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-38595

Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 12 June 2025
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 26 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, in relation to its grant agreements and contracts, what its position is on whether excluding employment costs arising from legal obligations to employees, including parental leave, sick leave and redundancy, from eligible costs, is in keeping with its fair work commitments.

The Scottish Government expects employers to meet their legal obligations regarding employment costs arising from statutory duties to workers, including in relation to parental leave, sick leave and redundancy. As part of our Fair Work approach, we also encourage employers to adopt practices which foster inclusive, equitable, and sustainable workplaces. I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-38593 on 24 June 2025 regarding employment costs in grant agreements.

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.

Question reference: S6W-38593

Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 10 June 2025
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 24 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how many of its grant agreements exclude employment costs arising from the grantee’s legal obligations to its employees, including parental leave, sick leave and redundancy, from eligible costs, and how many of any such grant agreements are with voluntary organisations.

Scottish Government Grants are subject to legally binding agreements. A model offer template is in place which includes terms and standard conditions and schedules covering claims and payments. The exclusion of employment costs forms part of clause 2.7 of the grant offer letter template and is a standard term for all discretionary grants. Employment arrangements of an organisation are a matter for that organisation.

Internal SG guidance requires that all costs must be specific to the delivery of the grant’s purpose therefore employment costs related to the job role of grant delivery are expected. Specifically excluded costs as noted in this clause relate to those which are reclaimable from HMRC. It is for the business area to make local decisions for their grant, the Scottish Government does not store these grant agreements centrally therefore the recording and retention of grant agreements is the responsibility of local business areas.

Question reference: S6W-38594

Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 10 June 2025
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 19 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how many of its contracts exclude employment costs arising from legal obligations to employees, including parental leave, sick leave and redundancy, from eligible costs, and how many of any such contracts are with voluntary organisations.

The Scottish Government have 880 live contracts and frameworks of which 42 are with voluntary organisations with details of these publicly available on the Public Contracts Scotland contract register. The Scottish Government requires suppliers to account for employment-related costs in its procurement processes, ensuring compliance with employment law and fair workforce practices and none have identified employment exclusions in the costs.

Question reference: S6O-04858

Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 June 2025
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 26 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the reported significant demand for apprenticeships from both employers and applicants, what it is doing to increase the number of apprenticeship places available.

Question reference: S6W-37925

Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what national guidance it has issued to NHS boards on the provision of blood testing facilities for people self-medicating gender hormones, in light of reports of long waiting times for gender identity care through the NHS.

Question reference: S6W-37926

Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 10 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how much has been allocated to NHS boards in 2025-26 for providing gender identity care.

The Scottish Government is committed to improving the lives of trans people, who, we know, continue to suffer poorer outcomes relative to the wider population, including in mental and physical health.

Accordingly, we are taking forward a range of actions to improve the delivery and accessibility of NHS gender identity services. In the 2025-26 financial year, the Scottish Government is providing almost £1.8 million of funding to Health Boards to support this work, of which the vast majority is directly allocated to territorial Health Boards hosting gender identity clinics, to support them to improve their service capacity and to reduce waiting times.

Question reference: S6F-04163

Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Monday, 09 June 2025
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 12 June 2025

Question to be taken in Chamber.

Question reference: S6O-04799

Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 04 June 2025
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 12 June 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide further details of its plans for bringing forward the requisite regulations to fully implement the Heat Networks (Scotland) Act 2021, including the special rights and powers that the Act foresees for heat network developers.

Question reference: S6W-37651

Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 15 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 27 May 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what action it (a) has taken in the last six months and (b) is planning to take to improve waiting times for autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) assessments in the Lothian region.

Long waits for neurodevelopmental support are unacceptable. Health boards and children’s services partners are responsible for working together to ensure that children and families receive support and access to services that meet their needs at the earliest opportunity. To support this, we have provided almost £250,000 in 2024-25 to fund a range of individual projects to improve neurodevelopmental assessment and support for children and young people. This includes nearly £54,000 for services in the Lothian area.

We have also directly allocated £123.5 million to NHS Boards and IJBs for the Enhanced Mental Health Outcomes Framework. The Framework provides a single, flexible funding stream to support continued improvements and better outcomes across a range of mental health and psychological services in line with the Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy including neurodevelopmental services for both adults and children.

We are also continuing to work with Health Boards and local authorities to improve our understanding current levels of need and the level of support children and young people currently receive, and how this could be used to support improvements for children and families.

For adults, we have commissioned the National Autism Implementation Team to support NHS Boards to develop, enhance and redesign adult neurodevelopmental services. Our £1 million Autism Support Fund for Adults funds organisations that support people with ADHD, especially where this co-occurs with autism.

Question reference: S6W-37572

Asked by: Lorna Slater, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 13 May 2025
Current Status: Answered by Alasdair Allan on 22 May 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what its plans are to legislate to require waste heat to be made available to heat networks to support Scotland’s transition to zero carbon heating.