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: S1W-09318

Asked by: Mr Brian Monteith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 22 August 2000
Current Status: Answered by Sam Galbraith on 7 September 2000

To ask the Scottish Executive which public relations consultancy has been engaged by the Scottish Qualifications Authority, when its contract starts and ends, what the value of the contract is and whether it was subject to competitive tendering.

Question reference: S1W-09233

Asked by: Mr Brian Monteith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 17 August 2000
Current Status: Answered by Sam Galbraith on 7 September 2000

To ask the Scottish Executive whether Ministerial approval was given for the appointment of Bill Morton as the interim chief executive of the Scottish Qualifications Authority, and if so, which Minister(s) gave the approval.

Question reference: S1W-09251

Asked by: Mr Brian Monteith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 18 August 2000
Current Status: Answered by David Steel on 7 September 2000

To ask the Presiding Officer whether the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body will make available in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre an unpriced copy of the construction management contract for the construction of the Scottish Parliament buildings at Holyrood.

Question reference: S1O-02171

Asked by: Mr Brian Monteith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 30 August 2000
Current Status: Answered by Sam Galbraith on 7 September 2000

To ask the Scottish Executive when Ministers last met representatives from the Scottish Qualifications Authority and what issues were discussed.

I have been in frequent contact with the Chairman and Chief Executive of the Scottish Qualifications Authority over recent weeks. In the period since the issue of examination results on 9 August, discussion has focused on how to remedy as quickly and effectively as possible the problems which have affected a proportion of candidates and on setting in hand analysis of the causes of the problems in order to ensure that they do not recur in future.

Question reference: S1W-09211

Asked by: Mr Brian Monteith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 15 August 2000
Current Status: Answered by Sam Galbraith on 5 September 2000

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will list who will conduct the independent inquiry into the processing and circulation of school examination results, what the inquiry remit will be and when it will be expected to publish its report.

As I announced on Friday 18 August, the inquiry will cover all operational and administrative issues surrounding production of the results for National Qualifications, "old" Highers, Certificates of Sixth year Studies and Standard Grades. The successful consultants will be asked to investigate all aspects of data handling, from the time information leaves the hands of teachers, lecturers or markers to the receipt of results by candidates, centres and UCAS. They will be asked to investigate which parts of the process led to delays and incompleteness in the results and to make recommendations for operational changes to avoid these being repeated next year. The remit also covers the quality assurance procedures surrounding exam marking.

Potential consultants were issued with a specification and an invitation to tender on Friday 18 August and I will make a further announcement after Parliament returns on 6 September.

Question reference: S1W-08994

Asked by: Mr Brian Monteith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 01 August 2000
Current Status: Answered by Sam Galbraith on 22 August 2000

To ask the Scottish Executive how many primary school classes of over 30 pupils in each local authority area have more than one full-time teacher.

In September 1999 there were 142 classes of over 30 pupils in publicly funded schools with more than one full-time teacher. The following table shows a breakdown by local authority area.

All Primary Classes with more than 30 pupils and more than 1 full-time teacher
Local Authority Area	No. of classes	Education Authority	Grant-aided
Scotland	142	129	13
Aberdeen City	2	2
Aberdeenshire	2	2
Angus	5	5
Argyll & Bute	1	1
Clackmannanshire	0
Dumfries & Galloway	2	2
Dundee City	9	9
East Ayrshire	5	5
East Dunbartonshire	5	5
East Lothian	0
East Renfrewshire	7	7
Edinburgh, City of	9	9
Eilean Siar	0
Falkirk	4	4
Fife	3	3
Glasgow City	35	22	13
Highland	3	3
Inverclyde	5	5
Midlothian	0
Moray	4	4
North Ayrshire	5	5
North Lanarkshire	4	4
Orkney Islands	0
Perth & Kinross	7	7
Renfrewshire	8	8
Scottish Borders	3	3
Shetland Islands	0
South Ayrshire	1	1
South Lanarkshire	3	3
Stirling	2	2
West Dunbartonshire	6	6
West Lothian	2	2

Question reference: S1W-08993

Asked by: Mr Brian Monteith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 01 August 2000
Current Status: Answered by Sam Galbraith on 22 August 2000

To ask the Scottish Executive how many (a) primary one to three and (b) primary four to seven classes in each local authority area contain more than 30 pupils.

In September 1999 there were (a) 607 primary one to three and (b) 1543 primary four to seven classes in publicly funded schools with more than 30 pupils. The following table shows the breakdown by local authority areas.

	Classes in Publicly Funded Schools with more than 30 pupils (1)
Local Authority Area	P1 to P3 1999	P4 to P7 1999
Scotland	607	1543
Aberdeen City	16	61
Aberdeenshire	15	37
Angus	12	28
Argyll & Bute	3	24
Clackmannanshire	5	18
Dumfries & Galloway	7	27
Dundee City	20	61
East Ayrshire	15	35
East Dunbartonshire	25	66
East Lothian	9	24
East Renfrewshire	37	79
Edinburgh, City of	54	149
Eilean Siar	0	0
Falkirk	35	60
Fife	20	73
Glasgow City	104	181
Highland	4	34
Inverclyde	11	28
Midlothian	5	18
Moray	8	25
North Ayrshire	19	41
North Lanarkshire	15	82
Orkney Islands	0	0
Perth & Kinross	16	45
Renfrewshire	46	87
Scottish Borders	7	20
Shetland Islands	0	0
South Ayrshire	20	49
South Lanarkshire	19	84
Stirling	4	13
West Dunbartonshire	8	22
West Lothian	48	72

(1) Includes Local Authority and Grant Aided Schools

Question reference: S1W-08991

Asked by: Mr Brian Monteith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 01 August 2000
Current Status: Answered by Sam Galbraith on 22 August 2000

To ask the Scottish Executive how many composite primary schools classes in each local authority area contain more than 25 pupils and, of these, how many have two qualified teachers.

