- Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 10 July 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Siobhian Brown on 25 July 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on whether reducing the number of firefighters from 45 to 25 and the number of fire appliances from two to one and withdrawing the rope rescue unit at Lochgelly Fire Station would improve fire response times or increase any risk to lives, property and businesses.
Answer
I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-39288 on 25 July 2025. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.
- Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 10 July 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Siobhian Brown on 25 July 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what analysis it has undertaken of any increased fire or major incident risk to communities in and around the Mossmorran petrochemical plant, three Forth bridges, M9 and Rosyth Dockyard in the event that 20 firefighters, a fire appliance and the rope rescue unit are removed from Lochgelly Fire Station.
Answer
The analysis of risk and provision of fire and rescue resources is an operational matter for the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS). The Scottish Government supports SFRS as it carefully considers how to adapt to changing risks to remain an effective and efficient service across the whole of Scotland, with firefighters in the right place at the right time. SFRS is conducting a public consultation on possible service changes, including Lochgelly fire station but until that consultation closes and the results are analysed, no decisions have been taken.
- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 10 July 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 25 July 2025
To ask the Scottish Government for what reason it has reportedly limited access to the Islands Business Resilience Fund to eight islands, and whether it will consider extending this fund to businesses in all of Scotland's island communities.
Answer
The Scottish Government has worked closely with Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) to develop and refine the eligibility criteria for the Islands Business Resilience Fund (IBRF) and identify how this targeted funding can reach those businesses which meet the criteria and have been impacted by reductions in ferry services.
HIE carried out detailed analysis of data and statistics provided by Transport Scotland and CalMac relating to ferry disruption. Based on this, the islands of South Uist, Colonsay, North Uist, Eriskay, Benbecula, Berneray, Grimsay and Arran were identified as eligible for the Fund, as they each had experienced more than 15% ferry cancellations over the last three operating seasons, with limited alternatives. For comparison, the average disruption to ferry services, across the CalMac network was around 6-7%.
- Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
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Submitting member has a registered interest.
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Date lodged: Thursday, 10 July 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Neil Gray on 25 July 2025
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to
question S6W-37919 by Neil Gray on 5 June 2025, whether it will
provide an update on the roll-out of the digital dermatology
pathway to (a) GPs and (b) NHS boards, including how many GP
practices are currently participating in the system.
Answer
All Territorial Boards can now provide their GPs with access to the new Digital Dermatology Pathway. Supplier data suggests that as of 18 July, 627 GP practices (71%) across 13 Territorial Boards have access to the pathway, of which 423 have used this to capture images as part of a referral to secondary care. The remaining Territorial Board has an existing pathway in place.
- Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 15 July 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Siobhian Brown on 25 July 2025
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on what actions have been implemented as a result of its youth violence summit on 12 June 2025.
Answer
The Scottish Government is continuing to invest in violence prevention activity through our grant funded partner organisations, including the Scottish Violence Reduction Unit and Youthlink Scotland’s No Knives Better Lives.
This includes the development and delivery of two campaigns on knife crime and weapon carrying, to raise awareness to older children and the adults around them, including a campaign specifically targeting primary aged school children.
The Quit Fighting for Likes campaign will be promoted to front line professionals to encourage conversations with young people to explore the impact of filming and sharing violent images online. Resources will also target parents to help support young people away from carrying weapons.
We are considering what more we can do to strengthen support for young people and communities.
- Asked by: Pam Gosal, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 09 July 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Dorothy Bain on 25 July 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how many individuals were (a) prosecuted and (b) convicted for selling counterfeit goods in the financial year 2024-25.
Answer
A search has been performed of the COPFS database for charges received by COPFS under a) the Trade Marks Act 1994, and b) a key word search for counterfeit or fake goods on charges under the Scottish Government Classification of "Fraud”.
During the period 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025 there was a total of 27 charges marked for court action relating to individuals. Of these 27 charges, four resulted in a conviction with 19 charges ongoing. No further action was taken in two charges and a further two charges resulted in the individual not being convicted.
