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-17167

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 11 June 2018
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 19 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many times meetings of the social security stakeholder reference groups have been (a) rearranged and (b) cancelled, and when each group last met.

The information requested is set out in the following table.

Reference Group	No of Meetings Cancelled	No of Meetings Rearranged	Date of Last meeting
Agency Operations Reference Group	0	1	7 March 2018
Best Start Grant Reference Group	0	0	31 January 2018
Carer Benefit Advisory Group	1	0	4 April 2018
Communications and Engagement Partnership Group	0	1	31 May 2018
Disability and Carers Benefits Expert Advisory Group	Information Not Held	Information Not Held	26 April 2018
Funeral Poverty and Funeral Expense Assistance Reference Group	0	0	24 April 2018
Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefits Advisory Group	1	0	11 December 2017
Ill Health and Disability Benefits Stakeholder Reference Group	0	1	12 December 2017
Joint Ministerial Group on Welfare	0	1	14 June 2018
Young Carer Grant Working Group	0	1	26 April 2018

Question reference: S5W-17172

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 11 June 2018
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 19 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-10875 by Jeane Freeman on 20 September 2017, what the average time is for processing social security experience panel members' expenses claims, and what the maximum time has been.

Experience Panels expense claims are received by the Scottish Government Experience panels research team either directly from panel members at events, or sent in via a First Class FREEPOST service. Once completed forms are received in the office they are usually sent to finance to be processed within one working day.

From June 2017 to December 2017 Experience Panels expense claims were handled by Scottish Government central finance. The average processing time for these claims was 3.4 days.

Since 5 December 2017 Experience Panels expense claims are handled by the Social Security agency finance team. The average processing time for these claims is 3 working days.

All 130 claims apart from 3 were paid within 4 working days. The maximum processing time from receiving a completed form for these three outliers was 36 days. These three outliers were due to incomplete information or errors. We are continuing to trial potential improvements to our processes to reduce the time it takes for payments to be made.

Question reference: S5W-17168

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 11 June 2018
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 19 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Government when it last conducted a review of the privacy impact assessment for the Social Security (Scotland) Act 2018 in accordance with the impact assessment for the Bill dated 20 June 2017, and whether it will publish any such review.

Question reference: S5W-17174

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 11 June 2018
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 19 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many social security experience panel (a) meetings and (b) communications have solely focused on the design of new social security benefits, beyond the About Your Benefits and You survey, which focused on past experiences of DWP benefits.

120 meetings have been held with the Experience Panels, other than the About Your Benefits and You survey. This includes benefits specific design work and cross cutting design for the new agency. This work is ongoing with further meetings planned.

20 communications have been sent to experience panel members, or groups within the experience panel about our research and opportunities to take part, beyond the About Your Benefits and You survey and focus groups.

This does not include follow up communications or communication with individual panel members on a one to one basis.

Question reference: S5W-17176

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 11 June 2018
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 19 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many social security experience panel members have not been engaged in the panels beyond the initial recruitment, and how it is attempting to re-engage with those individuals.

947 panel members have not engaged in the Experience Panels beyond the initial recruitment stage. It was made clear at the recruitment stage that members could participate as much or as little as they like.

For every piece of Experience Panels research we offer multiple channels for participation to account for different participation needs, including online, phone and face to face options. Our most recent survey has asked panel members for feedback about what is working well, and how we can improve our approach to engaging panel members. We are also working with key stakeholders to increase our engagement with these groups in our next large scale piece of research, and are reviewing non-participation to ascertain if there is anything further we can do.

As with all projects of this type, some panel members will choose not to engage preferring instead to simply be informed of what is happening, and a small number have opted to leave the panel. We will continue to recruit panel members on an annual basis to account for this.

Question reference: S5F-02483

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 18 June 2018
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 21 June 2018

To ask the First Minister what the Scottish Government’s response is to the National Audit Office report, Rolling out Universal Credit.

Question reference: S5W-16788

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 17 May 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 7 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-16451 by Shona Robison on 17 May 2018, in light of (a) paragraph 71 of its document, Guidance for SG Staff on Scottish Parliamentary Questions, which states that "Where a question relates to operational matters, it should be referred to the relevant Chief Executive to prepare the substance of the response" and (b) commitment at paragraph 1.3(d) of the Scottish Ministerial Code that "Ministers should be as open as possible with the Parliament and the public, reflecting the aspirations set out in the Report of the Consultative Steering Group on the Scottish Parliament", whether it will ask NHS Lanarkshire to provide the information that was requested regarding how it assesses suitability of coverage for primary care out-of-hours services in the (i) NHS board's area and (ii) Cumbernauld and Kilsyth constituency.

Question reference: S5W-16739

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 16 May 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 7 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-16456 by Shona Robison on 16 May 2018, for what reason this information is not held centrally, and, in light of the commitment at paragraph 1.3(d) of the Scottish Ministerial Code that "Ministers should be as open as possible with the Parliament and the public, reflecting the aspirations set out in the Report of the Consultative Steering Group on the Scottish Parliament", whether it will ask NHS Lanarkshire to provide the information that was requested regarding what the FTE staffing levels have been at the (a) Airdrie and (b) Hamilton primary care out-of-hours service in each month since April 2017.

Question reference: S5W-16738

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 16 May 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 7 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-16455 by Shona Robison on 16 May 2018, for what reason this information is not held centrally, and, in light of the commitment at paragraph 1.3(d) of the Scottish Ministerial Code that "Ministers should be as open as possible with the Parliament and the public, reflecting the aspirations set out in the Report of the Consultative Steering Group on the Scottish Parliament", whether it will ask NHS Lanarkshire to provide the information that was requested regarding how many times the (a) Airdrie and (b) Hamilton primary care out-of-hours service has been closed, suspended or unavailable in each year since 2015.

Question reference: S5W-16790

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 17 May 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 7 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-16461 by Shona Robison on 17 May 2018, in light of (a) paragraph 71 of its document, Guidance for SG Staff on Scottish Parliamentary Questions, which states that "Where a question relates to operational matters, it should be referred to the relevant Chief Executive to prepare the substance of the response" and (b) commitment at paragraph 1.3(d) of the Scottish Ministerial Code that "Ministers should be as open as possible with the Parliament and the public, reflecting the aspirations set out in the Report of the Consultative Steering Group on the Scottish Parliament", whether it will ask NHS Lanarkshire to provide the information that was requested regarding the reported calls from residents to restore the primary care out-of-hours service in the Cumbernauld and Kilsyth constituency.