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: S3W-29526

Asked by: John Scott, MSP for Ayr, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 December 2009
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 15 December 2009

To ask the Scottish Executive how it will ensure that carers are given the opportunity to complete a carer’s assessment and are provided with the support needed to continue as a carer.

Under the Community Care and Health (Scotland) Act 2002 carers who intend to, or provide, a substantial amount of care on a regular basis are entitled to an assessment of their ability to provide or to continue to provide care (carer''s assessment), independent of any assessment of the person they care for. Young carers under 16 have the same rights to assessment. Our National Minimum Information Standards (NMIS) reiterate the need for good outcomes for carers.

We are working with partners to increase the uptake of the carer''s assessment and to advance these as a means of ensuring better outcomes for unpaid carers in Scotland.

The Carers Strategy for Scotland, to be published during the first half of 2010, will include a chapter on the carer''s assessment and provision of services in support of carers.

Question reference: S3W-29524

Asked by: John Scott, MSP for Ayr, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 December 2009
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 15 December 2009

To ask the Scottish Executive how it will ensure that the needs of carers and young carers will be met by local authorities in the absence of ring fencing.

It is for local authorities to manage their own budgets and to allocate the total financial resources available to them on the basis of local needs and priorities, having first fulfilled their statutory obligations and the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities. Under the concordat arrangement with local government, local authorities have more freedom and flexibility, particularly as we have greatly reduced the number of ring-fenced funding streams. In any event, there was previously no formally ring-fenced funding for carers within the local government settlement.

The Carers Strategy for Scotland, including that part on young carers, is being developed in partnership with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA). As such, and in line with the principles of the concordat, it needs to be approved by COSLA, which should help ensure implementation at local level. The strategy will include high-level messages about the benefits of carer support, supported by evidence and set within the context of outcomes.

Question reference: S3W-29525

Asked by: John Scott, MSP for Ayr, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 December 2009
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 15 December 2009

To ask the Scottish Executive what is being done to ensure the provision of respite care.

Under the concordat, local authorities agreed to progress towards delivering 10,000 extra respite weeks per annum across Scotland. In addition to the concordat funding, as part of the overall local government settlement, the Scottish Government allocated an additional £1.37 million in 2009-10 and a further £2.82 million in 2010-11 to enable local authorities to deliver the extra respite weeks by 2011.

We are working with a number of organisations to consider the way forward for the provision of flexible, personalised short breaks.

Self-directed support (direct payments) is available to people following an assessment for community care services, and carers can gain respite as a result of the service provided to the cared-for person. We are currently considering options to extend direct payments to carers in their own right.

The Carers Strategy for Scotland, to be published in the first half of 2010, will include a chapter on short breaks/respite provision.

Question reference: S3W-29523

Asked by: John Scott, MSP for Ayr, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 December 2009
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 15 December 2009

To ask the Scottish Executive whether local authorities give preference to carers centres with a proven track record providing of support services to carers.

Local authorities make decisions on the funding of, and support to, carers'' centres on the basis of locally assessed priorities.

With regard to tendering, under the Public Contracts (Scotland) Regulations 2006, local authorities must decide, on a case by case basis, if the EC Treaty principles of equal treatment, non-discrimination and transparency require them to tender or re-tender a service. The Scottish Government published guidance in August 2008 which provided advice on the circumstances in which competitive tendering may be required and also set out scenarios where advertising and competition may not be required. The link to the 2008 guidance is:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/116601/0065310.pdf.

The 2008 guidance underlines the need for local authorities to have a strategy for the procurement of social care services which recognises the need to maintain the quality and continuity of services and addresses the concerns of service users.

We intend to publish further guidance and good practice materials in February 2010.

Question reference: S3O-08754

Asked by: John Scott, MSP for Ayr, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 10 December 2009
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 10 December 2009

To ask the Scottish Executive Scottish Executive for what reason the National Food Processing, Marketing and Co-operation Scheme has not supported projects connected to the Scotch Whisky industry or its supply chain.

Question reference: S3W-27606

Asked by: John Scott, MSP for Ayr, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 22 September 2009
Current Status: Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 6 October 2009

To ask the Scottish Executive what the current position is regarding Scottish Water leakage allowances in respect of payments for metered water supplies

Question reference: S3W-27485

Asked by: John Scott, MSP for Ayr, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 18 September 2009
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 1 October 2009

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will permit producers to carry out, record and report within-business moves of sheep on a batch basis following the introduction of EU Regulation 21/2004 on the identification of sheep and goats.

EU Regulation 21/2004 requires the individual identification and recording of all sheep and goats born after 1 January 2010. Derogations exist for those intended for slaughter within 12 months that can be identified and recorded on a batch level.

The Scottish Government has recently launched a public consultation on this Regulation and continues to work with industry to identify the best options available for implementation. Whilst we will look to be as flexible as possible, any procedures will have to remain within the constraints of the EU Regulations.

Question reference: S3W-27486

Asked by: John Scott, MSP for Ayr, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 18 September 2009
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 1 October 2009

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will commit to the following individual or group of cross-compliance requirements during farm inspections following the introduction of EU Regulation 21/2004 on the identification of sheep and goats: (a) a sample number of sheep are checked for identification, (b) a sample number of sheep are checked individually to verify that their identification matches the information recorded in the database and (c) no reconciliation of the database flock record is required.

Commission regulation 1505/2006 of 11 October 2006 implementing EU Regulation 21/2004 requires a minimum level of checks to be carried out in relation to the identification and registration of sheep and goats.

The Scottish Government currently inspects a sample of individual sheep to ensure compliance with tagging requirements and also inspect all sheep on a keepers holding by completing a head count to validate the keepers records and accuracy of movements being reported to the existing database on a batch move basis.

The Scottish Government will review these inspection procedures after considering the responses to the public consultation document on Regulation 21/2004 currently open until 2 November 2009.

Whether reconciliation of the database flock record is required and verification that their identification matches the information recorded in the database will be dependent on the findings of the public consultation into Regulation 21/2004 currently open until the 2 November 2009.

Question reference: S3O-07895

Asked by: John Scott, MSP for Ayr, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 24 September 2009
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 24 September 2009

To ask the Scottish Executive what action it has taken to help ensure that fracture patients have access to a high-quality fracture liaison service no matter where they live.

Question reference: S3W-26969

Asked by: John Scott, MSP for Ayr, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 04 September 2009
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 18 September 2009

To ask the Scottish Executivewhether it is aware of any information that shows deer welfare is compromised by stalking practices in Scotland.

Proposals for reform of the deer legislation in Scotland were requested in June 2008 by the then Minister for Environment in response to concerns he had raised following reports of incidents where deer welfare might have been compromised. Deer Commission for Scotland receives reports of a wide range of deer welfare concerns across the country each season, including reports that deer have been wounded rather than killed outright and concerns that dependant calves have been orphaned.

All the main organisations in the deer sector have recognised for a number of years that standards of deer management, including the welfare of deer, could be improved and have worked jointly to develop Best Practice Guides and to run training courses. These voluntary measures have helped to improve the knowledge and practice of those who have participated but have not involved all those who undertake deer management.

Deer Commission for Scotland have developed proposals on competence, undertaking a number of studies and reports into the options. This development was assisted by two industry workshops on Welfare and Competence. Summaries of these workshops are available on the Deer Commission website at:

http://www.dcs.gov.uk/information/Section%20Content/Welfare%20competence.aspx.

A scientific paper Survey of permanent wound tracts in the carcases of culled wild red deer in Scotland by Urquhart & McKendrick, published in the Veterinary Record in April 2003, also provides supporting evidence for possible welfare concerns.