capital funding allocations and, in particular, whether the fixed award of #1 million is a sufficient recognition of a local authority's base expenditure need.
Answer
Capital allocations for the period 2001-02 to 2003-04 based on the existing capital formula were announced following Spending Review 2000. Local authorities have set their spending plans on the basis of these allocations and there are no plans to change these. The fixed element of the formula is set at a level commensurate with the overall resources available for local authority capital expenditure. The main factors that determine an authority's (relative) expenditure needs are included in the variable elements of the formula. We have announced plans to reform the local authority capital finance system. Subject to the passage of the Local Government Bill, local authorities will be able to determine their own capital spending plans from 1 April 2004. Proposals for supporting capital expenditure from 2004-05 will be discussed with COSLA.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 09 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Lewis Macdonald on 23 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it was a requirement of the contractual arrangements with BEAR Scotland Ltd that former employees of The Highland Council who, following the assumption by BEAR Scotland Ltd of legal responsibility for the maintenance of trunk roads in the area, were employed by that company should continue to be members of an occupational pension scheme based on final salary and whether such employees continued to be so.
Answer
There was no contractual requirement for transferred employees to be provided with continued membership of a final salary pension scheme.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Allan Wilson on 19 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive whether, in the light of submissions made to the consultation exercise on the draft designation order for the proposed Cairngorms National Park, it will now widen the proposed boundaries and, if so, whether it will undertake a new consultation exercise on such new boundaries.
Answer
The consultation exercise into our proposals to establish a national park in the Cairngorms area has only recently finished. The responses are now being reviewed. We hope to complete that process shortly and will then bring forward a draft designation order for Parliamentary consideration.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 02 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Lewis Macdonald on 18 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive, in relation to the ex-gratia payments to be made to members of the Scottish Bus Group Pension Funds, how much the highest 20 payments will be; whether payments will be made to former directors of the Scottish Bus Group or the Scottish Transport Group companies, and, if so, how much will be paid to each former director, detailing in each case the name of the director.
Answer
It is not possible to provide details of the amounts paid to individual former members of the Scottish Bus Group Pension Schemes, as to do so may breach the terms of the Data Protection Act 1998.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 23 August 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Ross Finnie on 17 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive what resources it will commit to the development of land management contracts under its A Forward Strategy for Agriculture.
Answer
The future development of Land Management Contracts is being considered in a working group comprising a range of industry stakeholders. The working group is scheduled to report on this work to the Agriculture Strategy Implementation Group in early October. Decisions on the level of resources necessary to develop Land Management Contracts will be made in the light of both the report and the advice of the Agriculture Strategy Implementation Group.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 03 September 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Ross Finnie on 17 September 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will clarify its policy intentions in respect of how the Land Reform (Scotland) Bill will impact upon the recreational use of navigable rivers and, if its position is that the bill should not prevent the use of such rivers by canoeists, how legitimate interests of the various recreational users of rivers can best be protected.
Answer
I refer the member to the answer given to question S1W-28859 today. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/search_wa.
