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-43206

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 21 January 2026
Current Status: Answered by Tom Arthur on 5 February 2026

To ask the Scottish Government, regarding its draft Budget 2026-27, what its response is to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities' (COSLA) assessment that, despite calling for an additional £750 million for social care, there is no additional funding for social care after pay uplifts.

The Scottish Government are fully aware that the budgetary pressures on the Health and Social Care system in 2026-27 have never been greater. After the disappointing UK Government Spending Review in June, we called on the UK Chancellor to increase funding, but they failed to deliver anything like the scale of change required.

Nevertheless, the draft Budget 2026-27 will provide almost £22.5 billion investment in health and social care services exceeding consequentials and providing a real terms uplift to enable more sustainable and resilient services. This includes investment of over £2.3 billion for social care, delivering our commitment to increase funding by 25%, and exceeding this by over £0.5 billion.

The Scottish Budget also provides a real terms increase to the Local Government Settlement, bringing it to almost £15.7 billion and while I recognise COSLA’s view that further funding is needed, there has never been greater pressures on public finances and simply increasing resource without wider reform risks leaving us in the same unsustainable position next year.

Question reference: S6W-43208

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 21 January 2026
Current Status: Answered by Tom Arthur on 5 February 2026

To ask the Scottish Government, regarding its draft Budget 2026-27, what any projected funding gap for commissioned social care services will be to meet the obligated uplift to at least the real Living Wage in 2026-27 if this budget is passed.

The draft Budget 2026-27 sets out a further £160 million investment to enable the payment of the Real Living Wage to adult social care workers in commissioned services in the next financial year. This will take the total Scottish Government investment in adult social care pay to over £1.1 billion annually.

It is the legal obligation of all employers to pay the National Living Wage. The additional £160 million will fund the gap between the National Living Wage and the Real Living Wage, enabling Local Authorities to offer pay rates for adult social care workers in commissioned services of more than 5% above the National Living Wage rate. Therefore, there will be no funding gap.

Question reference: S6W-43207

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 21 January 2026
Current Status: Holding Answer by Tom Arthur on 4 February 2026

To ask the Scottish Government, regarding its draft Budget 2026-27 budget and level 4 tables that were published in conjunction with its draft Budget, whether the baseline used to calculate the total funds to implement the 2026-27 pay uplift in commissioned social care services was the current real Living Wage amount of £12.60ph.

Question reference: S6W-43205

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 21 January 2026
Current Status: Holding Answer by Tom Arthur on 4 February 2026

To ask the Scottish Government, regarding its draft Budget 2026-27, what its response is to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities' (COSLA) assessment that there is a £15 million funding gap in meeting the estimated £175 million cost of delivering the real Living Wage to adult social care workers.

Question reference: S6W-43234

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 21 January 2026
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 3 February 2026

To ask the Scottish Government what additional funding will be made available to (a) West Dunbartonshire and (b) Argyll and Bute Council to fund the pledge to deliver free Learn to Swim sessions, which was set out in the draft Scottish Budget 2026-27.

The draft Scottish Budget 2026-27 delivers a significant uplift in funding to sport. This allows us to deliver on our key ambition of ensuring every child has the opportunity to learn basic swimming skills, building confidence and safety in and around water.

We will work with Scottish Swimming and sportscotland to design a phased national roll-out of the National School Swimming Framework, ensuring the funding is targeted into addressing inequalities in access to swimming lessons across all local authority areas. That work is due to commence imminently.

Question reference: S6W-43497

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 02 February 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 16 February 2026

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the £45 million rolling programme of ring-fenced capital funding for replacing radiotherapy equipment, which was set out in the National Radiotherapy Plan, how much has been allocated each year, broken down by NHS board.

Question reference: S6W-43496

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 02 February 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 16 February 2026

To ask the Scottish Government, further to its Endoscopy and Urology Diagnostic Recovery and Renewal Plan, how many one-stop clinics each NHS board has, broken down by (a) set-up cost, (b) annual operating cost and (c) how many appointments each has delivered, each year

Question reference: S6W-43515

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 02 February 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 16 February 2026

To ask the Scottish Government when data on cancer mortality by deprivation levels will be published.

Question reference: S6W-43505

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 02 February 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 16 February 2026

To ask the Scottish Government what the process is for Healthcare Infection Incident Assessment reports, and under what circumstances ministers are notified of these.

Question reference: S6W-43500

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 02 February 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 16 February 2026

To ask the Scottish Government how many MRI scanners each NHS board has.