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-07737

Asked by: Michael Matheson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
Current Status: Answered by Cathy Jamieson on 20 May 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive whether the Scottish Prison Service (SPS) has had to sanction overtime payments for staff at any prison due to delay in prisoners being transferred by Reliance Custodial Services and, if so, what the additional cost to the SPS budget has been.

Question reference: S2W-07679

Asked by: Michael Matheson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
Current Status: Answered by Hugh Henry on 6 May 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive how many registered care homes have had an advisory visit from the fire service following the Rosepark Care Home fire, broken down by local authority area, and, of these, how many the fire service reported as unsatisfactory to the Care Commission and, of these, how many are local authority-owned.

As at 18 April 2004 the eightScottish Fire Brigades had carried out 1,204 advisory visits to residential carepremises in their brigade areas as set out in the following table.

Brigade	Number of Visits
Central Scotland Fire Brigade	72
Dumfries and Galloway Fire Brigade	45
Fife Fire and Rescue Service	121
Grampian Fire and Rescue Service	115
Highland and Islands Fire Brigade	98
Lothian and Borders Fire Brigade	230
Strathclyde Fire Brigade	359
Tayside Fire Brigade	164
Total	1,204

This number of advisory visitsrepresents approximately 65% of residential care services registered by the CareCommission in Scotland. Brigades will be continuing these visits, which havebeen welcomed by staff and residents, until all care premises have been covered.In some 80% of the visits, recommendations have been made about improvements infire safety. These were generally of a minor nature. The Care Commission has onlymoved to formal enforcement action in one case. However, for all visits which haveresulted in recommendations being made, the Care Commission has asked the providersof the service for action plans with timescales and is seeking the advice of brigadeson these plans where necessary. The information sought on ownership details is notheld centrally.

Question reference: S2W-07678

Asked by: Michael Matheson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 22 April 2004
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 6 May 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive how many registered care homes there are.

Question reference: S2W-05696

Asked by: Michael Matheson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 23 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 4 February 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive whether Fosamax (70mg) and Calcichew D3 will no longer be prescribed to patients under 65 with osteoporosis, and, if so, what the reasons are for the withdrawal of these drugs.

Question reference: S2W-05656

Asked by: Michael Matheson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 22 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 29 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive, in respect of each executive non-departmental public body (NDPB), advisory NDPB, tribunal, public corporation, nationalised industry and NHS body for which ministers are accountable, what external legal advice each organisation receives and from whom, what the jurisdiction is of each such legal advice provider, and what statutes govern the operation of each NDPB or other organisation and any contracts that they may enter into with third parties.

The information requested isnot held centrally.

Arrangements for theprovision of legal advice to non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs) are mattersfor individual organisations to consider. Details of the legislative basis ofpublic bodies where appropriate, can be found in the Directory of ScottishPublic Bodies on the Public Bodies Website at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/government/publicbodies/direct.asp.

NDPBs are required to complywith Scottish Executive guidelines on procurement and delegated limits whencontracting for goods and services.

Question reference: S2W-05657

Asked by: Michael Matheson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 22 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 29 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive, in respect of each executive non-departmental public body (NDPB), advisory NDPB, tribunal, public corporation, nationalised industry and NHS body for which ministers are accountable, how much each organisation has spent on external legal advice in each year since 1980, (a) in total and (b) adjusted for inflation with 1980 as the base year, broken down by legal jurisdiction of the invoicing provider.

Question reference: S2W-05129

Asked by: Michael Matheson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 18 December 2003
Current Status: Answered by Cathy Jamieson on 28 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive what performance points were accrued by the operating company of HM Prison Kilmarnock, broken down for each heading and subsection in Schedule F to the Minute of Agreement between the Secretary of State for Scotland and Kilmarnock Prison Services Limited for the Design, Construction, Management and Financing of a Prison at Kilmarnock, for the quarter July to September 2003.

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

2.1(g)	Discovery within Prison of Smuggled-in-Items	175
2.1( i)	Failure of Security Procedures	200
2.2(a)	Staff Assault - Serious Injury	0
- Minor Injury		0
- No Injury		15
2.2(b)	Prisoner Assault - Serious Injury	0
- Minor Injury		20
- No Injury		70
2.2(c)	Incident of Concerted Indiscipline	100
2.2(d)	Incident of Hostage Taking	10
2.2(f)	Incident of Self-Harm	15
2.2(g)	Incident of Class 'A' Drugs	450
2.2(h)	Incident of Drugs Other than Class 'A'	85
2.2(l)	Tool/Implement Loss (Recovered)	2
2.2(m)	Tool/Implement Loss (Not Recovered)	8
2.5(b)	Visits - Failure to Start within 20 Minutes of Visitor arriving	2

Question reference: S2W-05125

Asked by: Michael Matheson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 17 December 2003
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 28 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-4604 by Mrs Mary Mulligan on 12 December 2003, whether it will publish the guidance used by its Health Department's Directorate of Service Policy and Planning to assess the funding application made by the Seagull Trust in 2002.

