Seòmar agus comataidhean

Research shows that manyvisitors to Scotland give “family roots and ancestry” as the maininfluence on their decision to holiday in Scotland. Scotland is fortunate in having some of the best genealogicalresources in the world. In particular, the development of the £1.6 millionScottish Family History Centre announced by the Scottish Executive in December2002 provides a valuable opportunity to attract more visitors and maximise useof this tremendous resource.

The new Centre will link theadjacent General Register House and New Register House at the East end of Edinburgh’s Princes Streetto create a fully-integrated Register House campus. It will be fully operationalin 2006 and will create a one stop-shop for genealogy research, bringingtogether services provided separately by the General Register Office for Scotland,National Archives of Scotland and Court of the Lord Lyon.

In addition, in response togrowing demand for genealogy tourism to Scotland VisitScotland launched the AncestralScotlandwebsite in 2002. The primary aim behind the project is to use people’s interestin their ancestral roots as a hook to encourage tourism. AncestralScotlandoffers the user information on how to research ancestry and provides a databaseof names (based on the 1881 census) for users to search through. Thegenealogical information is linked directly to tourism information on therelevant regional tourist board site, thereby encouraging users not simply toresearch their ancestors but to travel to their homeland.

VisitScotland will attendthe Swedish International Travel and Tourism Fair to be held in Gothenburg inMarch. This will coincide with the new SAS Snowflake services from Scotland to Sweden commencingin March, while Ryanair already fly from Prestwick to Gothenburg. VisitScotland have been talking tothe Highlands of Scotland Tourist Board, Highlands and Islands Enterprise and SAS Snowflake about howbest to promote these links between Scotland and Sweden at the Fair.

The introduction of directair links to Sweden over the past year has raised the priority given to Sweden by VisitScotlandas a target market. Promotional activity in Sweden is being increasedaccordingly; for example, VisitScotland will run a spring campaign in Sweden forthe first time this year.

The Parliament has recentlybeen involved in discussions with the Nordic Council through its membership of the British-Irish Inter-parliamentary Body (BIIPB). The BIIPB will produce areport shortly on its links with the Nordic Council. MSPs and officials fromthe Scottish Parliament have participated in, and contributed to, theproduction of the forthcoming report. Most recently, in December 2003, this hasinvolved members visiting Norway to take forward issues in the draft report.

At present, there are nofirm plans to meet with the Nordic Council in 2004. However, it is expectedthat there will be productive exchanges with countries, regions andinstitutions from the Nordic/Baltic zone over the course of the year, e.g. SPCBstaff are currently working with Nordic parliament secretariats and Scottish universitiesto exchange views on committee practice. It is probable that there will befurther contact with the Nordic Council this year, but there are no plans atpresent to enter into discussions with the Nordic Council on gaining full orassociated membership, nor has the Nordic Council proposed that we do so.

The location of the headquarters of the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) was decided by headsof government at the Brussels European Council on 12 and 13 of December asrecorded in the presidency conclusions. There was strong competition from anumber of bids for the EMSA headquarters, including Glasgow. The conduct andprocess of the UK application for Glasgow were the responsibilityof the UK Government, and a full bid document was produced in co-operation withthe Scottish Executive. The Scottish Executive maintains close contact withthe UK Government on a range of EU matters including the process for the sitingof European agency’s headquarters.

The Scottish Executive strategy to promote the maritime sector in Glasgow, andthroughout Scotland, is through the ports policies set out in ModernPorts: A UK wide policy,(Bib. number 9874), through encouraging shipbuilding in Scotland, encouragingshipping as a sustainable method of transport, and through regular liaison withthe UK Government about reserved shipping polices as they affect Scotland.

There are no provisions inthe Transport (Scotland) Act 2001 for tolling of motorways and trunk roadsand no proposals to proceed with any tolling projects in Scotland.

Primary responsibility forinvestment in community centres rests with local authorities who receive blockallocations of revenue support grant and capital allocation from the Executive,to deploy according to their local priorities. In addition, however, the Scottish Executive offers grants of up to £100,000 through the local capital grants scheme,to assist local voluntary and community organisations, particularly in ruralareas, to provide new or upgrade existing community premises for educational,social or recreational activities.

All 554 public libraries in Scotland areconnected to the People’s Network, providing free access to the Internet. Ofthese, more than 84% (465 libraries) offer broadband internet access at 2Mbs orfaster. Connectivity at the remaining libraries is provided over connectionsranging from 64Kbs to 512 Kbs, with the majority (around 75%) connected at 128Kbs. The table shows a breakdown by local authority. The question of broadband provision in communitycentres is a matter for the local authorities concerned. The informationrequested is not held centrally.

Local Authority	Number of libraries with a 2Mbs or faster connection	Total number of libraries
Clackmannan	1	8
Dumfries and Galloway	20	24
Dundee	14	14
East Ayrshire	23	23
East Dunbartonshire	8	8
East Lothian	12	12
East Renfrewshire	5	8
Edinburgh	26	26
Falkirk	7	7
Fife	59	59
Glasgow	32	32
Highland	12	43
Inverclyde	9	9
Midlothian	10	10
Moray	16	16
North Ayrshire	17	17
North Lanarkshire	24	24
Orkney	2	2
Perth and Kinross	8	13
Renfrewshire	17	17
Scottish Borders	5	13
Shetland	1	1
South Ayrshire	15	15
South Lanarkshire	14	25
Stirling	10	15
West Dunbartonshire	10	11
West Lothian	13	15
Western Isles	1	6
Total	465	554

Information on loss of urbangreen space is not held centrally. We have no plans to collect suchinformation.

Information on loss ofplaying fields is supplied to the Scottish Executive through sportscotland.It has not been possible to collate the information requested in the timeavailable. I will ask the Minister for Tourism, Culture and Sport to write to the Member once the information is available. Acopy of the letter will be placed in the Parliament’s Reference Centre.

The Scottish Executive defines broadband, in the context of schools, as a high-capacity,two-way digital link capable of supporting full-motion, interactive videoapplications. The actual bandwidth required to achieve this benchmark variesaccording to the number of concurrent users in a school. For schools, 2Mbps is generallyregarded as the minimum transmission rate for a broadband connection.

According to the most recentlyavailable Schools’ ICT Survey (September 2002), 13% of primary schools and 49%of secondary schools have a minimum connection of 2Mbps.

The Scottish Executive’s public sector broadband policy is currently beingtaken forward in two Pathfinder areas (Highlands and Islands and South of Scotland). Decisions about further implementationof schools broadband will be taken on the basis of lessons learned from thePathfinder Projects.

A similar scheme alreadyoperates in the UK. Bookstart, which was established in 1992, providesthe parents of each new-born child with a pack containing an invitation tolibrary membership, advice on reading and two books. In Scotland,this is an inter-agency project, involving close co-operation between ScottishBook Trust, library services and health authorities. Health workers present thepack at six-month assessment, but it is generally library staff in each local authoritywho run the service.

28 of the 32 localauthorities currently operate the scheme. The remaining four have beenencouraged to join, but local partnerships take time to develop.

The Scottish Executive, through the Children and Young People’s Interim grant Scheme, isproviding funding of £190,000 for 2004-05 so that the service can continue, whileBookstart apply for future funding from the New Opportunities Fund.