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-14621

Asked by: Mr David Davidson, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 21 February 2005
Current Status: Answered by Nicol Stephen on 7 March 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive how many people have concessionary travel cards in each local authority area in the north east, broken down by type.

Question reference: S2W-14365

Asked by: Mr David Davidson, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 10 February 2005
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 7 March 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive how many delayed subsidy payments to farmers are outstanding in Aberdeenshire.

There are 20 Common Agriculture Policy subsidy payments being processed outside the payment window, arising from farmers in Aberdeenshire. Of these, six are under the Arable Area Payment Scheme 2004, and 14 under the Sheep Annual Premium Scheme 2004. The payment window for the 2004 cattle schemes runs until 30 June.

Recognising that some complex cases will arise, the European requirement is to process 96% of cases within the payment window and this target has been exceeded for both schemes.

Question reference: S2W-14620

Asked by: Mr David Davidson, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 22 February 2005
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 4 March 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has any plans to introduce a separate scheme for payments to NHS boards based on deprivation criteria.

There are currently no plans to introduce a separate scheme for payments to NHS boards based on deprivation criteria.

Funds are allocated to NHS boards on the basis of the Arbuthnott formula. The Arbuthnott formula takes account of four main indicators to determine the level of funding allocated to each board. These are each board’s population size, age/sex structure, deprivation levels and remoteness. No specific allocation is made to boards for deprivation. The formula is used to determine the total level of funds allocated to boards for their unified budgets. It is for each board to decide how best to meet the health care needs of their resident population from the totality of the funds it receives, taking account of national and local priorities.

Question reference: S2W-14614

Asked by: Mr David Davidson, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 21 February 2005
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 4 March 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive what discussions it has had with the royal colleges regarding reducing training times for consultants.

All aspects of postgraduate medical training in the UK are under review within the Modernising Medical Careers (MMC) training reforms and Royal Colleges are well represented within the MMC delivery mechanisms. New training programmes for consultants and general practitioners, to the standards set by the UK competentauthorities, are being discussed and will be developed in partnership with the Royal Colleges and other stakeholders. The Scottish Executive has established a Delivery Group to oversee the implementation of MMC in Scotland and medical Royal Colleges are represented on that committee.

Question reference: S2W-14184

Asked by: Mr David Davidson, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 04 February 2005
Current Status: Answered by Peter Peacock on 4 March 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive what support is provided for local authorities in north east Scotland to train special needs teachers.

Question reference: S2W-14174

Asked by: Mr David Davidson, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 04 February 2005
Current Status: Answered by Peter Peacock on 4 March 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive what guidance it has issued on the pupil-staff ratio required for special needs teaching.

The Scottish Executive does not issue guidance to education authorities on pupil staff ratios for the teaching of pupils with special educational needs.

The employment and deployment of school staff working with pupils who have special educational needs is the responsibility of individual local authorities. Class size maxima for special schools are set out in Teachers’ Terms and Conditions of Service.

Question reference: S2W-14185

Asked by: Mr David Davidson, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 04 February 2005
Current Status: Answered by Jim Wallace on 4 March 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive what discussions it has had with each local authority in north east Scotland with regard to economic development in the next five years.

The Framework for Economic Development in Scotland sets out the priorities for action for economic development in Scotland, and recognises that economic prosperity is only secured through the efforts and contributions of a wide range of individuals and bodies, working in an integrated and collaborative manner.

local economic forums demonstrate the Scottish Executive’s commitment to partnership working in economic development with membership comprising of key public and private sector representatives including local authorities. The North East Scotland Economic Forum (NESEF) has members from the two local authority areas which cover the north east. NESEF Business 2010 is the economic growth strategy for north east Scotland produced by the forum. The Scottish Executive receives updates on the forum’s progress on strategy and a recent document from NESEF informed us that they are currently working through their strategy. Last year, during a visit to NESEF, the then Deputy Minister for Enterprise and Lifelong Learning discussed local economic development with forum partners.

Aberdeen’s 20 year City-Vision (Energising Aberdeen: creating the conditions for growth) was prepared in 2003 in conjunction with Community Planning partners and stakeholders from across the Aberdeen City-Region, including Aberdeen City Council, Aberdeenshire Councils and NESEF. This City-Vision plan aims to place Aberdeen as a leading centre in Scotland’s new economy. Since early 2003, officials from the Scottish Executive have held a number of discussions with officials from Aberdeen City Council on progress made by Aberdeen in taking forward its City-Vision, which is supported by an £11.5 million grant from the Cities Growth Fund (2003-06).

At a more local level, a partnership of Scottish Enterprise Grampian, Aberdeenshire Council, and Communities Scotland has put in place the Building Buchan Action Plan which aims to focus collective resources on building sustainable communities throughout the Buchan area.

Every local authority in Scotland, including those in the north east, has arepresentative member on the Scottish Local Authority Economic Development Group.The Scottish Executive is also represented and attends the regular meetings of themain group where economic development issues are discussed.

Question reference: S2W-14616

Asked by: Mr David Davidson, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 21 February 2005
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 4 March 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive how many consultant cardiology posts were unfilled in each of the last five years and how many it projects will be unfilled in each of the next three years, broken down by NHS board.

The table provides a breakdown by NHS board of the number of vacant consultant posts in cardiology since 2000.

Consultant Cardiology Vacancies by Time and NHS Board (Headcount) at 30 September

	Total vacancies
2000	2001	2002	2003	2004
Scotland	-	-	4	6	5
NHS Ayrshire and Arran	-	-	-	-	-
NHS Borders	-	-	2	1	1
NHS Argyll and Clyde	-	-	-	-	-
NHS Fife	-	-	-	-	2
NHS Greater Glasgow	-	-	-	-	-
NHS Highland	-	-	-	-	-
NHS Lanarkshire	-	-	-	3	-
NHS Grampian	-	-	-	-	-
NHS Orkney	-	-	-	-	-
NHS Lothian	-	-	1	1	-
NHS Tayside	-	-	1	-	-
Special Health Boards ¹	-	-	-	-	-
NHS Forth Valley	-	-	-	-	1
NHS Western Isles	-	-	-	-	-
NHS National Services Scotland (formerly CSA)	-	-	-	-	-
NHS Dumfries and Galloway	-	-	-	1	1
NHS Shetland	-	-	-	-	-

Source: ISD Scotland.

Note: 1. Comprises NHS Education for Scotland, NHS Quality Improvement Scotland and NHS Health Scotland.

It is not possible to identify the actual number of unfilled posts over the next three years.

However, we are committed to building consultant capacity within NHS Scotland.

Question reference: S2W-14618

Asked by: Mr David Davidson, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 21 February 2005
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 4 March 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will publish a report on the current stages of the review of the Arbuthnott Formula.

I refer the member to the answer to question S2W-14556 on 21 February 2005. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament/webapp/wa.search.

The first meeting of the NHSScotland Resource Allocation Committee, set up to improve and refine the Arbuthnott Formula, took place on Thursday 24 February, therefore at this stage there is nothing to report.

Question reference: S2W-14598

Asked by: Mr David Davidson, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 21 February 2005
Current Status: Answered by Rhona Brankin on 3 March 2005

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has any plans to replicate the new services being rolled out in England for sufferers of chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis (CFS/ME).