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: S5W-11238

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 September 2017
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 21 September 2017

To ask the Scottish Government what research it has commissioned on automation and its impact on Scotland's labour market and economy.

The Scottish Government is currently considering external research around automation and its impact on Scotland’s labour market and economy. However, we continue to monitor the emerging evidence base.

Technological change, and issues such as automation, will have a significant impact over the next few decades, creating both challenges and opportunities for businesses and employees across Scotland. As highlighted in Scotland’s Labour Market Strategy, we will take forward analysis of issues like this in the future in order to help employers and employees respond to them positively, with the support of the Strategic Labour Market Group.

Question reference: S5W-11237

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 September 2017
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 20 September 2017

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the announcement in its Programme for Government, when the six export partnership pilots will be established; how the locations will be decided; what the budget will be for each pilot, and how many staff each will employ.

Question reference: S5O-01259

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 13 September 2017
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 20 September 2017

To ask the Scottish Government what action is being taken by the police to deal with antisocial behaviour at Helensburgh Central train station.

Question reference: S5W-10861

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 23 August 2017
Current Status: Answered by Mark McDonald on 8 September 2017

To ask the Scottish Government how many significant case reviews of social work services have been carried out in each year since 1999; how many recommendations have been (a) made and (b) implemented, and how many of the recommendations focused on a need for better support for (i) social workers and (ii) families, also broken down by how many of these have been implemented.

The Care Inspectorate has been the repository for significant case reviews for children and young people, since 2015. Significant case reviews were not collated before this, although the effectiveness of the response to significant case reviews findings within local authority areas will have been used by the Care Inspectorate during their inspections of children and young people’s services. It is the role of the Child Protection Committees and Chief Officers’ Groups to oversee actions and changes recommended by significant case reviews.

As outlined above, it is not possible to provide the requested detail [question 2. (a), (b), (i) & (ii)] on significant case review recommendations and their implementation because centralised records were not held before 2015, however, the following chronology and numbers provide some of the requested information for initial case reviews and significant case reviews carried out for children and young people:

(a) In 2012 Scottish Government published an analysis of findings from audit and analysis of 56 significant case reviews and 43 initial case reviews carried out in Scotland between 2007 and 2012 in which over 500 recommendations for improvement were made. http://www.gov.scot/Resource/0040/00404517.pdf

As noted above, in 2016, the Care Inspectorate published an analysis of findings from audit and analysis of 20 significant case reviews carried out in Scotland between 2012 and 2015, in which 177 recommendations for improvement were made.

The Care Inspectorate received 10 significant case reviews between 1 April 2015 and 31 March 2017, in which a total of 190 recommendations were made. The Care Inspectorate do not hold information on significant case reviews carried out in Scotland before 31 March 2007.

(b) Focus of recommendations:

• In the period 2007-2012, over half of the recommendations related to improvements required in key operational processes and a further quarter related to policies and procedures. Just over 70 recommendations were categorised as directly relating to the need for staff training, development and support. These findings related to staff across all key agencies.

• 2012-2015: out of the 177 recommendations, 13 were categorised as directly relating to staff training, development, support and supervision.

Information on significant case reviews for adults at risk of harm is not collated centrally. The new national Framework for Adult Protection Committees on conducting Significant Case Reviews which is under development will include a means to make this information available in future.

Question reference: S5W-10860

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 23 August 2017
Current Status: Answered by Mark McDonald on 8 September 2017

To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on commissioning boards independent of local authorities to carry out an external analysis of the significant case reviews of social work services.

A significant case review is a multi-agency process for establishing the facts of, and learning lessons from, a situation where an individual has died or been significantly harmed. It is not restricted to the delivery of social work services but rather considers the responsibility of all relevant agencies, including health, police and education services in keeping vulnerable individuals safe.

It is the Child Protection and Adult Protection Committees, on behalf of the Chief Officers' Group or equivalent, who determine whether a significant case review should be undertaken when either a child or an adult at risk of harm dies or has found to be exposed to, or suffered, significant harm.

Since 2015, the Care Inspectorate has collated and reviewed significant case reviews for children and young people to facilitate best practice and multi-agency change across Scotland to prevent future harm. The Care Inspectorate published a report on learning from significant case reviews in 2016 (http://www.careinspectorate.com/images/documents/3352/Learning%20from%20Significant%20Case%20Reviews%20in%20Scotland%202012%20-%202015.pdf).

The 2016 Child Protection Systems Review (http://www.gov.scot/Resource/0051/00514758.pdf) also considered significant case reviews. The findings of both these reports show that practice and learning around significant case reviews could be improved and the recommendations from the 2016 Child Protection Systems Review on significant case reviews (http://www.gov.scot/Resource/0051/00514758.pdf), are being taken forward through the Child Protection Improvement Programme (http://www.gov.scot/Resource/0051/00514761.pdf). Specifically, action is being taken around improving the consistency and quality of significant case reviews and greater sharing of learning.

The Scottish Government is developing national guidance for Adult Protection Committees on conducting significant case reviews. This will include a means of disseminating national learning from significant case reviews to support improvements in inter-agency practice and prevent harm to adults at risk. We are considering the option of this role being undertaken by an independent body.

Question reference: S5W-10602

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 04 August 2017
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 1 September 2017

To ask the Scottish Government which provisions in the Social Security (Scotland) Bill will be used to establish the Jobs Grant, and for what reason the Jobs Grant is not provided for on the face of the bill.

Question reference: S5W-10113

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 03 July 2017
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 29 August 2017

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has consolidated any funding streams for voluntary sector organisations, and whether the value has increased, stayed the same or decreased.

Question reference: S5W-10111

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 03 July 2017
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 29 August 2017

To ask the Scottish Government how many third sector organisations it provides financial support to and, of those, how many receive three-year funding.

Question reference: S5W-10112

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 03 July 2017
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 29 August 2017

To ask the Scottish Government what funding streams were available to third sector organisations in 2011, and what funding streams are available in 2017, broken down by (a) name and (b) value for the year.

Question reference: S5W-10448

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 24 July 2017
Current Status: Answered by Paul Wheelhouse on 28 August 2017

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment has been made of customer service satisfaction each year for the Scottish Manufacturing Advisory Service.

The Scottish Manufacturing Advisory Service (SMAS) carries out a regular review of customer satisfaction.

The following table presents survey findings from 2010 onwards:

Survey Date	Mar-15	Oct-13	Aug-12	Mar-11	Mar-10
% of businesses would work with SMAS again	97%	91%	93%	94%	94%
% of business have a defined approach to continuous improvement	75%	75%	80%	80%	N/A
% of businesses would recommend SMAS to other businesses	100%	98%	100%	98%	98%
% of businesses were satisfied/highly satisfied with the overall outcomes and management of their project	96%	96%	99%	98%	98%
% of businesses expectations from their projects were met in full or exceeded	96%	91%	99%	93%	93%

Source: Scottish Manufacturing Advisory Service - July 2017

In addition, SMAS uses a number of other methods to ensure customer satisfaction is being met, such as holding national conferences. These provide the service with the opportunity to obtain customer feedback on their business proposals. For example, the SMAS conference in 2012 supported their proposal for a new focus for the service on culture and people development. Following this, the SMAS conference in 2014 was then used to evaluate and confirm that the new focus was working and successfully realising benefits for their clients.