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.

Find out more about parliamentary questions

Filter your results Hide all filters

Displaying 42862 questions Show Answers

Order by |

Question reference: S6W-37746

Asked by: Douglas Ross, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 6 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6O-04664 by Jenny Gilruth on 15 May 2025, whether it will provide the information requested regarding which of the portfolio questions taken in the Chamber on 24 April 2025 raised matters that fall within the specific responsibilities of the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills, as listed on the Scottish Government website, in light of reported concerns about her missing the session for reasons not related to her ministerial duties.

Portfolio Question Time is an opportunity to raise questions relevant to the portfolio concerned and, as already set out in response to S6O-04664, all of the Education and Skills questions raised on 24 April 2025 were answered by a Minister from the Education and Skills portfolio, in line with rule 13.7 of the Parliament’s standing orders.

As Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills, all matters within the Education and Skills portfolio pertain to my responsibilities.

Question reference: S6W-38034

Asked by: Ariane Burgess, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 30 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Alasdair Allan on 6 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government at what stage its ministers are involved in applications to translocate beavers; how they approach any such interventions (a) in general and (b) when an application (i) complies with Scotland's Beaver Strategy and (ii) has strong community support, and how its ministers have approached the translocation in Glen Affric.

The responsibility of the species licensing function was transferred from Scottish Ministers to NatureScot on 1 July 2011. Scottish Ministers retain an interest in the exercise of all the licensing powers delegated.

NatureScot must inform Scottish Ministers about any novel or contentious issues that arise in connection with the exercise of the delegated licensing functions.

The Scottish Government has not been involved in the licensing decision regarding the translocation of beavers to Glen Affric. The Scottish Government fully supports the decision by NatureScot that further consultation with those land managers who may be affected by the translocation of beavers in Glen Affric will be beneficial, and to ensure that appropriate mitigation measures will be agreed before any licensing decision is made.

Question reference: S6W-36360

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 April 2025
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 6 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how much of the active travel budget has been used for that purpose in each year since 2020-21.

A significant share of the annual active travel budget is allocated to partner organisations, including local authorities. This means that not all of the planned spending on programmes and projects in any given budget happens within that year. Delays happen for a range of reasons, not least because of the pandemic between 2020-22 and cuts to capital funding allocations by the previous UK Government.

In 2020-21, 75% of the Active Travel Budget was spent. In 2021-22 76% was spent. In 2022-23, 93% was spent and in 2023-24, 91% was spent. While 2024-25 expenditure has not yet been consolidated, and we only have indicative figures currently, 63% of the active travel budget was spent as a result of urgent action necessary to balance the 2024-25 Budget, following the UK Labour Government’s fiscal statement in summer 2024

Question reference: S6W-38056

Asked by: Beatrice Wishart, MSP for Shetland Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 30 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 6 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether its Marine Directorate is aware of reports that the fishing vessel, Genesis II, left 45 miles of ghost fishing gear on the seabed to the north of Shetland when it was towed to Lerwick harbour on 3 May 2025, and what action it will take to investigate any such reports.

The Scottish Government is aware of the situation with a UK registered gillnet fishing vessel which had broken down and was towed to Lerwick, leaving its gear in the water. Officers from the Marine Directorate worked with the owners of the vessel as soon as it was made aware of the situation, to ensure the gear was recovered by another vessel.

The master was interviewed for breaching soak time limits and was issued with an Official Warning letter.

Question reference: S6W-38054

Asked by: Beatrice Wishart, MSP for Shetland Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 30 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 6 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it (a) is possible to speed up the approval process for Seafish training schemes and (b) will commit to funding such courses to begin every June.

Initial discussions have taken place over the opportunity for financial assistance through the Marine Fund Scotland (MFS) to support Seafish to deliver safety training through the approved Scottish providers. Once a full application has been received, we will assess it and consider provision of appropriate assistance. At present funding from the UK Government to deliver the MFS, is only available for 2025-26 and no commitment can be made in future years.

Question reference: S6W-38360

Asked by: Stephen Kerr, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 05 June 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 19 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government for what reason £85,000 was provided to Sikh Sanjog between 2017-18 and 2020-21 as part of the Promoting Equality and Cohesion Fund; what this funding was used for, and what the outcomes were of the Open Door Project.

Question reference: S6W-37949

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 Dorothy Bain on 5 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will consider removing non-suspicious deaths from the remit of the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.

COPFS understands the impact that the loss of a loved one can have on bereaved families.