Information is also provided for the period 1 April 2020 to 31 March 2024 and all information is broken down as follows:
Outcome | 2020-21 | 2021-22 | 2022-23 | 2023-24 | 2024-25 |
Convicted | 50 | 4 | 7 | 2 | 4 |
Not Convicted | 57 | 6 | 6 | 3 | 2 |
Ongoing | 6 | 0 | 22 | 31 | 19 |
No Further Action | 1 | 9 | 1 | 9 | 2 |
Total | 114 | 19 | 36 | 45 | 27 |
The information is provided under the caveat that COPFS uses a live, operational database to manage the processing of reports submitted to Procurators Fiscal by the police and other reporting agencies throughout Scotland. It is designed to meet business needs in the processing of criminal cases, rather than for statistical analysis, and the information within it is structured accordingly.
The numbers were arrived at following an interrogation of relevant charges however a manual review was not conducted to confirm accuracy.
- Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 27 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Kate Forbes on 25 July 2025
To ask the Scottish Government for what reason the Wellbeing Economy Monitor was not updated in 2024, and when an update can be expected.
Answer
The Wellbeing Economy Monitor is being published slightly later than planned owing to a review of the data and in order to make further improvements to the reporting. The updated monitor will be published in week commencing 14 July 2025. In addition to the Wellbeing Economy Monitor we will publish a data toolkit containing national and local data and a short report summarising wellbeing economy policy approaches in Scotland and internationally.
- Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 09 July 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Ivan McKee on 24 July 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to better enforce the Agent of Change principle, in light of reports that 72% of fans in Scotland strongly or somewhat agreed that laws should prevent new residents near music venues from filing noise complaints.
Answer
The Agent of Change principle is enshrined in both the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997 (the Planning Act) and National Planning Framework 4 (NPF4).
Section 41A of the Planning Act sets out that, if residents or occupiers of any proposed development are likely to be affected by significant noise from an existing activity, the planning authority must take account of whether the proposed development includes sufficient measures to minimise or manage the effect of noise between the development and any existing cultural venues or facilities (including in particular, but not limited to, live music venues). A planning authority may not, as a condition of granting planning permission for a noise-sensitive development, impose on a noise source additional costs relating to acoustic design measures to mitigate, minimise or manage the effects of noise.
Policy 31 (Culture and Creativity) of NPF4 states that development proposals within the vicinity of existing arts venues will fully reflect the Agent of Change principle and will only be supported where they can demonstrate that measures can be put in place to ensure that existing noise and disturbance impacts on the proposed development would be acceptable and that existing venues and facilities can continue without additional restrictions being placed on them as a result of the proposed new development.
It is the responsibility of planning authorities to ensure they comply with their statutory duties, including in relation to the determination of planning applications.
- Asked by: Ariane Burgess, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Green Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 18 July 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 24 July 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what the estimated annual cost to the public purse is of governing the salmon farming industry, including smolt production, in Scotland.
Answer
We are unable to provide the information requested. The aquaculture sector is governed by multiple agencies in both Scotland and the UK, for example APHA (Animal and Plant Health Agency). These agencies provide different legislative functions and charging schemes. The agencies and their respective employees who work on aquaculture undertake a wide range of duties relating to the governance of aquaculture in the round, not only to the salmon sector.
- Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 15 July 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Siobhian Brown on 24 July 2025
To ask the Scottish Government which actions in the 2025 Report from the Independent Working Group on Antisocial Behaviour have been implemented, and whether it will provide an update on which of the remaining actions will be implemented, and when.
Answer
The Scottish Government remain committed to addressing anti-social behaviour in partnership with COSLA and Police Scotland who have statutory responsibility for developing strategies to tackle antisocial behaviour at local level.
Recent actions of the Scottish Government contribute to a number of recommendations. For example, we recently announced a £26 million investment in the next phase of the CashBack for Communities programme. The programme’s focus on supporting projects that divert young people from anti-social behaviour and towards positive opportunities is closely aligned with the report’s findings and overall direction.
Further actions from the report are currently under active consideration, and we will provide a full update on implementation plans and timelines in due course. A formal response to the report is expected to be published later this summer.