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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: S6W-37656

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how it is addressing any gap in information provision for people with gynaecological cancers, in light of reported findings that they are less likely to receive the information required to care for themselves at home.

Scottish Government continues to work with ‘NHS inform’ to review and update their cancer information provision to best meet patient needs. Their website contains specific gynaecological cancer information, including cervical, ovarian, vaginal, vulval and womb.

Scottish Government is also committed to ensuring that people impacted by a cancer diagnosis, including those with gynaecological cancers, receive person-centred and holistic care.

We are working in partnership with Macmillan to improve the service we offer patients with cancer through the Transforming Cancer Care Programme (TCC). This joint partnership with Macmillan is worth £27 million and is the first of its kind in the UK, providing specialist key support workers who offer emotional, financial and practical support to people with cancer.

We are also supporting the roll out of the Improving the Cancer Journey (ICJ) model to every Health and Social Care Partnership, ensuring 100% of adults diagnosed with cancer (within agreed criteria) will be invited or referred to an ICJ service to speak to a link officer who will complete a Holistic Needs Assessment and generate a care plan to meet their needs.

Question reference: S6W-37948

Asked by: Rachael Hamilton, MSP for Ettrick, Roxburgh and Berwickshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what policies and procedures are in place regarding the storage, use, and disposal of tissue samples from non-suspicious deaths, and what safeguards exist to ensure that the consent and rights of the next of kin are respected.

Part 2 of the Human Tissue Act (Scotland) 2006 makes provision for post-mortem examinations for non-suspicious deaths including the requirement that any hospital-arranged post-mortem may only be carried out if authorisation is obtained from the nearest relative of the deceased or the deceased themselves in advance of death.

Failure to comply with the 2006 Act is an offence. Any authorisation given under the 2006 Act may also include such conditions as the party authorising the matter specifies, such as agreement to retain tissue samples as part of the medical record. It is the duty of those carrying out any authorised activity to do so, in so far as reasonably practicable, in accordance with the specified conditions.

The consent of the nearest relative is not required for a Procurator Fiscal-instructed post-mortem, however the views of the family will be taken into account when making a decision on whether or not to instruct a post-mortem.

Question reference: S6W-38276

Asked by: Mercedes Villalba, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 04 June 2025
Current Status: Answered by Paul McLennan on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what engagement it has had with local authorities regarding when they were first made aware of the risks of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete.

The Scottish Government has engaged closely with Local Authorities throughout the response to the issues raised by reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC). In August 2023 the Scottish Government held the first meeting of the RAAC Cross Sector Working Group to help raise awareness of RAAC across the public sector. Local Authorities are represented on this group as are representative organisations such as the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (CoSLA) and the Scottish Heads of Property Services (SHoPS).

Question reference: S6W-38080

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 02 June 2025
Current Status: Answered by Paul McLennan on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how many new social homes will be delivered in 2025-26, and how this compares with 2021-22, in light of the reported reduced budget allocation for social housing in 2025-26 compared with 2021-22.

We remain focused on delivering 110,000 affordable homes by 2032, with at least 70% of these for social rent and 10% in rural and island areas, including new build, rehabilitation and acquisitions.

Backed by £768 million of investment this year, we are continuing to work with partners to increase the delivery of more affordable homes. We will report on all homes delivered through the Affordable Housing Supply Programme via our quarterly official statistics. Official statistics for the Affordable Housing Supply Programme are available on the Scottish Government website at Housing statistics - gov.scot.

Local authorities, as strategic housing and planning authorities, are responsible for assessing affordable housing needs in their area and setting out their investment priorities in their Strategic Housing Investment Plans (SHIPs). These plans set out planned proposals for affordable housing supply over a five year period, and should be available on each local authority’s website.

From 23 March 2022 to 31 December 2024, a total of 26,039 affordable homes have been delivered towards the target of 110,000 affordable homes by 2032, consisting of 19,945 (77%) homes for social rent, 3,644 (14%) for affordable rent, and 2,450 (9%) for affordable home ownership.

Question reference: S6W-37935

Asked by: Ash Regan, MSP for Edinburgh Eastern, Alba Party
Date lodged: Monday, 02 June 2025
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it can create a strategic Bitcoin reserve, and, if so, whether it will consider the creation of such a reserve.

Question reference: S6W-38099

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 02 June 2025
Current Status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what studies for cover crop viability it plans to support, in light of the recommendation in the Project Willow report.

