- Asked by: Cathy Jamieson, MSP for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 January 2010
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Current Status:
Answered by Michael Russell on 4 February 2010
To ask the Scottish Executive what support it is providing for the establishment of credit unions in schools.
Answer
The Scottish Centre for Financial Education is actively encouraging pupils'' understanding of the role of credit unions through the provision of teacher support materials, training events and conferences. The credit union movement is represented on the National Numeracy Network''s Financial Education Strategy Review Group.
- Asked by: Cathy Jamieson, MSP for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 January 2010
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Current Status:
Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 4 February 2010
To ask the Scottish Executive what action it is taking to support the transfer of freight from road to rail in Ayrshire.
Answer
My officials are in regular discussion with all the main rail operators about rail freight opportunities throughout Scotland, including Ayrshire. We operate three rail freight mode shift grant schemes which encourage the transfer of freight from road to rail.
- Asked by: Cathy Jamieson, MSP for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 January 2010
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Current Status:
Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 4 February 2010
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it is satisfied that all rural communities in Ayrshire are adequately served by public transport.
Answer
Public transport provision is a matter for the local authorities, Strathclyde Partnership for Transport and individual transport operators in the first instance.
The Scottish Government is supporting bus operations in a number of ways, including the promotion of Statutory Quality Partnerships, Punctuality Improvement Partnerships, and the appointment of a Senior Bus Development Advisor. On rail, we are working with First ScotRail to take forward the Rolling Stock Procurement Programme, which will directly improve rail services in Ayrshire.
- Asked by: Cathy Jamieson, MSP for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 January 2010
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Current Status:
Answered by Shona Robison on 4 February 2010
To ask the Scottish Executive how many schools in (a) Scotland, (b) East Ayrshire and (c) South Ayrshire have a dedicated school nurse.
Answer
Information on the number of schools in Scotland with a dedicated school nurse is not held by the Scottish Government. However, each school in Scotland has a named nurse with whom the school will liaise on health issues. Figures recently published show an increase of 16% from 2007 to 2009 in the number of whole time equivalent school nurses in Scotland.
Each of the 17 secondary schools, 89 primary schools and six special educational needs schools in East and South Ayrshire have a named school nurse.
- Asked by: Cathy Jamieson, MSP for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 January 2010
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Current Status:
Answered by Richard Lochhead on 4 February 2010
To ask the Scottish Executive whether the £547,000 awarded to East Ayrshire Council from the Zero Waste Fund can be used for any purpose other than making progress toward meeting the 2013 Landfill Directive.
Answer
East Ayrshire have been awarded a total of £674,000 for 2010-11 from the Scottish Government for Zero Waste, this includes the Zero Waste Operational Grant, Zero Waste Capital Grant and the consolidated funding from the former Strategic Waste Fund. Funding to local authorities is no longer ring-fenced and local authorities have the flexibility to allocate resources on the basis of local needs and priorities. As landfill tax continues to increase and doing nothing will cost local authorities more both environmentally and financially, I would encourage them to use Zero Waste funding for the purpose for which it was intended.
- Asked by: Cathy Jamieson, MSP for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 January 2010
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Current Status:
Answered by Keith Brown on 4 February 2010
To ask the Scottish Executive which local authorities place an age restriction on vehicles used for school transport.
Answer
This information is not collected centrally. There is no age restriction on vehicles provided they are roadworthy. All buses are checked annually by the Vehicle and Operator Services Agency and, in between these annual checks, operators are legally obliged to regularly check their vehicles to ensure their roadworthiness.
- Asked by: Cathy Jamieson, MSP for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 21 January 2010
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Current Status:
Answered by Shona Robison on 4 February 2010
To ask the Scottish Executive what the cost would have been of providing free prescriptions for cancer patients in 2009-10, broken down by NHS board area.
Answer
I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-30968 on 4 February 2010. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament''s website, the search facility for which can be found at
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/Apps2/Business/PQA/Default.aspx.
- Asked by: Cathy Jamieson, MSP for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 January 2010
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Current Status:
Answered by Michael Russell on 3 February 2010
To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of schools have a dedicated librarian, broken down by local authority area.
Answer
The following table sets out the percentage of primary, secondary and special schools that had a dedicated librarian as collected in the 2009 teacher census. This therefore represents the position as of September 2009. Librarians in through-schools are counted in both primary and secondary sector.
