- Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 18 July 2006
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Current Status:
Answered by Robert Brown on 14 August 2006
To ask the Scottish Executive when figures for 2005-06 on the number of referrals to the Scottish Children’s Reporter Administration under section 52(2)(j) of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995 will be published.
Answer
This is a matter for the Scottish Children’s Reporter Administration.
- Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 17 July 2006
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Current Status:
Answered by Robert Brown on 14 August 2006
To ask the Scottish Executive how many children were placed for adoption in each year since 1999.
Answer
This information is notcollected centrally in precisely this form. The number of children who wereadopted by non-relations in the years 1999–2005 is set out in the following table(but this does not include children who were placed for adoption but where anadoption order was not in the event made). Such children will have been placed withthe adopters by an adoption agency. Children adopted by relations (almostalways step-parents) will not usually have been placed with them by an adoptionorder.
| Year | Number of Children Adopted by Non-Relations |
| 1999 | 238 |
| 2000 | 198 |
| 2001 | 264 |
| 2002 | 235 |
| 2003 | 283 |
| 2004 | 239 |
| 2005 | 283 |
Source: General RegisterOffice for Scotland Vital Events Reference Tables.
- Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 17 July 2006
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Current Status:
Answered by Colin Boyd on 14 August 2006
To ask the Scottish Executive what consideration it will give to a full public inquiry into the death of Mr Willie Macrae in April 1985, following claims by a retired police officer that he was paid, in his then role as a private detective, to carry out surveillance of Mr Macrae shortly before his death.
Answer
The circumstancessurrounding the death of William MacRae have been fully considered on a numberof occasions and there is no basis upon which to instruct any type of public inquiry.
- Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 17 July 2006
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 14 August 2006
To ask the Scottish Executive how many public appointments made by Scottish ministers were of individuals with known or declared membership of the Labour or Liberal Democrat parties in each year since 1999, expressed also as a percentage of the total number of public appointments.
Answer
I refer the member to thequestion S2W-13115 answered on 2 February 2005 which provided thisinformation for the period from 1 April 2001 until 31 March 2004 and explainedwhy the annual data for the preceding period was not available. All answers to written parliamentary questions areavailable on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can befound at:
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.
Regular returns on politicalactivity were supplied to the Office of the Commissioner for Public Appointments for periods preceding 31 May 2004 and, since 1 June 2004, havebeen provided to the Office of the Commissioner for Public Appointments in Scotland. This information has been submitted by the Executive for inclusion in the Commissioners’ annual reports. The followingtable contains data taken from these returns and details the number of boardmembers of public bodies regulated by the Commissioner who, on appointment orreappointment between 1 April 2004 and 31 May 2006, have declared political activityon behalf of all parties:
| | 1 April 2004 – 31 May 2004 | 1 June 2004 – 31 May 2005 | 1 June 2005 – 31 May 2006 |
| Total number of appointments made in period (including reappointments) | 78 | 179 | 172 |
| Total number of appointees declaring party political activity | 12 | 33 | 23 |
| Conservative | 2 made to Executive NDPBs (2% of all new appointments and reappointments). 1 made to an NHS Body (1% of all new appointments and reappointments). | 5 made to Executive NDPBs (3%). | 2 made to Executive NDPBs (1%) |
| Labour | 5 made to NHS Bodies (6% of all new appointments and reappointments). | 11 made to Executive NDPBs (6%). 1 made to a NHS Body (0.5%). | 7 made to Executive NDPBs (4%) 7 made to NHS Bodies (4%) |
| Liberal Democrat | 0 | 3 made to Executive NDPBs (2%). | 3 made to Executive NDPBs (2%) 2 made to NHS Bodies (1%) |
| SNP | 2 made to Executive NDPBs (2% of all new appointments and reappointments). | 2 made to Executive NDPBs (1%). | |
| Other | 2 made to Executive NDPBs (2% of all new appointments and reappointments). | 10 made to Executive NDPBs (6%). 1 made to an NHS Body (0.5%) | 2 made to a Nationalised Industry (1%) |
The Executive continues topublish details of the declared political activity of all current regulatedMinisterial appointments on its public appointments website which can be foundat:
www.scotland.gov.uk/government/publicbodies.
- Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 17 July 2006
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Current Status:
Answered by Hugh Henry on 9 August 2006
To ask the Scottish Executive what quantity of illegal drugs it estimates are brought into Scotland annually (a) via Scottish ports, (b) via Scottish airports and (c) across the border by car or train.
Answer
The Scottish Executive doesnot hold this information.
- Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 04 July 2006
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Current Status:
Answered by Robert Brown on 9 August 2006
To ask the Scottish Executive how many meetings have ministers or their officials held with officials from the Scottish Children’s Reporter Administration (SCRA) at which the SCRA’s annual report for 2005/06 was discussed since May 2006.
Answer
Scottish Executive officialshave held one meeting with the Scottish Children’s Reporter Administration(SCRA) since May 2006 at which SCRA’s Annual Report 2005-06 was discussed.
Separately I have establisheda “task group” with representatives of SCRA, the Association of Chief PoliceOfficers in Scotland and the Association of Directors of Social Work. Inrespect of cases which otherwise might generate a referral to the reporter onnon offence grounds, the role of the group is to consider what appropriatealternatives might be available for the Police Service to adopt. Since May 2006the group has met twice.
- Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 11 July 2006
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Current Status:
Answered by Hugh Henry on 8 August 2006
To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of class A drugs in circulation in Scotland it estimates originate from Afghanistan.
Answer
Information on thepercentage of class A drugs in Scotland estimated to originate from Afghanistanis not held centrally.
At the UK level, however,the “UK Threat Assessment 2006-07”, published by the Serious Organised CrimeAgency (SOCA) on 31 July 2006 estimates that 90% of the UK's identified heroinsupply originates in Afghanistan. The report is available at http://www.soca.gov.uk/assessPublications/downloads/threat_assess_unclass_250706.pdf.
- Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 11 July 2006
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Current Status:
Answered by Hugh Henry on 8 August 2006
To ask the Scottish Executive how many registered class A drug users there have been in Scotland in each year since the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.
Answer
There is no central registerof problem drug misusers in Scotland.
- Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 11 July 2006
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Current Status:
Answered by Hugh Henry on 8 August 2006
To ask the Scottish Executive what research it has carried out into the impact of any increase in the supply of class A drugs in Scotland originating from Afghanistan following the invasion by US, UK and other NATO forces in 2001.
Answer
No such research has beencarried out by the Scottish Executive.
- Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 19 July 2006
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Current Status:
Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 4 August 2006
To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the evidence to the Communities Committee by Johann Lamont at Stage 2 of the Housing Bill on 28 September 2005 (Official Report, Communities Committee, c. 2468-72) and the Stage 3 proceedings of the Bill on 24 November 2005 (Official Report, c. 21058-21118), when draft regulations pertinent to the house seller pack will be available; what progress has been made with regard to the “loan scheme” to fund such packs and, in particular, whether such loans will be secured loans and whether a seller can make repeat loan applications in respect of the same property should it fail to sell within the shelf life of the single seller survey, and what discussions it has had with building societies and other lenders regarding the status of the single seller survey.
Answer
Since the Housing (Scotland) Act2006 received Royal Assent we have been working with stakeholders including mortgagelenders on the design of the mandatory Single Survey scheme. I expect that draftregulations will be available next year. We intend, as far as possible, to go withthe grain of the current house buying and selling system. Discussions with lendersindicate that an arrangement similar to the present one under which they are providedwith transcripts of information from surveys in order to assess mortgage applicationsis most likely to meet their requirements for information from the single survey.
Work is also under way to developthe scheme of assistance under part 2 of the act. The form of any assistance forhouse sellers will be considered as part of that.
