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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-15742

Asked by: Michael Marra, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 March 2023
Current Status: Answered by Clare Haughey on 23 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government, according to the latest data, (a) how many and (b) what percentage of children are currently accessing (i) 600 and (ii) 1,140 hours of funded Early Learning and Childcare (ELC), broken down by local authority area.

Summary Statistics for Schools in Scotland provides census data on numbers of registrations for funded early learning and childcare (ELC) at the local authority level as of September 2022. These figures are shown in the following table. The census does not currently record the number of hours being accessed by each child.

Local Authority	Number of funded registrations
Aberdeen City	3,740
Aberdeenshire	4,765
Angus	1,806
Argyll and Bute	1,290
City of Edinburgh	7,765
Clackmannanshire	897
Dumfries and Galloway	2,244
Dundee City	2,546
East Ayrshire	2,346
East Dunbartonshire	2,024
East Lothian	2,073
East Renfrewshire	1,897
Falkirk	2,699
Fife	6,452
Glasgow City	10,403
Highland	3,946
Inverclyde	1,255
Midlothian	2,196
Moray	1,521
Na h-Eileanan Siar	406
North Ayrshire	1,952
North Lanarkshire	5,855
Orkney Islands	382
Perth and Kinross	2,398
Renfrewshire	3,427
Scottish Borders	1,704
Shetland Islands	441
South Ayrshire	1,794
South Lanarkshire	5,939
Stirling	1,506
West Dunbartonshire	1,583
West Lothian	3,363
Scotland	92,615

Separately, the latest management information collected from local authorities and published by the Improvement Service in September 2022, reported that there were 93,902 children accessing funded ELC as of August 2022. Of that number, 83,237 children (88.6%) were accessing 1,140 hours, 91,465 (97.4%) children were accessing more than 600 hours, and 2,437 children (2.6%) were accessing 600 hours or fewer. This management information is not published at local authority level.

Question reference: S6W-15701

Asked by: Monica Lennon, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 March 2023
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 23 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to reduce the risk of relapse in people who are in recovery from alcohol use disorder.

The Scottish Government provides funding to support our local Alcohol and Drug Partnerships who are responsible for the design and delivery of treatment and recovery pathways at the local level. They ensure a full range of recovery services are available such as aftercare, detox, residential rehabilitation and psychosocial treatments.

We acknowledge that alcohol recovery for most people is not a linear process, and for those whose goal is abstinence there is a risk of relapse at various points in their recovery journey, so alcohol services are supportive of people re-engaging after relapse. For others, they may want to consume alcohol but at a lower level. Alcohol services are open to and supportive of these individuals in achieving their goals. Services are also supportive of re-engagement if after meeting a goal an individual relapses into previous drinking patterns or if they want to work towards a new goal regarding their drinking.

The Scottish Government has consulted on restricting alcohol advertising and promotion to protect vulnerable groups, including those in recovery. Evidence suggests that alcohol marketing can be a barrier to successful recovery. Following analysis of responses we will consider possible restrictions.

Question reference: S6W-15816

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 March 2023
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 23 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government how many people have received a face-to-face meeting to assist them with a homelessness application in each local authority area in each year since 1999.

Question reference: S6W-15815

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 March 2023
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 23 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on how many local authorities are currently not providing face-to-face meetings to assist people with homelessness applications.

Question reference: S6W-15785

Asked by: Willie Rennie, MSP for North East Fife, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 March 2023
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 23 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what funding it has made available to implement the Data Strategy for health and social care; for how long it plans to fund the implementation of the strategy, and by when it expects the actions in the strategy to be implemented.

Scotland's first Data Strategy for Health & Social Care brings together a range of existing activity, along with its associated funding. The Strategy provides a framework for how improvements to data will be driven forward to the benefit of the people of Scotland.

A newly formed Data Board for Health and Social Care will oversee the delivery of the Strategy and any investment cases required to progress specific actions. The Board will also consider what further work is required for the next iterations of the Data Strategy.

Delivering the principles and priorities set out in the Strategy should be seen as a long term commitment of the Scottish Government and COSLA. Implementation of each iteration of the Strategy will be accompanied by a delivery plan.

Question reference: S6W-15739

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 March 2023
Current Status: Answered by Lorna Slater on 23 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on its work to identify how older and disabled people who are unable to access physical return points will be protected during the phase-in period of an online takeback service for the Deposit Return Scheme.

We have proposed to bring forward amendments to the Deposit Return Scheme regulations so that only the largest grocery retailers will initially be obliged to provide an online takeback service and all other businesses will be exempt.- Further work will be undertaken to identify how older and disabled people will be protected during this phasing-in of online takeback to ensure the scheme is accessible to everyone.

Question reference: S6W-15793

Asked by: Fulton MacGregor, MSP for Coatbridge and Chryston, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 March 2023
Current Status: Answered by Clare Haughey on 23 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government, in relation to the national service specification for secure transport, jointly developed with COSLA, whether the relevant minister will meet with representatives of the Hope Instead of Handcuffs campaign to discuss long-term solutions for regulating secure transport, including to prevent transport providers restraining children in care.

The Scottish Government is aware of the issues facing Scottish local authorities in relation to secure transport, reflecting many of those matters highlighted by the Hope Instead of Handcuffs campaign.

There are no current plans for Ministers to meet with campaign representatives. However, Scottish Government officials met with representatives of the campaign on 13 March to discuss the ongoing multi-agency work to develop solutions to these issues, including the development of a service specification.

Question reference: S6W-15645

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 March 2023
Current Status: Answered by Angus Robertson on 23 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to the urgent question by Angus Robertson on 28 February 2023, whether the Cabinet Secretary for the Constitution, External Affairs and Culture plans to request the addition of a correction in the Official Report, within the 20 working day deadline of 28 March 2023, in relation to his statement that the claim that Scotland has 25% of Europe’s potential offshore wind resource “is now considered to be overtaken by developments”, in light of the UK Statistics Authority’s reported investigation and letter of 7 December 2022 stating that it was never accurate and that “it is good practice for elected representatives to correct their use of official statistics”.

The Scottish Government has accepted that this statistic relating to Scotland’s offshore wind potential needs revising. In response to the issues raised in the UK Statistics Authority’s letter, dated 7 December 2022, the Scottish Government has engaged directly with the Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) setting out the steps that have been taken to ensure the statistic is not used further, and provided an update on the analytical work that is underway to produce a replacement statistic, which will be published in due course.

Question reference: S6W-15736

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 March 2023
Current Status: Answered by Lorna Slater on 23 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government, regarding the Deposit Return Scheme, how many applications for return point exemption were (a) made, (b) approved and (c) rejected since applications opened, broken down by month.

The following table shows the number of exemptions and voluntary return point applications, broken down by month, as of 16 March 2023.

	Feb-22	Mar-22	Apr-22	May-22	Jun-22	Jul-22	Aug-22	Sept-22	Oct-22	Nov-22	Dec-22	Jan-23	Feb-23	Mar-23	Totals
Proximity Applications Received	1			1	3		9		1		1		21	1	38
Granted				1		4	7				1			1	14
Rejected								1	1		1			1	4
Environmental Health Applications Received	3				1		2	1	1	4	7	16	51	168	254
Granted										1	3	2	4		11
Rejected				1	1					2	7				11
Voluntary Return Point Applications Received													1		1
Granted															0
Rejected															0

Question reference: S6W-15819

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 March 2023
Current Status: Answered by Clare Haughey on 23 March 2023

To ask the Scottish Government how many looked after young people have been placed in unregulated accommodation in each year since 1999, broken down by local authority area.