The Procurator Fiscal will investigate every death reported to us thoroughly and independently to establish what happened and consider whether criminal proceedings or a Fatal Accident Inquiry (FAI) would be appropriate.

It is a strength of the Scottish system, which reflects a common European model, that death investigations are undertaken by a public prosecutor. That investigation may, depending on the circumstances, disclose a basis for criminal proceedings.

More than 13,000 deaths are reported to COPFS each year. In 2024-25, 98% of deaths where no investigation was required were closed within 6 weeks and 71% where further investigation was required were concluded within 12 weeks.

COPFS has significantly reformed its processes in recent years to improve the quality of death investigations and reduce the time taken to investigate deaths and bring FAIs to court. We are committed to identifying further improvements that can be made. A Death Investigations Improvement Board has been established to oversee all ongoing pieces of work and new proposals to achieve greater public confidence, improve the service delivered to bereaved relatives and reduce the journey time for concluding investigations.

Question reference: S6W-37950

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 Dorothy Bain on 5 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to expand the use of non-invasive post-mortem technologies, such as CT scanners, for non-suspicious deaths.

COPFS rely on pathology providers as the medical experts to determine the nature and extent of the examination required to establish a cause of death.

COPFS would support any proposals where evidence is provided that a particular approach would fully meet the requirements of our investigation in a timely and cost-effective manner, whilst reducing distress to families from the post mortem examination process.

The potential further use of CT scanners has formed part of regular discussions with the current pathology providers. From May 2025, Glasgow University Pathology and NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde Health Board will undertake a service development pilot to investigate the potential benefits of incorporating CT scanning in Procurator Fiscal-instructed post mortem examinations taking place at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital Mortuary in Glasgow. The findings of the pilot will be considered by COPFS as part of its future planning.

Question reference: S6W-37932

Asked by: Ash Regan, MSP for Edinburgh Eastern, Alba Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 5 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it undertook that resulted in it determining that CalMac should be directly awarded the Clyde and Hebrides Ferry Services contract without an open tender process, in light of it stating that directly awarding the contract for the Small Vessel Replacement Programme to Ferguson Marine would present a legal risk.

Direct award of public contracts is only possible in strictly limited circumstances under public procurement rules.

The CHFS3 decision was subject to a due diligence process which concluded there was no financial, operational or legal impediment to implementing a Teckal-compliant direct award.

Shipbuilding is a competitive global market and a designated sensitive sector under the UK Subsidy Control Act. For SVRP, it was assessed that a substantial subsidy would have been required to support direct award of the Phase 1 contract to Fergusons, which we did not consider would be capable of being justified. Given no clear path to subsidy control compliance and the risks of legal challenge, Ministers concluded that directly awarding the Phase 1 contract would have been likely to lead to the worst of both worlds - a delay in adding new ferries to the network and the yard ultimately not securing any work from the programme.

Question reference: S6W-37816

Asked by: Martin Whitfield, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 22 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Natalie Don-Innes on 5 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the Scottish National Party 2016 manifesto commitment that “Every nursery already has a teacher or qualified childcare professional. By 2018, every nursery in a deprived community will have an additional teacher or childcare graduate to support children’s learning”, how many nurseries currently operate without a fully qualified teacher.

To support those children who benefit most from high quality early learning and childcare (ELC) provision, the Scottish Government made a commitment that, from August 2018, nurseries in the most disadvantaged areas would benefit from an additional teacher or degree-qualified ELC professional. These posts are described nationally as Equity and Excellence Leads (originally Additional Graduates) and have different names and job specifications locally.

Snapshot figures of graduate level posts in ELC are published annually in the Summary Statistics for Schools in Scotland publication. Data in the tables is gathered from centres (either local authority or partner provider centres) with children registered for the funded entitlement at the time of the Census. In 2024, this was collected from 9 – 13 September. As of September 2024, there were 356 (317 FTE) Equity and Excellence Leads in post, which equates to 73% of those that are funded.

The majority of the Scottish Government’s funding to Local Government is provided through the General Revenue Grant. As of 2024-25, and in line with the Verity House Agreement, this covers all funding for statutory ELC provision, including for Equity and Excellence Leads.

It is the responsibility of individual local authorities to manage their own budgets and to allocate the total financial resources available to them, including on ELC, on the basis of local needs and priorities, having first fulfilled their statutory obligations and the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities.

We are working with local authority partners to take forward an evaluation of the Equity and Excellence Leads programme, which will seek to identify good practice, any lessons learned and how best to support this critical resource going forward.