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-29336

Asked by: Kenny MacAskill, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 27 October 2006
Current Status: Answered by Cathy Jamieson on 8 November 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what the estimated annual costs of Addiewell prison are from 2007 to 2017.

I have asked Tony Cameron, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service to respond. His response is as follows:

No costs will be incurred forHM Prison Addiewell until the prison comes on stream towards the end of 2008. Thecontract will run for 25 years from this point and the contract value is estimatedto be £369 million in Net Present Value terms. This equates to around £15 millionpa in Net Present Value terms over the life of the contract.

Question reference: S2W-29314

Asked by: Kenny MacAskill, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 October 2006
Current Status: Answered by Patricia Ferguson on 8 November 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how much has been spent by Visitscotland in New Zealand in each year since 1999.

VisitBritain is the lead agencyin the delivery of the Scotland brand in New Zealand. VisitScotland works in partnership with VisitBritainto market Scotland as a visitor destination in New Zealand, with Scotland a majorpart of the Britain brand. In addition, VisitScotland currently invests approximately£200,000 per year in marketing Scotland across the world through its Ancestral Tourismmarketing strategy, with New Zealand forming an important strand of this work.

Question reference: S2W-29000

Asked by: Kenny MacAskill, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 October 2006
Current Status: Answered by Elish Angiolini on 7 November 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will consider using sheriff officers to cite prosecution witnessess and what the reasons are for its position on this matter.

There are no plans to use sheriffofficers to cite prosecution witnesses.

In September 2003 a system ofissuing citations by post was introduced for most witnesses in summary cases. FromApril 2006 postal citation was extended to civilian witnesses in sheriff andjury cases, except those with special requirements, such as children, vulnerableadults and witnesses whose first language is not English. The number of citationsthe police have to serve personally has fallen by an average of almost 68,000 peryear.

Witnesses receive a letter throughthe post including a reply form, postage paid, for return to the Procurator Fiscal.This is a modern and efficientsystem for citing civilian witnesses in a way that is more convenient for witnessesand frees up police time. Using sheriff officers would require manual productionof hard copies for delivery and manual processing of the receipts. The retentionof police delivery for vulnerable witnesses and children, however, avoids them receivingletters they may not fully understand and provides an opportunity for them to askquestions of the person who delivers the citation.

It is intended to introduce postalcitation for High Court witnesses later this year and plans to issue electroniccitations for police witnesses are progressing.

Question reference: S2W-28999

Asked by: Kenny MacAskill, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 October 2006
Current Status: Answered by Cathy Jamieson on 7 November 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what information it has on the amount of police time deployed in serving prosecution witness citations in each year since 1999.

Question reference: S2W-29001

Asked by: Kenny MacAskill, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 October 2006
Current Status: Answered by Elish Angiolini on 7 November 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how many prosecution witness citations have been served by police officers in each year since 1999.

The total number of witness citationsissued for service by police officers (or by civilian staff employed by the police)on non-police prosecution witnesses is set out in the following table.

Prosecution Witness Citations(Non-Police Witnesses): Number of Citations Issued to Police for Personal Service¹

Year²	No. of Citations
2002-03	315,651
2003-04	280,008
2004-05	248,507
2005-06	211,494

Notes:

1. The information in thetable has been extracted from the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service’sCase Management Database. The database is a live, operational database used tomanage the processing of reports submitted to procurators fiscal by the policeand other reporting agencies. For operational reasons, some witness citations mayneed to be re-issued and this will create some duplication of records withinthe database.

2. The Crown Office andProcurator Fiscal Service completed an upgrade of its electronic casemanagement system in April 2002. Only case records created after that datecontain complete data which is capable of electronic analysis.

The main reason for the reductionin the number of citations issued to the police for personal service in recent yearshas been the introduction of arrangements for serving some citations by post. In2005-06 around 70,000 witness citations were successfully served by post.

Question reference: S2W-29282

Asked by: Kenny MacAskill, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 October 2006
Current Status: Answered by Patricia Ferguson on 7 November 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how much was spent promoting Scottish culture in the United States of America in each year since 1999.

The Scottish Arts Council (SAC)has responsibility for funding and advising those within Scotland’s culturalsectors who seek to promote their work abroad. Figures for work involving UnitedStates of America are only available since 2001 and are as follows:

Year	Totals	Number of Grants
2001	£16,763	17
2002	£130,183	38
2003	£320,929	79
2004	£78,521	52
2005	£203,893	54

These figures do not includefunding for events directly associated with the annual Tartan Week celebration,which are funded separately.

Question reference: S2W-29283

Asked by: Kenny MacAskill, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 October 2006
Current Status: Answered by Patricia Ferguson on 7 November 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what funds are available for Scottish artists, writers and playwrights to promote their work in the United States of America.

