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: S5W-20624

Asked by: Mike Rumbles, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 17 December 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 10 January 2019

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the ScotRail timetable changes on 9 December 2018 and the reduction in services travelling south from Stonehaven from 11 to three per day, what action it has taken to mitigate any inconvenience for passengers on this route; what plans it has to work with Network Rail and ScotRail to improve waiting facilities at Montrose for passengers connecting from Stonehaven; what action it has taken to ensure that routes from Stonehaven to Montrose, and Montrose to the Central Belt, are convenient for passengers connecting the two routes; what concerns passengers have raised with it regarding the reduction in services, and whether, in light of any concerns that passengers raise, it will ask ScotRail to review the number of journeys from Stonehaven.

ScotRail has worked closely with Transport Scotland, Nestran, Tactran, Aberdeen City and Aberdeenshire Councils in developing plans to deliver the greatest benefits to customers in the North East of Scotland from the additional trains we are bringing into service.

Ultimately, all timetables are by necessity a compromise. The plans will deliver a material improvement for the vast majority of customers in the Stonehaven area and ScotRail has worked to limit the negative impacts by retaining some intercity calls, minimising interchange times at Montrose and improving facilities. The next phase of timetable improvements in this corridor will be introduced at the end of 2019 and ScotRail will monitor how customers use the new services to inform future changes.

Question reference: S5W-20360

Asked by: Mike Rumbles, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 03 December 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 18 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-19743 by Michael Matheson on 15 November 2018, whether it will provide the information that was requested regarding which minister (a) was responsible for producing and (b) signed-off the original contract for the construction of the Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route (AWPR).

Question reference: S5W-20255

Asked by: Mike Rumbles, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 17 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further the answer to question S5W-14812 by Humza Yousaf on 28 February 2018, whether it will provide the information regarding stop-skipping broken down by each month since April 2015.

Question reference: S5W-20296

Asked by: Mike Rumbles, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 03 December 2018
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 13 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the Brexit uplift for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs announced by the UK Government, what the value is of the consequential uplift that Scotland has received.

After the UK Government’s Spring Statement, it was announced that the Scottish Government would receive Barnett consequentials on those elements of the £1.5 billion of Brexit preparation funding allocated to areas of devolved responsibility within UK Departments in 2018-19. These equated to £37.3m in total(£35.7m resource, £1.6m capital).

It is for Scottish Ministers to decide how funding allocated to Scotland is spent; there is no automatic assumption that consequentials will be spent on the same activities or in the same proportions in Scotland as in UK Government Departments.

The Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs received £310m extra resource funding for Brexit preparations, which equated to a Barnett consequential of £30.3m for Scotland. As set out in the Autumn Budget Revision, the Rural Economy portfolio received £8.9m in EU Exit preparation funding for 2018-19.

A further £500m of EU exit preparation funding has been announced for 2019-20 in addition to the £1.5bn already announced by the Chancellor at the 2017 Autumn Budget. However, allocations to individual UK Departments are still to be announced, and until they are, consequential amounts to flow to Scotland will not be confirmed.

Question reference: S5W-20297

Asked by: Mike Rumbles, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 03 December 2018
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 13 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the Brexit uplift for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs announced by the UK Government, whether it has or plans to pass on its share of extra funding to support agriculture and the rural economy of Scotland.

Question reference: S5W-20326

Asked by: Mike Rumbles, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 03 December 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 13 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what role the Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure, Investment and Cities played in the decision in December 2014 to award the contract for the Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route (AWPR) to Aberdeen Roads Ltd, and who had overall ministerial responsibility for this decision.

Scottish Ministers are impartial to the awarding of public contracts and therefore the Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure, Investment and Cities played no role in the decision making process to award the contract for the AWPR to Aberdeen Roads Limited (ARL).

A decision was taken by Ministers to progress the AWPR procurement in 2012, immediately following a successful Supreme Court decision. The evaluation criteria required that the tender was awarded to the most economically advantageous tender. In this case that was ARL.

Question reference: S5W-20257

Asked by: Mike Rumbles, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 12 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how much compensation to passengers each month ScotRail (a) awarded in 2017-18 and (b) has awarded since April 2018, also broken down by how much estimated unclaimed compensation there was each month.

Under ScotRail’s ‘Delay Repay’ guarantee, total compensation of £647,670.00 was paid in 2017-18, and in 2018-19 (year to date) a total of £505,121.00 compensation has been paid. The table below shows the amounts paid in each Rail Industry 4 week period.

The increases in compensation payments made in Periods 4 and 7 (2018/19) were related to speed restrictions (Period 4) as Scotland experienced a hotter summer than normal, and in Period 7 the impact of ‘Storm Ali’ and an early autumn both of which impacted on ScotRail’s performance.

The Scottish Government does not have the specific information asked for related to unclaimed compensation.

4 week	Year:
Period	2017-18	2018-19
1	19,308.00	42,262.00
2	26,033.00	44,924.00
3	50,053.00	51,287.00
4	22,636.00	107,278.00
5	41,446.00	64,809.00
6	22,045.00	54,629.00
7	45,828.00	139,932.00
8	73,326.00
9	56,103.00
10	24,687.00
11	33,561.00
12	92,130.00
13	140,514.00
Totals	647,670.00	505,121.00

Question reference: S5W-20256

Asked by: Mike Rumbles, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 12 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-15061 by Humza Yousaf on 15 March 2018, what discussions it has had with ScotRail since that date regarding the introduction of automatic compensation; what the outcome was of the discussions between Transport Scotland and ScotRail, and whether it will place in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe) a copy of any analysis or documents that accompanied these discussions, including any data on how passengers could benefit.

Following discussions between Transport Scotland and ScotRail, ScotRail have submitted a proposal to extend their existing Delay Repay scheme to include journeys between 15 and 29 minutes (Delay Repay 15) for the remainder of the current (7 year) franchise term. This proposal is currently under consideration and as such there is some commercially sensitive information which would not be appropriate for lodging with SPICe at this stage.

Question reference: S5W-20203

Asked by: Mike Rumbles, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 27 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 12 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of news that part of the Forth and Clyde Canal has been closed to navigation due to restoration work being carried out on a bridge and footbridge, what action it is taking to assist with the repairs and return the canal to operational use.

Question reference: S5W-20202

Asked by: Mike Rumbles, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 27 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 12 December 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of news that part of the Forth and Clyde Canal has been closed to navigation due to restoration work being carried out on a bridge and footbridge, what discussions it has had with Scottish Canals regarding the closure; whether it will provide details of the work to be carried out, and when the canal is expected to return to operational use.

The Scottish Government has regular discussions with Scottish Canals about the opportunities and challenges involved in maintaining the canal network. It was announced in June that additional funding of £1.625m would be provided to Scottish Canals in 2018-19 to enable repairs to the bridges at Twechar and Bonnybridge in addition to completion of work at Ardrishaig. Scottish Canals have stated that they aim to have the work completed and the bridges operational by spring 2019. Scottish Canals also have a programme of works to address issues with a bridge at Knightswood which should be completed by the start of the 2019 season and they are working to find a solution to bring the Leamington Swing Bridge in Edinburgh back to full operational use by June 2019.