Chamber and committees

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: S6O-00295

Asked by: Ariane Burgess, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 October 2021
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 28 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether it is considering a scheme to support and incentivise social housing providers and homeowners to retrofit and refurbish long-term empty homes and bring them back into use as zero emissions housing.

Question reference: S6O-00293

Asked by: Emma Harper, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 October 2021
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 28 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to promote manufacturing in Scotland.

Question reference: S6O-00299

Asked by: Annabelle Ewing, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 October 2021
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 28 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the new medical centre for Lochgelly.

Question reference: S6O-00296

Asked by: Emma Roddick, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 October 2021
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 28 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what it is doing to support social housing providers in the Highlands and Islands.

Question reference: S6W-03038

Asked by: Richard Leonard, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 September 2021
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Graeme Dey on 20 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what recent discussions Caledonian Maritime Assets Ltd has had with (a) CalMac Ferries, (b) shipbrokers and (c) shipowners regarding the charter of vessels to increase carrying capacity on routes in the Clyde and Hebrides Ferry Services contract.

On 5 October 2021, the Scottish Government was delighted to announce the purchase, by Caledonian Maritime Assets Limited (CMAL), of the MV Utne which will provide additional resilience to the Clyde and Hebrides Ferry Service network.

Regular discussions with CMAL on the charter and potential purchase of available and suitable vessels to support and improve services on Scotland's ferry networks will continue.

Question reference: S6W-02961

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 14 September 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 20 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what the average waiting time has been for cleft pallet surgery for babies in each year since 1999.

Question reference: S6W-03525

Asked by: Mercedes Villalba, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 06 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Mairi McAllan on 20 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what legislation it plans to introduce to (a) tackle the concentration of land ownership in Scotland and (b) promote the use of land in the interests of (i) local communities and (ii) the natural environment; what the timescales are for any (A) such legislation and (B) other measures on these issues, and when any consultations are expected to be undertaken.

We have an ongoing and unwavering commitment to land reform, and to tackling the issues associated with the scale and concentration of land ownership. We will be introducing a new Land Reform Bill by the end of 2023, which will aim to ensure that the public interest is considered on transfers of particularly large scale land holdings. We also aim to introduce a pre-emption in favour of community buy-out where the public interest test applies, and where it is appropriate to do so.

In addition we are committed to doubling the funding available for communities to buy land and land assets through the Scottish Land Fund, to £20 million, by the end of this Parliament.

We will be undertaking a wide-ranging public consultation on proposals for the Bill in 2022, and we are committed to engaging with all stakeholders to develop policy and legislative solutions to progress our proposals.

Question reference: S6W-03490

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 05 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Dorothy Bain on 20 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to reduce toxicology waiting times, and by what date it expects this reduction will begin to take place.

COPFS and the University of Glasgow agreed an Improvement Plan to reduce the toxicology waiting times. This plan defined performance targets and required the University of Glasgow to provide data to COPFS on a weekly basis. The required data was to highlight the laboratory’s progress with outstanding cases and new cases.

The Improvement Plan has been successful; the toxicology waiting times are now reduced and there is no delay in provision of those reports to the pathologists who require them to finalise the post mortem report.

An indication of the effectiveness of the improvement plan is that, in the week of 25 September 2020, there were 1351 open toxicology cases with University of Glasgow and in the week of 26 September 2021 there were 351 open toxicology cases.

Question reference: S6W-03488

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 05 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Dorothy Bain on 20 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what information it has regarding the number of toxicology reports that remain outstanding because of the reported backlog.

In 2019 COPFS began to experience delays in the provision of toxicology reports from the University of Glasgow, the main contractor for this service. This was further compounded during 2020 due to the pandemic.

Once a toxicological report has been finalised, it is then considered by the pathologist(s) who conducted the post mortem, and thereafter a final post mortem report is issued to the appropriate team in COPFS, who require to review it in detail before the next of kin can be informed of the final cause of death.

Working with Glasgow University, COPFS put various measures in place to address both the backlog and the increasing number of new deaths requiring toxicological analysis. The measures included agreeing a new format of abbreviated report for some cases, and an Improvement Plan which set out weekly performance targets and ensured focused progression with both the backlog of cases and newly reported cases.

Successful implementation of the Improvement Plan in particular means that there is now no backlog of toxicology reports and toxicology analysis is being completed in the majority of cases within 8 weeks.

Question reference: S6W-03299

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 27 September 2021
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 20 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answers to questions S6W-02678 to S6W-02684 and S6W-02686 by Richard Lochhead on 22 September 2021, whether it will clarify what or who it means, precisely, by "partners, communities and other stakeholders".

Our approach to developing the Fund will mirror our just transition planning work. The Fund will be co-designed and co-delivered with those who stand to be most significantly impacted by the transition to net zero. This is likely to include, but not be limited to, community groups, workers and trade unions, businesses, business leaders and industry bodies and include input from academia and educators, and climate leaders, activists and thinkers.