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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.

Find out more about parliamentary questions

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Question reference: S6F-03665

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 16 December 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 19 December 2024

To ask the First Minister what consideration the Scottish Government has given to what the potential impact might be on Deaf and Deafblind people of the termination of its contract with Contact Scotland BSL.

Question reference: S6F-03654

Asked by: Sandesh Gulhane, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Date lodged: Monday, 16 December 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 19 December 2024

To ask the First Minister what steps the Scottish Government is taking in response to the reported announcement that NHS Scotland's IT software supplier, INPS, has entered administration, in light of concerns that this could leave GPs without the digital infrastructure to maintain electronic health records.

Question reference: S6F-03648

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for Midlothian South, Tweeddale and Lauderdale, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 16 December 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 19 December 2024

To ask the First Minister whether the Scottish Government will encourage the public not to buy puppies or dogs during the festive period, in light of the reported possibility that these may be the product of irresponsible breeders, including illegal puppy farms.

Question reference: S6F-03641

Asked by: Russell Findlay, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 16 December 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 19 December 2024

Question to be taken in Chamber.

Question reference: S6F-03643

Asked by: Patrick Harvie, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Monday, 16 December 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 19 December 2024

Question to be taken in Chamber.

Question reference: S6F-03642

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 16 December 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 19 December 2024

Question to be taken in Chamber.

Question reference: S6W-31966

Asked by: Sarah Boyack, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 04 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Gillian Martin on 16 December 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-30029 by Gillian Martin on 30 September 2024, whether any of the listed flood prevention schemes have since been completed.

Question reference: S6W-31809

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 November 2024
Current Status: Answered by Graeme Dey on 16 December 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what mechanisms it uses to ensure best value for the spending of public funds on, and consistency of, support for disabled students in further and higher education.

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that all students with a disability, long term medical condition or additional support needs are able to access further and higher education and are fully supported throughout their studies.

Further Education

The Additional Support Needs for Learning Allowance is a non-income assessed allowance administered by individual colleges. It is intended to support students with disabilities or additional learning needs who are studying a course of Further Education and may have extra costs because of their disability.

Colleges, as part of their integral core funding via Scottish Funding Council, also receive the Access and Inclusion Fund. This supports the teaching and learning of students with additional support needs.

It is the responsibility of individual colleges to manage their student support budgets in a prudent and effective manner. The Scottish Funding Council has clear guidelines and processes in place to monitor colleges’ management of their student support funds, including the requirement for colleges to be audited, by external auditors, on their annual student support expenditure.

Higher Education

The Disabled Students Allowance (DSA) is a non-income assessed fund that is administered by Student Awards Agency Scotland. It is intended to support disabled students and those with additional learning needs who are studying a course of Higher Education and may have extra costs because of their disability.

As a bespoke fund, the amount a student is eligible to receive is based on their individual needs. Those awards are made based on comprehensive guidance prepared by Student Award Agency Scotland and shared with institutions on an annual basis, ensuring that there is a consistency of approach across the sector.

Question reference: S6W-31919

Asked by: Colin Beattie, MSP for Midlothian North and Musselburgh, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 02 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 16 December 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what support is being provided to independent businesses in (a) rural and (b) small communities.

The Scottish Government is committed to building a vibrant, sustainable, and inclusive rural economy that meets the goals of achieving a nature-positive and wellbeing economy for future generations.

Our enterprise agencies help businesses across Scotland to start and scale, be more productive, access finance and attract investment, develop new products and services, enter new markets and positively impact on their communities.

We have allocated over £321 million to the enterprise agencies in 2025-26 to support their work and help them unlock the full economic potential of their regions.

Question reference: S6W-31948

Asked by: Jamie Greene, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 03 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 16 December 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of its response to freedom of information request FOI/202400436576, which shows that it was notified of 16 cyber attacks on public bodies in 2024, whether it will provide an update on what steps it is taking to improve its cyber resilience.

Good cyber resilience is essential for delivering secure digital public services. Staying ahead of cyber criminals is an ongoing battle; as technologies evolve, so do their tactics. Public sector organisations are responsible for their own cyber resilience and security arrangements, and must continually adapt to these emerging threats. However, the Scottish Government does provide assistance to the public sector to strengthen their cyber resilience posture and address areas for improvement.

Through the implementation of The Strategic Framework for a Cyber Resilient Scotland and the Public Sector Cyber Resilience Framework, supported by the new central function of the Scottish Cyber Coordination Centre, the Scottish Government works with the public sector to help them to put in place robust security standards, controls and governance, maintain and regularly test incident response plans, train staff and learn lessons from past incidents.

Specifically, the Scottish Cyber Coordination Centre plays a key role in coordinating effective multi-agency response to incidents which impact on the public sector. In September 2024, the Scottish Government published the SC3 Strategic Plan which sets out the strategic objectives for the next three years. SC3 is working with the sector to progress towards these objectives:

1. Create a data-driven operation that can track and evaluate actionable security metrics for every public sector organisation in Scotland.

2. Ensure that public sector organisations remain informed regarding current and emerging risks and threats so that they are equipped and prepared to manage them.

3. Reduce the prevalence and remediation timescales of exposed and exploitable vulnerabilities across the public sector.

4. Increase the level of preparedness for cyber incidents across the public sector, such that all organisations have current and well tested response plans and that major national cyber incident response processes are robust and effective.

5. Ensure that appropriate standards and good practices for cyber and information security are defined, reviewed, adopted, and adhered to across the public sector.