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-03549

Asked by: Dr Alasdair Allan, MSP for Na h-Eileanan an Iar, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 June 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 12 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the recently published data from Scotland’s Census on the number of people with Gaelic language skills.

Question reference: S6O-03562

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness and Nairn, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 June 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 12 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, regarding the application of the principles in the Scottish Public Finance Manual, what its position is on whether the reported estimated cost of £3.56 million for refurbishment to decarbonise the Procurator Fiscal’s Office in Elgin represents value for money, in light of the property being valued at £275,000 in March 2022.

Question reference: S6O-03570

Asked by: Emma Roddick, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 June 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 13 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how it envisages that the recommendations of the second Strategic Transport Projects Review will benefit the people of the Highlands and Islands.

Question reference: S6O-03557

Asked by: Foysol Choudhury, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 June 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 12 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with local authorities regarding any further allocation from its Budget, including for housebuilding.

Question reference: S6O-03552

Asked by: James Dornan, MSP for Glasgow Cathcart, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 June 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 12 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the impact that Brexit is having on Scotland’s economy.

Question reference: S6O-03550

Asked by: Clare Adamson, MSP for Motherwell and Wishaw, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 June 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 12 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what its priorities are for improving intergovernmental relations with the UK Government.

Question reference: S6O-03558

Asked by: John Mason, MSP for Glasgow Shettleston, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 June 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 12 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government when councillors’ pay is expected to rise.

Question reference: S6W-26881

Asked by: Rhoda Grant, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 29 May 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jim Fairlie on 5 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how much private finance, which involves paying returns to private investors, was (a) arranged under the support of the private finance pilot and (b) spent on (i) tree planting and (ii) peatland restoration between the launch of the £2 billion private finance pilot on 1 March 2023 and the last day of February 2024; who the private finance providers involved were; how much was invested and on which projects, and whether it considers any finance awarded by any lottery funds to be private finance.

The Nature Investment Partnership (formerly referred to as the Private Finance Pilot) has not yet invested any private finance in to projects on the ground, or delivered any return to investors.

The Partnership is focussed on building the pipeline of projects to enable that investment to flow, and engaging with a range of investors and communities to establish the best fit for each project. NatureScot have published a detailed FAQs page ( Private finance pilot for nature: FAQs | NatureScot ). The first pilot – the Wild Heart Expansion Project - has been established in the South of Scotland and is now engaging with communities and land managers to test the appetite for nature finance and design the potential investment.

We consider lottery funding to be philanthropic funding.

Question reference: S6W-27814

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 23 May 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 5 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what guidance it provides to the Scottish Ambulance Service on the objectives of its community first responders programme.

Question reference: S6W-27817

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 23 May 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 5 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how many community first responders have been trained by the Scottish Ambulance Service, to date, broken down by parliamentary region.

The Scottish Ambulance Service currently has around 900 Community First Responders. The number of Community First Responders trained by the Scottish Ambulance Service by SAS Operational Areas between April 2021 - March 2024:

	Region
Period	North	East	West	Total
April 21 - March 22	34	2	5	41*
April 22 - March 23	33	30	19	82
April 23 - March 24	56	63	66	185
	123	95	90	308

*The focus in 2021-2022 was re-mobilisation of Community First Responders post Covid, therefore recruitment of new volunteers was limited.