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-32256

Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Claire Baker (on behalf of the SPCB) on 14 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body, further to the answer to question S6W-31550 by Claire Baker on 11 December 2024, how many email and domain accounts for MSP spouses who are not in paid employment by MSPs there are on the Parliament IT system, and what the average annual cost is of administering any such accounts.

Question reference: S6W-32234

Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Claire Baker (on behalf of the SPCB) on 14 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body how much it has spent on electric hand dryers in the Parliament building in each of the last three years.

The general maintenance of hand driers is included within the Building Maintenance Contract and the only spend is on replacement parts or replacement hand driers if they fail. Below is spend for last 3 financial years and note on current year.

· 21/22 – No Spend

· 22/23 – No Spend

· 23/24 – £1560.87 – Spend is on parts & machines only as labour is included within planned maintenance.

· 24/25 – No spend to date.

Question reference: S6W-32344

Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Claire Baker (on behalf of the SPCB) on 14 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body what the cost of maintaining the Parliament's bees has been in each of the last five years.

The total cost of maintaining the Parliament’s bees on-site for the last five years in total is £20,219.68. This includes the installation and maintenance of 15 beehives since March 2020.

The costs per year are given in the table below:

Hoods Honey Costs per year
Year	Ex VAT	Gross Amount
2023/24	£ 4,349.90	£ 5,219.88
2022/23	£ 3,199.92	£ 3,839.90
2021/22	£ 3,199.92	£ 3,839.90
2020/21	£ 3,600.00	£ 4,320.00
2019/20	£ 2,500.00	£ 3,000.00

Question reference: S6W-33116

Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 10 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 14 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what the cost has been of administering the justice of the peace system in each of the last five years.

Question reference: S6W-33115

Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 10 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 14 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what proportion of cases handled by justices of the peace in each of the last five years resulted in convictions.

Question reference: S6W-33098

Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 10 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 14 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what its policy is on the purchase or use of personalised number plates for its official vehicles.

Question reference: S6W-32799

Asked by: Carol Mochan, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 06 January 2025
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 14 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how it is monitoring the Softer Landing, Safer Care programme to assess how often it is being used across hospital workforces.

NHS Education for Scotland (NES) has developed the Softer Landing, Safer Care programme. When it was introduced health boards agreed with NES to implement the programme for International Medical graduates (IMGs) starting their first hospital placement in NHS Scotland. The programme is part of a coordinated offer that sits alongside the training pathway and is devolved for local implementation at local board level. IMGs, like other trainees, feedback their experience through established quality assurance processes such as the Scottish Training Survey. As such, the Scottish Government does not formally monitor the initiative and it has not yet been formally evaluated.

Question reference: S6W-32775

Asked by: Paul Sweeney, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 23 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 14 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether expressions of interest will be invioted to develop the air rights above (a) Charing Cross and (ii) High Street railway station in Glasgow to assess the potential for funding improvement of the (a) station infrastructure and (b) wider cityscape.

Question reference: S6W-32118

Asked by: Mercedes Villalba, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 20 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Angus Robertson on 14 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of its commitment to establish a Peace Institute in Scotland and its ongoing work funded through its international development fund, whether it (a) has supported and (b) plans to support peacebuilding initiatives in Colombia.

In May 2024, the Scottish Government issued a request for proposals for a supplier to support the delivery of the Scottish Peace Programme, including establishment of a Scottish Peace Platform and the 1325 Women in Conflict Fellowships. In developing a Peace platform the Scottish Government will be able to better assess the potential for further investment in a Peace institute, in line with the full recommendations of the research report on establishing a Peace Institute. More information is published on the Scottish Government website.

There are no plans at this time for the Scottish Peace Platform to focus on peacebuilding initiatives in Columbia specifically. However we have hosted nine peacebuilders from Colombia on the Women in Conflict Fellowship and the Scottish Human Rights Defenders programmes.

Question reference: S6W-32599

Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 19 December 2024
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 14 January 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how any delays to the decarbonisation of the railway network will affect passenger fares over the next decade.