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: S4W-30647

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 10 March 2016
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 21 March 2016

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has allocated specific funds for the building of a new health centre for Lochgelly.

Question reference: S4W-30029

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 22 February 2016
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 7 March 2016

To ask the Scottish Government how much it has cost NHS Fife to use agency staff from Medinet Wales Ltd in each week since 26 January 2016; how many agency staff have been hired; which clinical specialities have been provided, and how many patients have been seen by them.

Question reference: S4W-30018

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 22 February 2016
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 3 March 2016

To ask the Scottish Government what estimates it has of the number of extra GPs required in the Cowdenbeath constituency.

There is no ‘one size fits all’ approach to service provision and health boards are expected to design and put in place those service models that best reflect their local circumstances.

We are working to increase the number of GPs in Scotland, and the First Minister recently announced that we are increasing training places for GPs by a third – from 300 to 400 a year. We are also transforming primary care, including developing new ways of working with multi-disciplinary teams that elevate the role of GPs as medical experts in the community.

Question reference: S4W-30019

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 22 February 2016
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 3 March 2016

To ask the Scottish Government what information it has on current consultant vacancies in NHS Fife and whether the board is having difficulties recruiting in specific clinical areas.

NHS Fife continues to proactively recruit to available consultant posts, with a targeted media campaign resulting in the successful appointment of a number of permanent consultants.

Under this government, the number of consultants in NHS Fife has increased by 74.4 whole time equivalent (WTE), or 44.2 per cent between September 2010 and December 2015, while the establishment has increased by over 50 WTE during this period.

Any fluctuation in consultant vacancies is linked to our efforts to increase capacity by recruiting even more staff. Information on consultant vacancies in NHS Fife is published by Information Services Division (ISD) Scotland and is shown in Table 1:

Table 1. Whole time equivalent of NHS Fife consultant vacancies, staff in post and vacancies as a percentage of establishment as at 31 December 2015.

	Vacancies	Staff in Post	Vacancies as a % of establishment
December 2015	34.0	240.6	12.4%

Sources: Scottish Workforce Information Standard System, ISD(M)36.

Notes:

1. In March 2014 the definition of a vacancy changed to: A vacancy is a post which has been cleared for advert after being through the redeployment process (internal or external advert) and remains a vacancy until an individual starts in the post. Prior to this, a vacancy stopped being classified as such at the point when the post was offered to someone and accepted. The impact of this change is a significant increase in the number of reported vacancies.

2. Establishment is calculated as number of staff in post plus total vacancies.

Question reference: S4W-30017

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 22 February 2016
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 3 March 2016

To ask the Scottish Government what information it has regarding any difficulty in obtaining a GP appointment in the Cowdenbeath constituency.

Under the legal framework for service provision, NHS boards are responsible for ensuring the provision of primary medical services for their areas. NHS Fife works with GP practices to ensure that everyone in Fife has access to GP services. This includes appointments at the medical practice, care home visits, home visits, and extended opening hours to help those who are unable to make appointments during core hours.

As part of the £85 million the Scottish Government is investing in improving services through the Primary Care Fund, £6 million will be invested in developing digital services, including helping online appointment booking.

Question reference: S4W-29352

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 18 January 2016
Current Status: Answered by Annabelle Ewing on 26 January 2016

To ask the Scottish Government what information it has regarding how the apprenticeship levy scheme that was announced in the 2015 Autumn Statement will apply to Scotland.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer announced the rate and scope of the UK apprenticeship levy that will be implemented from April 2017. The rate for the levy will be set at 0.5% of an employer’s pay-bill. All employers will receive an allowance of £15,000 meaning that the levy will only be payable on pay-bill in excess of £3,000,000 per annum. It includes all employers in private, public and third sectors and will be collected via PAYE.

As greater clarity emerges from the UK Government on Scotland’s share of the levy, we will work with employers and other stakeholders to explore how the introduction of the levy will align with Scotland’s successful apprenticeship programme.

Question reference: S4W-27980

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 09 October 2015
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 27 October 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how many meetings it has had with the communications firm, Charlotte Street Partners, in each of the last five years, broken down by meetings organised by (a) it and (b) the firm, and how many were attended by (i) the First Minister, (ii) other ministers and (iii) officials.

Question reference: S4W-27982

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 09 October 2015
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 15 October 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how many contracts it has awarded to the communications firm, Charlotte Street Partners, in each year since 2007, also broken down the (a) duration and (b) value of each contract.

Question reference: S4W-27983

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 09 October 2015
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 15 October 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how many contracts it has awarded to organisations (a) represented by and (b) with an established link to the communications firm, Charlotte Street Partners, in each year since 2007, also broken down by the name of the organisation and the (i) duration and (ii) value of each contract.

Question reference: S4O-04444

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Cowdenbeath, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 June 2015
Current Status: Awaiting answer

To ask the Scottish Government how many unfilled consultant posts there are in NHS Fife.