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: S4O-01498

Asked by: Ken Macintosh, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 14 November 2012
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 21 November 2012

To ask the Scottish Government what contact the Cabinet Secretary for Culture and External Affairs has had with Creative Scotland in the last month.

Question reference: S4W-10753

Asked by: Ken Macintosh, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 31 October 2012
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 8 November 2012

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-09939 by John Swinney on 30 October 2012, when it will inform the Parliament of whether it plans to lodge a legislative consent motion regarding changes to pension arrangements and what the deadline is for lodging such a motion.

The Scottish Government is currently considering the UK Government’s request to support a Legislative Consent Motion in relation to certain provisions within the Public Sector Pensions Bill. It will lodge a Legislative Consent Memorandum in Parliament and inform Parliament about this issue shortly.

Whilst the Scottish Parliament’s Standing Orders require that an LCM should normally be lodged within two weeks of a relevant Bill’s introduction at Westminster, that is not a mandatory requirement. Late notification from the UK Government around the need for an LCM in advance of the Bill has meant that the Scottish Government was unable to meet that timescale.

Question reference: S4W-10752

Asked by: Ken Macintosh, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 31 October 2012
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 8 November 2012

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-09939 by John Swinney on 30 October 2012, when it was first informed that a legislative consent motion might be required.

Question reference: S4W-10424

Asked by: Ken Macintosh, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 24 October 2012
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 7 November 2012

To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on complaints from small and medium-sized enterprises that they are being shut out of government projects because contracts are bundled together or by the requirement of a minimum size of business turnover.

The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that small and medium sized businesses have fair and equal access to public sector contracts in Scotland.

When developing collaborative procurement strategies, we actively engage with suppliers of all sizes. Strategies are tailored to the individual characteristics of the market concerned and we expect public sector buyers to take the impact on SMEs and the local economy into account – for example by splitting requirements into specialist or geographical lots where appropriate and supporting SME consortia and wider supply chain opportunities wherever possible.

SMEs have been successful in winning places on several government-led collaborative frameworks across a range of commodity areas, and also play a vital role in the supply chains of larger prime contractors. It is also important to note that the share of procurement spend won by SMEs has remained relatively constant at around 46% since collaborative procurement centres of expertise were established, and of the businesses winning contracts through Public Contracts Scotland last financial year 79% were registered as SMEs and 64% were registered as SMEs with a Scottish address.

With regards to turnover, in May this year, following examples brought to the then Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure and Capital Investment’s attention relating to turnover requirements, Alex Neil asked officials to issue guidance which underlined the need for public bodies to ensure that requirements at the selection stage of a procurement exercise are proportionate to the subject matter of the contract and do not act as a barrier to participation by SMEs or recent start-ups. The guidance recommended that annual turnover is only used as a minimum standard in exceptional circumstances and asks public bodies to consider whether other information could, in the case in question, provide a better indication of bidders’ ability to deliver the contract requirements. The guidance can be accessed at the following link:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/resource/0039/00394311.pdf.

Question reference: S4W-10207

Asked by: Ken Macintosh, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 12 October 2012
Current Status: Answered by Alex Neil on 7 November 2012

To ask the Scottish Government how many individual patient treatment requests (IPTR) were made for patients with colon cancer in 2011-12.

Question reference: S4W-10206

Asked by: Ken Macintosh, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 12 October 2012
Current Status: Answered by Alex Neil on 7 November 2012

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-06212 by Nicola Sturgeon on 26 March 2012, whether all NHS boards now have a practising medical consultant on all individual patient treatment request (IPTR) panels.

The Scottish Government guidance published on 13 February 2012 under cover of SGHD/CMO(2012)1, clarified that from 1 April 2012, NHS Board Individual Patient Treatment Request (IPTR) panels are expected to include a practising medical consultant with (or with access to) specialist medical knowledge of the relevant clinical area.

All NHS boards have confirmed that they have updated their IPTR management to reflect this additional guidance.

Question reference: S4W-10208

Asked by: Ken Macintosh, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 12 October 2012
Current Status: Answered by Alex Neil on 7 November 2012

To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on making monoclonal antibodies available.

Question reference: S4W-10210

Asked by: Ken Macintosh, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 12 October 2012
Current Status: Answered by Alex Neil on 6 November 2012

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-06515 by Nicola Sturgeon on 26 April 2012, what monitoring is carried out of the effectiveness medicines introduced via individual patient treatment requests (IPTR) and whether this informs decisions made by the Scottish Medicines Consortium.

Information on the effectiveness of medicines introduced via Individual Patient Treatment Requests (IPTRs) on a “case by case” basis for individual patients is not held centrally.

The Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) appraises the clinical and cost-effectiveness of newly licensed medicines for which a pharmaceutical company has made a submission. The SMC will only re-appraise medicines where the pharmaceutical company makes a resubmission.

Question reference: S4W-10211

Asked by: Ken Macintosh, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 12 October 2012
Current Status: Answered by Alex Neil on 6 November 2012

To ask the Scottish Government whether NHS boards can access national contingency funding to meet the cost of dealing with individual patient treatment requests (IPTR).

Question reference: S4W-10209

Asked by: Ken Macintosh, MSP for Eastwood, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 12 October 2012
Current Status: Answered by Alex Neil on 6 November 2012

To ask the Scottish Government how it monitors the work of the Scottish Medicines Consortium.