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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.

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Question reference: S5W-25699

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 07 October 2019
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 24 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what the mean salary is for staff in the (a) Programme Management and Delivery and (b) Chief Digital Officer division of the Social Security Directorate, broken down by grade, and how this compares with that of contingent staff.

We publish the following information on staff salaries in the Scottish Government, which includes the Social Security Directorate:
https://www.gov.scot/publications/public-sector-pay-policy-staff-pay-remits-2019-20-technical-guide/pages/9/

https://www.gov.scot/publications/foi-19-00145/

https://www.gov.scot/policies/public-sector-pay/pay-transparency/

And we publish the following information on our staff numbers:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/workforce-information/

Regarding the salaries for contingent workers, we refer you to the PQ responses in the following links:

S5W-25516 – https://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx?SearchType=Advance&ReferenceNumbers=S5W-25516&ResultsPerPage=10

S5W-25345 – https://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx?SearchType=Advance&ReferenceNumbers=S5W-25345&ResultsPerPage=10

Question reference: S5W-25707

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 08 October 2019
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 22 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how many interim and contingent workers it has conducted an IR35 assessment for in each month since April 2017, and of those how many were (a) in and (b) out of scope.

Question reference: S5W-25706

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 08 October 2019
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 22 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what information it collects regarding the day-rates of the interim and contingent workers that it hires.

Question reference: S5W-25708

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 08 October 2019
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 22 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how many interim and contingent workers are filled (a) directly and have a Scottish Government payroll record and (b) by a supplier, for the purposes of paying tax and national insurance in accordance with IR35 requirements.

Contingent workers are not employed directly by Scottish Government and do not have records on an SG payroll. Information on contingent workers employed by agencies and engaged in Scottish Government Core is published in our Official Statistics publication which can be found here. https://www.gov.scot/publications/workforce-information/

Workers in scope for IR35 are an exception to the above as regards payroll. They are counted as contingent workers and are not employed directly by SG. They have a contract for provision of services not a contract of employment but do have a payroll record. Payroll is used to deduct the necessary PAYE tax and National Insurance contributions from the payment for services provided. It does not infer any employment relationship.

Since 2017, 4 workers hired directly have been found to be in scope and we are making appropriate tax and NI deductions.

Question reference: S5W-25709

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 08 October 2019
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 22 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what information it collects regarding the (a) tax-domicile and (b) residency status of the interim and contingent workers that it hires where the role is filled by (i) a supplier and (ii) the worker directly.

Question reference: S5W-25560

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 30 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 18 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what evidence Social Security Scotland provided to Audit Scotland to determine whether Carer's Allowance spending under agency arrangements was in line with the relevant legislation.

Question reference: S5W-25559

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 30 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 18 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has asked Audit Scotland to correct exhibit 2 in its paper, Social Security Scotland annual audit report 2018/19, which states that the Scottish Child Payment will be delivered at the end of 2022.

Exhibit 2 correctly states that eligible families with children under 16 will receive their payments by the end of 2022, which reflects the timeline announced by the First Minister for the Scottish Government in its Programme for Government 2019-2020. The document referred to is not produced by Scottish Government or Social Security Scotland and any questions regarding its editing should be put to Audit Scotland.

Question reference: S5W-25516

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 7 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-25345 by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 25 September 2019, what the mean (a) full-time equivalent and (b) day-rate salary is for contingent workers in each division of the Social Security Directorate.

Question reference: S5W-25494

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 7 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the Cabinet Secretary for Social Security and Older People's letter of 8 August 2019 to the Social Security Committee, which stated that "the Scottish Government worked directly with people in receipt of Universal Credit (UC) in Scotland as we developed the UC Scottish choices... they told us that it made most sense for people to be offered the choices after the first assessment period because only at that point did they know how much their UC award was going to be", whether it has published the findings of this work.

Question reference: S5O-03649

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 October 2019
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 9 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how it supports the participation in cultural and tourism-related activities of disabled people and people with long-term health conditions.