The section 10(1) grantscheme aims to assist voluntary organisations in developing social workservices and promoting social welfare. Both revenue and capital grants may beprovided. Revenue grants are available as both core funding and project grants.

Priorities for servicedevelopment in community care are:

to sustain, promote anddevelop person-centred services for people in need, and for theirfamilies/carers, and to encourage collaboration and joint working amongstagencies and organisations to improve service delivery and representation, andto promote good physical and mental health and wellbeing. Adult client groupsinclude homeless people, older people, people with a physical disability,people with mental health difficulties, people with learning disabilities,people with drug/alcohol difficulties, people with HIV/Aids, and carers.

Key priorities are:

services which can help andsupport people to live independently in the community, and improve theirquality of life;

respite care and othersupport for carers;

opportunities designed topromote the participation of users and carers in care management as well asplanning, development and delivery of services;

advice, counselling andinformation services;

alcohol, solvent and drugmisuse services aimed at harm reduction and rehabilitation; and

work with homeless people.

Question reference: S2W-05373

Asked by: Michael Matheson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 08 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 22 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive what discussions it has had with Her Majesty's Government in respect of the introduction of 80% mandatory rates relief for community amateur sports clubs and what the cost would be of the introduction of such a scheme in Scotland.

Question reference: S2W-05372

Asked by: Michael Matheson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 08 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 22 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive which local authorities provide rates relief to sports clubs and what funding has been allocated to local authorities to provide such rates relief in each of the last five years.

Sports clubs may qualify fora number of rate reliefs such as mandatory charitable rate relief, and/or discretionaryrate relief or small business rate relief. Only information relating to theamount of discretionary rate relief granted to sports clubs by each localauthority is held centrally. The table below shows the amount of discretionaryrate relief granted by each local authority to sports clubs in the last fiveyears. The Executive funds 100% of any discretionary rate relief granted tosports clubs.

Discretionary Relief for Sports Clubs: 1998-99 to 2002-03

	1998-99	1999-2000	2000-01	2001-02	2002-03*
Aberdeen City	137,963	186,921	208,970	145,020	265,311
Aberdeenshire	454,998	457,548	524,103	570,105	605,328
Angus	140,252	150,026	170,652	180,148	192,560
Argyll and Bute	196,373	232,547	261,281	281,930	289,724
Clackmannanshire	25,301	29,157	29,643	30,189	31,517
Dumfries and Galloway	252,616	266,198	279,552	288,210	294,596
Dundee City	105,240	109,535	119,578	126,000	132,494
East Ayrshire	71,471	76,477	110,036	132,809	114,480
East Dunbartonshire	143,894	186,908	257,642	278,304	286,519
East Lothian	251,442	264,519	280,847	348,251	380,624
East Renfrewshire	153,906	154,842	158,757	179,198	180,967
Edinburgh, City of	726,318	751,327	810,044	841,948	859,368
Eilean Siar	22,485	27,511	29,463	31,251	37,231
Falkirk	42,214	46,286	49,791	50,433	73,615
Fife	287,627	295,251	280,373	330,908	333,193
Glasgow City	346,262	347,199	374,905	398,709	398,257
Highland	134,106	293,585	349,694	278,457	350,961
Inverclyde	65,454	68,302	71,517	76,634	75,910
Midlothian	122,443	128,192	145,410	140,136	147,284
Moray	208,942	221,165	238,088	254,226	263,391
North Ayrshire	131,597	137,715	156,694	155,642	173,570
North Lanarkshire	209,984	221,427	223,681	230,853	236,196
Orkney	14,444	18,396	20,334	22,264	24,466
Perth and Kinross	317,228	326,527	371,546	385,443	415,639
Renfrewshire	151,792	159,794	172,613	175,605*	182,374
Scottish Borders	295,274	303,100	313,132	326,816	339,291
Shetland	148,748	153,860	156,395	155,997	160,904
South Ayrshire	149,937	178,581	177,074	191,563	197,694
South Lanarkshire	220,899	224,236	252,217	261,439	268,259
Stirling	141,495	212,069	222,119	262,957	292,654
West Dunbartonshire	28,318	29,511	40,720	46,059	42,217
West Lothian	198,583	214,466	236,283	262,097	253,370
Scotland	5,897,606	6,473,178	7,093,154	7,439,601	7,899,964

*Notified Amounts – figureswhich are in the process of being certified by the local authority auditors.