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: S2W-13202

Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 23 December 2004
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 12 January 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive what discussions it will hold with (a) the Scottish Environment Protection Agency and (b) Scottish Water in respect of the burning of waste-derived fuel at Longannet Power Station.

Question reference: S2W-13203

Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 23 December 2004
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 12 January 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive what advice its solicitors provided to the Scottish Environment Protection Agency and/or Scottish Water in respect of the burning of waste-derived fuel at Longannet Power Station.

Question reference: S2W-13201

Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 23 December 2004
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 12 January 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive what advice or guidance it provided to (a) the Scottish Environment Protection Agency and (b) Scottish Water in respect of the burning of waste-derived fuel at Longannet Power Station.

Question reference: S2W-12447

Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 19 November 2004
Current Status: Answered by Hugh Henry on 12 January 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive when its further consultation on the future of fire control rooms is expected to begin and conclude.

Question reference: S2W-12448

Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 19 November 2004
Current Status: Answered by Hugh Henry on 23 December 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive how it intends to enable the Parliament to consider the outcome of its further consultation on the future of fire control rooms.

Question reference: S2W-12209

Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 12 November 2004
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 6 December 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will carry out a review of the level of rateable values in respect of telecommunications cables similar to that carried out in England and Wales and, if so, when such a review will be undertaken.

Question reference: S2W-12208

Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 12 November 2004
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 6 December 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-3782 by Mr Andy Kerr on 14 November 2003, whether it has now made an assessment in respect of the effect of differences in rateable values between Scotland and England on its initiatives to extend the availability of broadband.

The valuation assessor has advised that there is no difference in the approach in arriving at the rateable value of fixed line rental networks between Scotland and England. No valuation will therefore exceed the valuation of an equivalent network in England. Discussions on individual valuations continue between the Scottish assessors and the network operators. Established appeal procedures exist for ratepayers if they disagree with the rateable value assigned to their property by the assessor.

The Executive is committed to delivering affordable broadband access to every community in Scotland and aims to achieve this by the end of 2005.

Question reference: S2W-12207

Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 12 November 2004
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 6 December 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive, in light of its commitment to a strategy for pervasive and affordable broadband coverage, what levels of rateable value are ascribed to telecommunications cables in the primary control of network operators other than BT and what comparative information it has on the values ascribed to equivalent cables controlled by the same operators in England.

Question reference: S2W-12446

Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 19 November 2004
Current Status: Answered by Hugh Henry on 6 December 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive what form its further consultation on the future of fire control rooms will take.

Question reference: S2W-12115

Asked by: Bruce Crawford, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 09 November 2004
Current Status: Answered by Nicol Stephen on 26 November 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive what action it will take to ensure that there is no further reduction in rural bus services.

The provision of local bus servicesis generally a matter for individual bus operators who use their commercial judgementas to the level and frequency of services to be provided. Beyond these commercialdecisions, it is the responsibility of the relevant local transport authority toidentify where there is a social need for a particular bus service and to make subsidyavailable, if it so chooses, so that appropriate additional services are provided.

TheExecutive gives considerable funding to local authorities through Grant Aided Expenditurearrangements to support socially necessary bus services. In this financial yearthis amounts to £25.5 million and will rise to £26.5 million in 2005-06. However,decisions about how and where to allocate resources from within a council’s budgetare ultimately for the council concerned.

Inaddition to the funding allocated to local authorities for the provision of subsidisedservices, the Executive has recently launched a new grant scheme aimed at developingunder-used and new local bus services. The Bus Route Development Grant Scheme willprovide short-term funding to kick-start existing and new bus services with thepotential to grow. Local authorities have been invited to develop bids in conjunctionwith local bus operators and around £20 million has been allocated over three yearsfor these projects. The deadline for receipt of bids for the first round of BusRoute Development Grant was 31 July 2004. Officials are now considering the bidsreceived and we hope to make an announcement on funding in the near future.

TheExecutive is also helping to improve rural transport services through its RuralTransport Fund. The largest part of this funding is allocated to local authoritiesto help provide new and improved rural public transport services in their area.Since the fund’s introduction in 1998, £30.6 million has been distributed to localauthorities. A further allocation of £6.1 million will be made in 2005-06. To date,over 400 new and enhanced rural services, mainly bus, have been introduced.

TheRural Transport Fund is also providing support through the Rural Community TransportInitiative for rural community transport projects which are of particular benefitin areas where there are no scheduled bus services or where services are very limited.So far, £10.5 million has been awarded to 149 projects. These include communityminibuses, dial-a-bus, taxi-buses and voluntary car schemes.

TheExecutive is also providing a further £1.5 million between 2003-06 to pilot a smallnumber of demand responsive transport projects in rural areas.

I hope this is helpful.

Cable & Wireless (Mercury)	£3.15 million
THUS	£2.7 million
Telewest (includes cable TV)	£4.3 million
NTL (includes cable TV)	£2.5 million