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-26838

Asked by: Stewart Maxwell, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 14 June 2006
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 21 June 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how many, and what percentage of, nurses recruited in each of the last five years are nurse consultants.

Question reference: S2W-26446

Asked by: Stewart Maxwell, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 01 June 2006
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 7 June 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will consider making the recently purchased second-level domains “scotland.eu” or “alba.eu” available to the Scottish public in the form of a number of third-level domains (e.g. www.thirdleveldomains.scotland.eu or www.thirdleveldomains.alba.eu) or whether it intends to use “scotland.eu” for a single site redirect as has been outlined for the domains registered by it during Phase II of the European Registry of Internet Domain Names (EUrid) domain application process.

Question reference: S2W-25735

Asked by: Stewart Maxwell, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 08 May 2006
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 30 May 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will support the campaign for a Scottish internet domain and the aims of the dotSCO organisation.

Question reference: S2W-25734

Asked by: Stewart Maxwell, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 08 May 2006
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 30 May 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive why Scotland does not have a top-level internet domain name.

Question reference: S2W-25733

Asked by: Stewart Maxwell, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 08 May 2006
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 30 May 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it considers that “sco” and “scot” are appropriate abbreviations for Scotland, especially for use on the internet.

Question reference: S2W-25731

Asked by: Stewart Maxwell, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 08 May 2006
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 30 May 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive which domain names have been registered with the European Registry of Internet Domain Names (EURid) on its behalf; when it intends to use them; what their intended uses are, and how much it cost to register these domains.

The UK Cabinet Officereserved the Second Level Domain (SLD) scotland.eu during the sunrise period onbehalf of the Executive.

After the sunrise period a PhaseII period when public bodies could make applications began. The Executive’s International Projects Division, via Demys the Intellectual Property Management Agency,applied for and was granted:

Alba.eu

Albain.eu

Ecosse.eu

Escocia.eu

Freshtalentscotland.eu

Friendsofscotland.eu

Globalfriendsofscotland.eu

Global-friends-of-scotland.eu

Iskocya.eu

Schotland.eu

Schottland.eu

Scotlandistheplace.eu

Scotlandnow.eu

Scotland-now.eu

Scozia.eu

Shotimaa.eu

Skocia.eu

Skotia.eu

Skotija.eu

Skotland.eu

Skotlanti.eu

Skotska.eu

Skotsko.eu

Skottland.eu

Skozja.eu

Sotimaa.eu

Szkocja.eu

Yralban.eu.

Each name cost £100 (excVAT) to process + an annual management fee of £110 (exc VAT).

All the above names nowpoint either to www.scotlandistheplace.com.

The intention is to ensurethat those searching for online information about Scotland aredirected to the appropriate promotional site which deals with the country’sinternational image and fresh talent initiative.

When the process moved ontoPhase II and applications were opened to everyone. IPD reapplied for two namesrejected under Phase I. A decision is still pending.

Freshtalent.eu

Fresh-talent.eu

If successful these willcost £150 (exc VAT) + annual management charge of £110 (exc VAT)

In addition Scotland onLine, the Executive’s web hosting contractor bought six names on behalf of thewebsite.

Scottishexecutive.eu

Scottish-executive.eu

Scottishgovernment.eu

Scottish-government.eu

Scottishadministration.eu

Scottish-administration.eu.

The cost of these isexpected to be £100 (excluding VAT) each, but no invoices have yet beenreceived.

They have been bought toprotect and prevent abuse of the Executive’s online identity. All point to www.scotland.gov.uk.

Question reference: S2W-25732

Asked by: Stewart Maxwell, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 08 May 2006
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 30 May 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what its reasons are for not registering “.sco.eu” or “.scot.eu” with the European Registry of Internet Domain Names (EURid).

The Internet AssignedNumbers Authority (IANA) is the international organisation responsible forclassifying Top Level Domains. The Top Level Domains for countries are all currentlytwo letters long e.g. .es (Spain), .fr (France), .jp (Japan).

Scotland is included within the two TLDs allocated to the United Kingdom- .uk and .gb, however the Executive has also recently acquired a new SecondLevel Domain (SLD) - scotland.eu.

Thedomain scotland.eu was registered with EURID (European Registry of InternetDomain Names) because it clearly satisfied the criteria which allowed EU memberstates to apply for domains related to geographical areas. While theabbreviations “sco” and “scot” do have some merit as internet abbreviations,they also have limitations, in particular they are not clearly geographicallydescriptive. Therefore sco.eu and scot.eu did not satisfy the criteria fordomains related to geographical areas and any attempt to reserve them wouldhave been unsuccessful.

The Executive believes thatScotland.eu, combined with the Top Level Domain (TLD) .uk will clearly convey Scotland’sonline identity.

Question reference: S2W-25145

Asked by: Stewart Maxwell, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 10 April 2006
Current Status: Answered by Johann Lamont on 12 May 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive whether all hospital respiratory departments offer pulmonary rehabilitation and, if not, which do not, broken down into NHS board area.

Planning Advice Notes (PANs)contain advice and do not generally place obligations on local authorities. PAN65 sets out good practice on the role of the planning system in protectingexisting open space and ensuring provision associated with new development, andencourages local authorities to prepare an open space strategy based on anaudit and assessment of open space provision and need.

National Planning PolicyGuideline (NPPG) 11: Sport, Physical Recreation and Open Space is currently underreview and a draft Scottish Planning Policy (SPP) will be published for consultationin the near future. A central part of the revised policy will be theintroduction of a requirement for each local authority to prepare and update anopen space audit and strategy to inform preparation of the development plan. TheSPP will also introduce new national minimum standards for open space provisionin certain types of new development.

Question reference: S2W-25143

Asked by: Stewart Maxwell, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 10 April 2006
Current Status: Answered by Lewis Macdonald on 11 May 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will list the number and percentage of children in each deprivation category who have attended for formal pre-school health checks in each of the last five years, broken down by NHS board.

The number of children canbe found in the table Number of Children that had a Pre-school Review byyear, NHS Board and Deprivation Category, a copy of which has beenplaced in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 39496).

It is not possible toaccurately report these figures as a percentage as the Child Health Surveillance Programme Pre-School system (CHSP-PS)holds information only on those children who have received a review. Therefore, it was not possible to use these data toderive a ‘denominator population’ of all children who would have been eligible.

The information requested isnot available for all NHS boards. It is only held centrally for NHS boards thatparticipate in the CHSP-PS.

Question reference: S2W-25402

Asked by: Stewart Maxwell, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 25 April 2006
Current Status: Answered by Peter Peacock on 10 May 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-16445 by Peter Peacock on 18 May 2005, how many children left school with no qualifications in each of the last five years, broken down by local authority area.