Question reference: S6W-37944

Asked by: Ash Regan, MSP for Edinburgh Eastern, Alba Party
Date lodged: Friday, 30 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will consider progressing a Dundee Northern Relief Road to reduce conflict between strategic and local traffic in Dundee, and to improve the connectivity of Aberdeen to the Central Belt, including Edinburgh, and what it estimates the cost of such a project is.

The Scottish Government currently has no plans to take forward a Dundee Northern Bypass or Relief Road. The A90 is an important part of Scotland’s Trunk Road network and passes through suburban Dundee, thus serving both strategic need through traffic and the need for local accessibility.

An upgrade to the A90 Kingsway or a possible Dundee northern bypass was considered as part of the second Strategic Transport Projects Review (STPR2), published in 2022. After careful analysis and assessment of the evidence, the national level appraisal concluded that a bypass could provide accessibility benefits for Dundee’s northern communities and reduce journey times for through-traffic on the A90.

However, the scale of these benefits was relatively modest in comparison to the significant environmental and financial costs of a new road. Further, this option did not score well with Transport Scotland’s Sustainable Investment Hierarchy, where the rationale for investment in transport infrastructure projects is to maintain and make best use of our existing transport assets, over building new infrastructure. Taking the totality of the evidence, it was considered that the case for investment in a relief road for Dundee was therefore not sufficiently proven.

Further analysis also noted that major on-line changes to the A90 through Dundee were not considered feasible and reallocation of road space to other purposes was likely to have adverse consequences for traffic routeing. Therefore, the recommendation from STPR2 was that further, more detailed work was required, in the form of an Integrated Transport Plan, to develop a solution that delivered for local residents and strategic through-traffic alike.

A preliminary construction cost estimate for a potential bypass was developed for the STPR2 transport appraisal in 2021. However, given the intervening period and the resulting construction price inflation that has occurred since, these estimates are now out of date.

Question reference: S6W-37978

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 30 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Angus Robertson on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how it will ensure that Creative Scotland maintains political neutrality in its grant-making.

Creative Scotland assesses all applications made - irrespective of theme, subject matter or artform - in accordance with the published criteria and guidance for each funding stream. This guidance states explicit restrictions on the use of funding provided by Creative Scotland for party political activities. The terms and conditions of the agreements entered into with successful applicants further support this position, making clear that funding awarded cannot be used for such activities.

Question reference: S6W-37977

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 30 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Angus Robertson on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether the independent review of Creative Scotland will include scrutiny of all funding decisions over the last five years.

I agreed the remit of the Review of Creative Scotland with the independent Chair, Angela Leitch, and it is available on the Scottish Government’s website at the following link: Independent Review of Creative Scotland: remit - gov.scot

The review will include consideration of Creative Scotland’s finances and distribution of funds.

The Review is independent of the Scottish Government and will deliver its recommendations in November.

Question reference: S6W-37993

Asked by: Keith Brown, MSP for Clackmannanshire and Dunblane, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 30 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what progress has been made towards the delivery of the Stirling and Clackmannanshire City Region Deal.

The Scottish Government and UK Government have made a joint investment commitment of £90.2 million to the Stirling and Clackmannanshire City Region Deal over a ten year period until the end of March 2030.

The Deal, now in its 6th year of delivery, has spent £34.68 million of this available funding up to the end of quarter 4 of financial year 2024-25. This has resulted in completion of the following five projects:

restoration of the Japanese Gardens at Cowden;
a digital hub in Cowie, offering training and business development opportunities;
Walk, Cycle, Live Stirling active travel project, providing two high quality walking and cycling routes;
A Regional Energy Masterplan, supporting a strategic whole systems approach to energy across Stirling and Clackmannanshire; and
transfer of land from the Ministry of Defence to Stirling Council to enable wider regeneration at Forthside.

Meanwhile, the following four projects are in delivery:

a flexible skills project, providing skills development opportunities to improve the employability of up to 500 individuals;
an inclusion workers and investment fund, providing tailored employability support to 245 people from traditionally excluded groups;
Scotland’s International Environment Centre (SIEC), offering research and collaboration opportunities to protect and enhance natural resources; and
the National Aquaculture Technology and Innovation Hub (NATIH), a research facility and business development hub for sustainable aquaculture food production that is due to open in November 2025.