In September 1999 there were 41 composite classes in Scotland with more than 25 pupils. Of these 12 had two full time teachers and 14 had additional support in the classroom. The other 15 classes all had either 26 or 27 pupils. Full details are shown in the attached table.

Composite Classes with over 25 pupils in Publicly Funded Schools
Local Authority Area	Total No. of publicly funded composite classes (1) 1999	Number of publicly funded composite classes with 2 full-time teachers (2)	Number of publicly funded composite classes with 1 teacher and additional classroom staff (3)
Scotland	41	12	14
Aberdeen City	0
Aberdeenshire	2
Angus	3		2
Argyll & Bute	3	1	2
Clackmannanshire	1		1
Dumfries & Galloway	0
Dundee City	0
East Ayrshire	0
East Dunbartonshire	0
East Lothian	2
East Renfrewshire	0
Edinburgh, City of	3	1	1
Eilean Siar	1		1
Falkirk	1		1
Fife	7	3	2
Glasgow City	1
Highland	6	3	2
Inverclyde	0
Midlothian	0
Moray	1	1
North Ayrshire	0
North Lanarkshire	0
Orkney Islands	0
Perth & Kinross	0
Renfrewshire	0
Scottish Borders	6	1	1
Shetland Islands	0
South Ayrshire	0
South Lanarkshire	2	1
Stirling	1		1
West Dunbartonshire	1	1
West Lothian	0

Notes

1. In the context of the School Census, part of the definition of a teacher is that they are qualified to teach.

2. The first column (1) in the table contains 41 Education Authority classes.

3. The second column (2) shows that out of the 41 composite primary classes in Scotland with more than 25 pupils, 12 have 2 full-time teachers.

4. Out of the remaining 29 classes, the 14 identified in column (3) have some additional classroom staff.

5. The balance of 15 classes that have no additional teaching staff all have either 26 or 27 pupils. P3 is the lowest stage present in any of the other 15 classes.

Question reference: S1W-08992

Asked by: Mr Brian Monteith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 01 August 2000
Current Status: Answered by Sam Galbraith on 22 August 2000

To ask the Scottish Executive how many (a) primary one to three and (b) primary four to seven classes in each local authority area have more than one qualified teacher.

In September 1999 there were 151 primary one to three classes and 65 primary four to seven classes with more than one qualified teacher. Full details are shown in attached table.

	All Classes in Publicly Funded Schools with more than one teacher
Local Authority Area	All Classes with P1 to P3 pupils only	Composite classes with pupils from both P1 to P3 and P4 to P7	All Classes with P4 to P7 pupils only
Scotland	151	9	65
Aberdeen City	2		0
Aberdeenshire	1	2	2
Angus	6	1	3
Argyll & Bute	4	3	4
Clackmannanshire	0		0
Dumfries & Galloway	3		0
Dundee City	7		2
East Ayrshire	5		1
East Dunbartonshire	5		0
East Lothian	0		0
East Renfrewshire	5	1	3
Edinburgh, City of	13		1
Eilean Siar	0		0
Falkirk	4		0
Fife	1		5
Glasgow City	33	1	15
Highland	5		2
Inverclyde	6		0
Midlothian	0		0
Moray	2		2
North Ayrshire	5	1	5
North Lanarkshire	4		4
Orkney Islands	0		0
Perth & Kinross	9		1
Renfrewshire	6		5
Scottish Borders	2		1
Shetland Islands	0		0
South Ayrshire	2		0
South Lanarkshire	4		5
Stirling	2		1
West Dunbartonshire	10		2
West Lothian	5		1

Question reference: S1W-08650

Asked by: Mr Brian Monteith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 11 July 2000
Current Status: Answered by Sarah Boyack on 14 August 2000

To ask the Scottish Executive how many road accidents have occurred in the last five years on the Lochearnhead to Tyndrum stretch of the A85.

The number of personal injury accidents for each of the last five years which have occurred on the A85 trunk road between Lochearnhead and Crianlarich and the A82 trunk road between Crianlarich and Tyndrum is as follows:-

A85 Lochearnhead to Crianlarich

Year	Fatal	Serious	Slight	Total
1995	0	5	3	8
1996	0	8	6	14
1997	0	4	6	10
1998	0	4	3	7
1999	0	1	4	5
Total	0	22	22	44

A82 Crianlarich to Tyndrum

Year	Fatal	Serious	Slight	Total
1995	1	1	3	5
1996	1	5	7	13
1997	0	3	1	4
1998	1	2	0	3
1999	0	2	4	6
Total	3	13	15	31