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: S6W-04249

Asked by: Daniel Johnson, MSP for Edinburgh Southern, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 08 November 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 6 December 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the effectiveness of the COVID-19 vaccine passport scheme, and on the number of times the vaccine passport app has been downloaded, broken down by the age of those who have downloaded it.

We published an updated evidence paper on the Covid 19 status certification scheme on Friday 19 November 2021.

Public Heath Scotland also publish a weekly COVID-19 statistical report which includes the number of times the NHS Scotland COVID Status App has been downloaded. As at 15 November 2021 this is 1.5 million times. The statistical information for the app is provided by Apple and Google and we do not receive a breakdown by age or demographic.

Question reference: S6W-04216

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 09 November 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 6 December 2021

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of reports that not all of the companies, NetCompany, Service Now, Jumio, iProov, Albasoft, Amazon Web Services, CFH Docmail, Microsoft Azure, Gov.uk Notify Service and Royal Mail, are able to access data from the NHS Scotland COVID Status App, even though it is shared, whether it will provide clarification of what this means.

Question reference: S6W-04211

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 09 November 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 6 December 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has had any communication with the Scottish Human Rights Commission regarding its reported concerns about the NHS Scotland COVID Status App, and, if so, whether it will publish any such correspondence and the minutes of any meetings.

Question reference: S6W-04099

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 01 November 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 6 December 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish the findings from each three-week review of the COVID-19 vaccine certification scheme.

We continually keep our COVID-19 Status Certification scheme under review and consider a range of evidence, data, and information which is already published. Information such as the “ trends in daily data ”; the weekly report on the “ state of the epidemic ”, and the anticipated pressures on our public services. Following that consideration Ministers then report to parliament, detailing the outcome of their review every 3 weeks.

Question reference: S6W-03952

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 25 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 6 December 2021

To ask the Scottish Government which NHS boards have (a) declared themselves to be Code Black and (b) triggered escalation procedures for Code Black since 1 September 2021.

Each Health Board operates their own escalation policy for the management of inpatient capacity that includes well established processes with locally agreed trigger points for maintaining a safe service and ensuring patient safety. At present, we are only aware of NHS Lanarkshire operating at the highest level of their local escalation - “Black”.

Health Boards across the country are operating under significant pressure due to the direct and indirect consequences of the pandemic, which has been the biggest challenge the NHS has faced in its 73 year existence.

The Scottish Government is in daily contact with all Health Boards to monitor the pressures in the system and continues to support improvement work to minimise delays for patients no matter where they are in the system.

Question reference: S6W-04140

Asked by: Monica Lennon, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 05 November 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 6 December 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with (a) Police Scotland and (b) businesses about any potential circulation of counterfeit vaccine passports.

Ministers and officials are in regular contact with Police Scotland and other stakeholders on a range of issues associated with the COVID-19 Status Certification scheme, which includes but not limited to security of the certification.

The app has a number of counter fraud elements built in. This includes a secure QR code, visual motion elements including a ‘shimmer’ icon, and a clock showing the current time which protects against screenshots being presented as certificates. In addition, we have a secure identification verification process.

Although not a requirement for business to use, we also encourage use of the NHS Scotland Covid Check App as it is specifically designed to verify the authenticity of a certificate by checking that the QR code was issued by a trusted authority (e.g. NHS Scotland, or any of the countries linked to the EU Digital Covid Certificate).

Question reference: S6W-04772

Current Status: Withdrawn

Question reference: S6W-04550

Asked by: Pam Duncan-Glancy, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 23 November 2021
Current Status: Answered by Ben Macpherson on 3 December 2021

To ask the Scottish Government how many personal independence payment (PIP) cases are being transferred from the DWP to Social Security Scotland, and by what date this will be completed.

We have started the transfer of approximately 52,000 DLA Child awards from DWP to Social Security Scotland. We will begin the transfer of approximately 300,000 awards of Personal Independence Payment in summer 2022.

Our aim is to safely and securely complete case transfer for all people in Scotland in receipt of disability and carer benefits by the end of 2025. We will do so sooner if possible, as long as we do not risk the process being anything other than safe and secure for this significantly large number of people, and will do so jointly with the UK Government as case transfer is a joint programme of work.

Question reference: S6W-04311

Asked by: Monica Lennon, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 18 November 2021
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 3 December 2021

To ask the Scottish Government how much funding it has awarded to Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland in each year since 2019 in connection with (a) chronic pain groups, (b) meetings of the National Advisory Committee for Chronic Pain and (c) the involvement of contractors to arrange capacity-building meetings and the production of terms of reference.

The Scottish Government has awarded the following funding to the Health and Social Care Alliance for work related to the Chronic Pain Patient Reference Group since 2019 to cover all activities including support for representatives attending meetings of the National Advisory Committee for Chronic Pain and capacity building activities. Funding has been provided since 2019 as follows:

2019-2020	£6000
2020-2021	£10,077
2021-2022	£10,076

Question reference: S6W-04308

Asked by: Jackson Carlaw, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 18 November 2021
Current Status: Answered by Clare Haughey on 3 December 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to ensure that local authorities adhere to the Funding Follows the Child guidance, which states that local authorities should give appropriate consideration to the potential impact of their recruitment activity on the sustainability of funded providers.

Local authorities have worked with local partners to undertake a significant workforce expansion to support delivery of the 1140 commitment and we have seen an increase in the availability of funded early learning and childcare (ELC) places across the local authority, private, third and childminding sectors.

The underpinning policy framework for the ELC expansion, Funding Follows the Child, was developed jointly between the Scottish Government and COSLA. Local authorities are responsible for adhering to the guidance and ensuring they undertake appropriate impact assessments to support their policy and investment decisions, as they do routinely.

Implementation of Funding Follows the Child is overseen by the ELC Joint Delivery Board which is chaired by the Minister for Children and Young People and the COSLA Spokesperson for Children and Young People. The Joint Delivery Board regularly reviews the risks and impacts of the ELC expansion programme, including any issues with adherence to the Funding Follows the Child and National Standard guidance.