Questions and answers

Question reference: S6W-41123

Asked by: Pauline McNeill, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 08 October 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 5 November 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what the new traineeship scheme for legal aid will look like.

Question reference: S6W-40991

Asked by: Pauline McNeill, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 03 October 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 31 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what the target operating capacity of HMP Glasgow will be.

Question reference: S6W-40511

Asked by: Pauline McNeill, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 15 September 2025
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 23 September 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what contracts it currently holds with Fujitsu; what the total value is of these; by what date each will end; whether it plans to renew any and, if so, which, and whether it will rule out inviting Fujitsu to bid for any future contracts.

The Scottish Government has one contract with Fujitsu (Case 440206 Electronic Counting for Local Government Elections) to deliver electronic vote counting for Scottish local government elections. The contract commenced October 2020 at a value of £6,345,172 and is currently scheduled to conclude on 16th February 2027. The Scottish Government is currently undertaking an open procurement exercise to re-let this contract.

With regard to future procurement activity, the Scottish Government conducts its procurements in line with Scottish public procurement legislation and Scottish Government policy. All organisations bidding for contracts need to pass the selection criteria detailed in the procurement documents, which will include mandatory and discretionary exclusion grounds. Any decision to exclude Fujitsu from participating in Scottish Government tenders will be considered on a case-by-case basis. Where a ground for exclusion applies, a supplier may be able to provide evidence of self-cleansing measures taken to demonstrate their reliability despite the existence of a relevant ground for exclusion, should this evidence prove that the measures taken by the supplier are sufficient then the supplier would not be excluded. These decisions will be made in accordance with regulation 58 of the Public Contracts (Scotland) Regulations 2015.

At this time, the Scottish Government is not aware of Fujitsu tendering for any Scottish Government contracts.

Question reference: S6W-40700

Asked by: Pauline McNeill, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 22 September 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 6 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what stage it is at regarding potentially legislating to make the creation of deepfake pornographic content a crime.

Question reference: S6W-40699

Asked by: Pauline McNeill, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 22 September 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 6 October 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what progress it is making with tackling image-based abuse.

Question reference: S6O-04965

Current Status: Withdrawn

Question reference: S6O-04948

Asked by: Pauline McNeill, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2025
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 18 September 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with Turner & Townsend regarding its role in auditing and monitoring the work undertaken by Amey to complete the M8 Woodside viaducts.

Question reference: S6W-39678

Asked by: Pauline McNeill, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Date lodged: Thursday, 31 July 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 28 August 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will ensure that secondary school pupils will be taught, during education on sex and relationships, that strangulation is illegal even if it does not cause any visible injury, as is the case in England under its new relationships, sex and health education guidance.

Relationships, sexual health and parenthood (RSHP) education is an integral part of the health and wellbeing area of the school curriculum in Scotland. RSHP education focuses on equipping children and young people with the knowledge, skills and values to make informed and positive choices about forming relationships. This includes understanding of issues like consent, appropriate relationships and boundaries.

RSHP teaching guidance is specific about the need for children and young people to gain knowledge appropriate to their age and stage of education. The curriculum in Scotland is not statutory and therefore it is for teachers to decide the on the development and implementation of the curriculum. As such, teachers in Scotland have the flexibility to include content on non-fatal strangulation, for example as part of learning about abuse in relationships or on the impact of pornography, as part of RSHP lessons.

We are also funding Time for Inclusive Education’s Digital Discourse Initiative, which provides training for teachers and educators to address the effects of online hate and disinformation on children and young people.

In addition, the 2025-26 Programme for Government committed the Scottish Government to carrying out a comprehensive assessment of the law in relation to non-fatal strangulation to determine if there is further action that needs to be taken beyond existing provisions in law that could be used to tackle this issue.

Question reference: S6W-39504

Asked by: Pauline McNeill, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 28 July 2025
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 25 August 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what funding it has allocated to electric vehicle (EV) home-charging solutions for residents without driveways, including the exploration of gully cableway systems, in each of the last five years.

The Scottish Government recognises the importance of ensuring equitable access to electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure as we transition to a net zero transport system. Approximately 40% of households in Scotland do not have access to off-street parking, and we are committed to supporting innovative solutions such as gully cableway systems and other cross-pavement charging technologies to address this challenge.

The installation of cross pavement charging is complex, covering road works permissions, neighbourhood relations, pedestrian safety and ongoing maintenance, liabilities and responsibilities for residents and local authorities. This is why we are working closely with the Scottish Collaboration of Transport Specialists (SCOTS) – a strategic collaborative body representing Scotland’s 32 local authorities and seven regional transport partnerships - to develop Scottish specific guidance for local authorities. The draft guidance will be issued to stakeholders for consultation in autumn 2025.

In order to ensure a just transition, it is critical that as many households as possible can access lower cost home charging. That is why in this year's Programme for Government Scottish Ministers have committed to enabling the wider implementation of cross-pavement charging solutions via a pilot scheme for those without access to their own off-street parking. The learning from the pilot scheme will complement the work with SCOTS, to demonstrate safe and legal ways of rolling out cross-pavement charging infrastructure across all of Scotland’s local authorities.

Since 2021 we have also made grant funding available to those who live in flatted & factored properties through EST. Funding allocated to recipients of the ‘flatted/factored development scheme’ since its inception can be found in the following table.

Year	Value of grants issued
2024-25	£30,601
2023-24	£119,580
2022-23	£39,330
2021-22 (pilot year)	£7,941

Question reference: S6W-39505

Asked by: Pauline McNeill, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 22 July 2025
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 13 August 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will issue guidance to assist local authorities in piloting and adopting innovations to ensure that policies are in place to provide equitable access to affordable electric vehicle (EV) charging points for all households.

The Scottish Government recognises the importance of ensuring equitable access to electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure as we transition to a net zero transport system. Approximately 40% of households in Scotland do not have access to off-street parking, and we are committed to supporting innovative solutions such as cross-pavement charging to address this challenge.

The installation of cross pavement charging is complex, covering road works permissions, neighbourhood relations, pedestrian safety and ongoing maintenance, liabilities and responsibilities for residents and local authorities. This is why we are working closely with the Scottish Collaboration of Transport Specialists (SCOTS) – a strategic collaborative body representing Scotland’s 32 local authorities and seven regional transport partnerships - to develop Scottish specific guidance for local authorities. The draft guidance will be issued to stakeholders for consultation in autumn 2025.

This summer Scottish Ministers will also launch a new ‘cross pavement charging’ pilot scheme that will offer financial support to eligible residents without off-street parking in participating local authority areas. In order to ensure a just transition, it is critical that as many households as possible can access lower-cost home charging. The learning from the pilot scheme will complement the work with SCOTS, to demonstrate safe and legal ways of rolling out cross-pavement charging infrastructure across all of Scotland’s local authorities. More information will be made available on the Energy Savings Trust website later this month.

Ensuring a fair and just transition to sustainable transport is central the Scottish Government’s net zero ambitions; this is reflected in Scottish Ministers’ visionfor the future of public EV charging and the accompanying Draft Implementation Plan, which set out a clear direction for the future of EV infrastructure in Scotland. Through our £30 million EV Infrastructure Fund, we are also continuing to support local authorities to work in partnership with the private sector to expand public EV charging across Scotland.

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Chamber and committees