Percentage of Schools with Dedicated Librarian
| | Primary | Secondary | Special | Total |
| Aberdeen City | - | 100 | - | 17 |
| Aberdeenshire | - | 94 | - | 9 |
| Angus | - | 100 | - | 13 |
| Argyll and Bute | 4 | 100 | - | 13 |
| Clackmannanshire | - | 100 | - | 12 |
| Dumfries and Galloway | 1 | 94 | - | 13 |
| Dundee City | - | 90 | - | 19 |
| East Ayrshire | - | 89 | - | 13 |
| East Dunbartonshire | - | 100 | - | 16 |
| East Lothian | - | 100 | - | 14 |
| East Renfrewshire | - | 71 | - | 16 |
| Edinburgh City | - | 100 | - | 18 |
| Eilean Siar | 3 | 20 | - | 7 |
| Falkirk | - | 88 | 20 | 13 |
| Fife | - | 95 | - | 10 |
| Glasgow City | - | 90 | - | 11 |
| Highland | 1 | 63 | - | 9 |
| Inverclyde | - | 100 | - | 20 |
| Midlothian | - | 83 | - | 13 |
| Moray | 2 | 100 | - | 17 |
| North Ayrshire | - | 100 | - | 13 |
| North Lanarkshire | - | 92 | - | 14 |
| Orkney Islands | - | 33 | - | 7 |
| Perth and Kinross | 5 | 100 | 100 | 17 |
| Renfrewshire | - | 91 | - | 16 |
| Scottish Borders | - | 100 | - | 12 |
| Shetland Islands | 16 | 67 | - | 27 |
| South Ayrshire | - | 88 | - | 13 |
| South Lanarkshire | - | 47 | - | 5 |
| Stirling | - | 71 | - | 10 |
| West Dunbartonshire | - | 100 | - | 12 |
| West Lothian | - | 100 | - | 13 |
| All local authorities | 1 | 86 | 1 | 13 |
- Asked by: Cathy Jamieson, MSP for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 January 2010
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Current Status:
Answered by Michael Russell on 3 February 2010
To ask the Scottish Executive how many (a) primary, (b) secondary and (c) special schools have a dedicated librarian, broken down by local authority area.
Answer
The following table sets out the number of primary, secondary and special schools that had a dedicated librarian as collected in the 2009 teacher census. This therefore represents the position as of September 2009. Librarians in through-schools are counted in both primary and secondary sector.
Number of Schools
| | Primary | Secondary | Special |
| Aberdeen City | - | 12 | - |
| Aberdeenshire | - | 16 | - |
| Angus | - | 8 | - |
| Argyll and Bute | 3 | 10 | - |
| Clackmannanshire | - | 3 | - |
| Dumfries and Galloway | 1 | 15 | - |
| Dundee City | - | 9 | - |
| East Ayrshire | - | 8 | - |
| East Dunbartonshire | - | 8 | - |
| East Lothian | - | 6 | - |
| East Renfrewshire | - | 5 | - |
| Edinburgh City | - | 23 | - |
| Eilean Siar | 1 | 2 | - |
| Falkirk | - | 7 | 1 |
| Fife | - | 18 | - |
| Glasgow City | - | 27 | - |
| Highland | 1 | 19 | - |
| Inverclyde | - | 7 | - |
| Midlothian | - | 5 | - |
| Moray | 1 | 8 | - |
| North Ayrshire | - | 9 | - |
| North Lanarkshire | - | 22 | - |
| Orkney Islands | - | 2 | - |
| Perth and Kinross | 4 | 10 | 1 |
| Renfrewshire | - | 10 | - |
| Scottish Borders | - | 9 | - |
| Shetland Islands | 5 | 6 | - |
| South Ayrshire | - | 7 | - |
| South Lanarkshire | - | 8 | - |
| Stirling | - | 5 | - |
| West Dunbartonshire | - | 5 | - |
| West Lothian | - | 11 | - |
| All local authorities | 16 | 320 | 2 |
- Asked by: Cathy Jamieson, MSP for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 January 2010
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Current Status:
Answered by Fergus Ewing on 2 February 2010
To ask the Scottish Executive in how many cases involving domestic violence in (a) East Ayrshire and (b) South Ayrshire a custodial sentence of six months or less has been given in each of the last five years for which figures are available.
Answer
The available information is given in the following table.
Persons Convicted for an Offence1 with a Domestic Aggravator2,3 who Received a Custodial Sentence of Six Months or Less, by Approximate Local Authority4, 2005-06 to 2007-08
| Local Authority | 2005-06 | 2006-07 | 2007-08 |
| East Ayrshire | 31 | 42 | 44 |
| South Ayrshire | 37 | 41 | 47 |
| Total | 68 | 83 | 91 |
Notes:
1. Where main offence.
2. The recording of aggravators has improved over time therefore caution is needed when comparing changes over time. 2005-06 is the first year where it has been considered that the use and recording of domestic abuse aggravator codes from the Scottish Government Court Proceedings Database has been of sufficient coverage to be used.
3. The data recording codes for aggravators changed on 10 March 2008. The new codes will be reconciled against the existing codes when the 2008-09 data is available in March 2010.
4. Incorporates an approximate mapping of sheriff courts into local authority areas. Some sheriff courts will deal with cases from more than one local authority area.
