Chamber and committees

The Home Office Immigration Service is responsible for refugees and asylum seekers and such matters are reserved. The Scottish Prison Service has housed such individuals, mainly in Greenock Prison. However, with effect from 3 September the process began of transferring such individuals from prison to the newly opened Dungavel Immigration Facility for which the Home Office is responsible.

This is a matter for South Lanarkshire Council. Additional information is available in answers to questions S1W-17739 and S1W-17996.

Officers and members from South Lanarkshire Council have met with representatives of the Immigration Service on a number of occasions in the last year to discuss safety, health and educational arrangements. Strathclyde Police and Lanarkshire Health Board and Primary Care Trust have also been represented at meetings. Social Work Services Inspectorate has been in correspondence and telephone discussions with the Immigration Service, Department of Health and South Lanarkshire Council about standards of care for children.

The Home Office is responsible for the Immigration Detention Centre at Dungavel House. Discussion is taking place with Lanarkshire Health Board about appropriate arrangements for the medical needs of individuals held there.

The number of staff currently on loan to other organisations is 35. Staff on loan move to the pay systems of the receiving organisation with full salary costs met by that organisation. There is no cost to the Scottish Consolidated Fund.

The number of staff currently on secondment to other organisations who are having their salary costs met by the Scottish Executive is 17. The number of staff currently on secondment who are having their salaries met by the receiving organisation is 91. The total cost to the Scottish Consolidated Fund in financial year 2001-02 will be £434,970.

The total number of staff on loan to other organisations at any time in the period May 1999 to date is 61. Staff on loan move to the pay systems of the receiving organisation with full salary costs met by that organisation. There is no cost to the Scottish Consolidated Fund.

The number of staff on secondment to other organisations in the period May 1999 to July 2001 who have had their salary costs met by the Scottish Executive is 27. The number of staff on secondment to other organisations during this period who have had their salaries met by the receiving organisation is 126. The total cost to the Scottish Consolidated Fund was £1,068,990.

No felling licences have been withdrawn when landowners have failed to comply with the conditions in the licence. The Forestry Commission has, however, served 16 enforcement notices on landowners in these circumstances over the last five years.

Section 61(4) of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1987 (as it will be amended by section 43(5) of the Housing (Scotland) Act 2001) provides that section 61 of that Act (which gives the right to buy) does not apply where the registered social landlord (RSL) was, at Royal Assent of the Act, "a recognised body within the meaning of section 1(7) (Scottish charities) of the Law Reform (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Scotland) Act 1990". We are currently considering what further provisions may be required in secondary legislation under the Housing (Scotland) Act 2001 to protect any existing entitlement to the right to buy on the part of tenants whose houses are transferred to a registered social landlord which is exempt from the right to buy as a result of its charitable status.However, most assured tenancies of housing associations do not currently have the right to buy and, following commencement of the relevant provisions of the 2001 Act, they will in any event be subject to the operation of section 44 of the Act which provides for a 10-year exemption from the right to buy.