Scottish artists, writers andplaywrights who wish to promote their work in the United States of America can apply to the Scottish Arts Council (SAC) for support.The SAC, through its continuing partnership with British Council Scotland, is wellplaced to provide advice, funding and facilitation services in respect of this activity.

However, the SAC does not setaside funding on a country-by-country basis, but rather awards funding accordingto the respective merits of each application.

Question reference: S2W-28458

Asked by: Kenny MacAskill, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 19 September 2006
Current Status: Answered by Patricia Ferguson on 27 October 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how much has been spent in each year since 1999 by (a) VisitScotland and (b) Executive departments or other agencies in promoting the Edinburgh (i) International Festival, (ii) Festival Fringe, (iii) Film Festival and (iv) Book Festival.

The information is not held centrallyin the form requested. Details of specific funding provided by the Executive throughits agencies are set out in the following tables:

Edinburgh Festivals (inc. Winter Festivals)

Year	Amount (£)	Agency
2005-06	528,000	VisitScotland

Around £500,000 of the moneyfrom VisitScotland was media spend which was put towards a series of TV and cinemaadverts which included clips from the festivals. £14,000 was given to the JointFestivals Marketing Group for the production of an electronic media kit to targetpotential customers through news and travel broadcasts. £5,000 was used to partfund the post of a travel press officer for the Edinburgh Festivals, while an estimated£9,000 was spent on press trip activity.

Edinburgh International Festival

Year	Amount (£)	Agency
1999-2000	775,000	Scottish Arts Council
2000-01	1,475,000	Scottish Arts Council
2001-02	975,500	Scottish Arts Council
2002-03	1,090,665	Scottish Arts Council
2003-04	1,459,526	Scottish Arts Council
2004-05	1,242,131	Scottish Arts Council
2005-06	1,207,478 300,000	Scottish Arts Council EventScotland

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

Year	Amount (£)	Agency
1999-2000	170,316	Scottish Arts Council
2000-01	43,281	Scottish Arts Council
2001-02	60,033	Scottish Arts Council
2002-03	25,700	Scottish Arts Council
2003-04	2,250	Scottish Arts Council
2004-05	34,165	Scottish Arts Council
2005-06	57,015	Scottish Arts Council

Edinburgh International Film Festival

Year	Amount (£)	Agency
1999-2000	101,000	Scottish Screen
2000-01	22,000	Scottish Screen
2001-02	121,000	Scottish Screen
2002-03	71,000	Scottish Screen
2003-04	22,000	Scottish Screen
2004-05	126,000	Scottish Screen
2005-06	222,000 50,000	Scottish Screen EventScotland

Edinburgh International Book Festival

Year	Amount (£)	Agency
1999-2000	62,500	Scottish Arts Council
2000-01	96,081	Scottish Arts Council
2001-02	208,910	Scottish Arts Council
2002-03	192,510	Scottish Arts Council
2003-04	220,612	Scottish Arts Council
2004-05	167,039	Scottish Arts Council
2005-06	161,812 6,000	Scottish Arts Council EventScotland

The Scotlandistheplace campaignset aside £50,000 for Edinburgh Festivals advertising-sponsorship in 2006.

Question reference: S2W-28696

Asked by: Kenny MacAskill, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 September 2006
Current Status: Answered by Nicol Stephen on 27 October 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how many people have been employed in the printing sector in (a) Scotland and (b) Edinburgh in each year since 1997.

Table 1 shows the number of employeejobs in Edinburgh and Scotland in the printing sector. Due to changes in the data between2002 and 2003 there is a discontinuity with the data therefore comparisons betweendata from 2003 onwards with data prior to 2003 should be used with caution

Table 1: Employee Jobs in PrintingSector - Edinburgh and Scotland – 1997-2004

	City of Edinburgh	Scotland
1997	1,800	10,700
1998	2,400	11,800
1999	2,100	11,600
2000	1,800	10,300
2001	1,800	9,900
2002	1,500	10,100
2003	1,300	9,200
2004	1,500	8,900

Notes:

1. Figures have been roundedto the nearest hundred.

2. The printing industry is definedas Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) 22.2

3. 1997-2002 figures are basedon SIC 1992 codes and 2003-2004 figures are based on SIC 2003 codes. This may leadto a discontinuity in levels.

4. Data for 1997–2002 are basedon 1991 census wards. Data for 2003-04 are based on 2003 CAS wards.

Question reference: S2W-28697

Asked by: Kenny MacAskill, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 September 2006
Current Status: Answered by Tavish Scott on 25 October 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what funding is available for port infrastructure improvements in Edinburgh or Fife to promote fast ferries or other maritime links.