- Asked by: Irene McGugan, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 24 January 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Wendy Alexander on 7 February 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive how many applications to the Disabled Students' Allowance Scheme were fully processed before students currently studying with the Open University who made applications started their courses.
Answer
To date, 31 applications for Disabled Students' Allowance from students studying through the Open University have been fully processed prior to the start of their courses.
- Asked by: Irene McGugan, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 17 January 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Allan Wilson on 31 January 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive what consideration it has given to the Rural Parliament which exists in Sweden and whether it plans to establish a Rural Parliament.
Answer
We are aware of the Rural Parliament which exists in Sweden, and will consider carefully any lessons of relevance to rural Scotland. However, we have no plans to establish a Rural Parliament here in Scotland.
- Asked by: Irene McGugan, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 17 January 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Allan Wilson on 31 January 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it plans to establish an organisation to undertake work similar to that carried out by Rural Forum and, if so, what progress has been made in determining how such an organisation will be set up and what its functions will be.
Answer
The Scottish Executive, together with Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Scottish Enterprise, Scottish Natural Heritage, Scottish Homes and COSLA, commissioned EKOS Limited to investigate the mechanisms which exist or are required to support rural communities. The report of this study was received in the summer of 2001, and has been passed to the Scottish National Rural Partnership for further consideration and advice.
- Asked by: Irene McGugan, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 17 January 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Ross Finnie on 31 January 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive to what extent rural benchmarking is taking place in respect of the 29 social justice milestones as referred to in the report by the Rural Poverty and Inclusion Working Group, Poverty and Social Exclusion in Rural Scotland.
Answer
Where data was readily available, analysis in the 2001 Social Justice Annual Report contained a rural/urban breakdown against the milestones. Work on rural benchmarking of the other social justice milestones is currently being carried out in-house within the Scottish Executive. Consultation is under way both within the Executive and with external dataholders to investigate the provision of proxy measures against the milestones for rural Scotland.
- Asked by: Irene McGugan, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 17 January 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Ross Finnie on 31 January 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive what progress has been made in addressing the findings of the report by the Rural Poverty and Inclusion Working Group, Poverty and Social Exclusion in Rural Scotland and what action plan and timetable have been drawn up against which progress can be monitored.
Answer
The Minister for Social Justice and I are currently taking forward work in response to the issues raised in the report of the Rural Poverty and Inclusion Working Group, Poverty and Social Exclusion in Rural Scotland. This will include engaging with external bodies that have a role in progressing some of the report's recommendations.We are also taking action to ensure, where appropriate, that we can disaggregate all the Social Justice Milestones on a rural/urban basis - providing proxy measures where this is not currently possible - and that rural issues are taken into account within the new Index of Deprivation that is being developed as part of the Neighbourhood Statistics Strategy. Progress will be reported on in the Executive's Social Justice Annual Report.
- Asked by: Irene McGugan, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 17 January 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Ross Finnie on 31 January 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive what the nature is of preparatory work being undertaken to identify appropriate indicators from a rural perspective in relation to the report by the Rural Poverty and Inclusion Working Group, Poverty and Social Exclusion in Rural Scotland; who is undertaking this work, and when it will be completed and the findings published.
Answer
The Executive's Central Research Unit are currently taking forward preparatory work to identify indicators for possible inclusion in the new Index of Deprivation that is being developed as part of the Neighbourhood Statistics Strategy. This involves an analysis of the Scottish Household Survey and other relevant datasets, which will help us to explore further some of the issues raised by the Rural Poverty and Inclusion Working Group, and identify measures which could be used as indicators in a rural context.The preparatory work will be completed by late spring and will feed into work on the development of the new Index of Deprivation, which will be completed in 2003.
- Asked by: Irene McGugan, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 17 January 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Cathy Jamieson on 31 January 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive what action it is taking to implement the recommendations of the report prepared by the University of Aberdeen, Pre-School Education Provision in Rural Areas and, in particular, to address any gap between the number of eligible pre-school children and the provision of places in remote areas and any difficulties of access in intermediate areas, together with the level of costs involved, and to provide additional funding for the provision of pre-school provision in remote and intermediate areas.
Answer
The findings of the report are based on data collected between October 1998 and June 1999. Since then, the number of three- and four-year-olds attending part-funded pre-school education has risen significantly across Scotland. All four-year-olds now have access to a funded part-time pre-school place, and we expect that all three-year-olds will have access to a place by April 2002. From April 2002, all local authorities will be placed under a duty to provide a free part-time pre-school education place to all three- and four-year-olds whose parents want one. To take account of the additional cost of pre-school provision in rural areas, the pre-school education grant, which from April 2002 will be re-integrated into the local government settlement, includes a rural weighting. For 2002-03, this rural weighting will be worth £6.4 million.
- Asked by: Irene McGugan, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 16 January 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Nicol Stephen on 30 January 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive how many full-time equivalent vacancies there were for teachers in (a) chemistry, (b) biology and (c) physics in each year since 1997, broken down by local authority area.
Answer
Teacher vacancies are largely a matter for education authorities (EAs). The requested information on vacancies for each year since 1997 is not held centrally. On the basis of advice from 31 out of 32 EAs, there are the following numbers of full-time equivalent vacancies in EA secondary schools at 10 September 2001:
Chemistry | 7.7 |
Biology | 13 |
Physics | 8.5 |
Total | 29.2 |
- Asked by: Irene McGugan, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 16 January 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Nicol Stephen on 30 January 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive what criteria were used to determine how much was spent by schools on (a) chemistry, (b) biology and (c) physics and from which budgets the funds for such spending were allocated in each year since 1997.
Answer
I refer the member to the answer given to question S1W-21934.
- Asked by: Irene McGugan, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 16 January 2002
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Current Status:
Answered by Nicol Stephen on 30 January 2002
To ask the Scottish Executive how much was spent by schools on accommodation, materials and equipment in (a) science subjects, (b) business studies suites and (c) computing suites in each year since 1997, broken down by local authority area.
Answer
The information requested is not collected by the Scottish Executive. Individual education authorities and schools are responsible for the detailed decisions on the allocation of resources for particular subject areas in schools.
