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-09245

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 19 May 2017
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 5 June 2017

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport on 16 May 2017 (Official Report, c. 4), whether it will publish details of any action it has taken in response to warnings issued by the National Cyber Security Centre regarding the need to protect services from hackers.

The Scottish Government’s Cyber Security Operations Centre (C-SOC) monitors guidance and threat reports issued by the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) and takes appropriate action on relevant warnings. These actions include: taking relevant additional precautionary steps to protect Scottish Government systems and infrastructure; sharing threat information with other bodies; sharing relevant information back with NCSC.

Question reference: S5W-09241

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 19 May 2017
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 5 June 2017

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport on 16 May 2017 (Official Report, c. 4), when it acted on the alert issued by Microsoft in March 2017; whether it will publish any warnings that it subsequently issued to departments and agencies for which it has responsibility, and which of those failed to respond.

The Scottish Government installs Microsoft updates across its core infrastructure as a minimum on a monthly basis. All Microsoft-based devices connected to the Scottish Government’s ICT network (SCOTS) before May’s Wannacrypt attack had this update applied.

The Scottish Government’s Information and Technology Services (iTECS) division does not have responsibility for alerting other departments and agencies to Microsoft security bulletins. These organisations will receive the alerts and updates direct from Microsoft.

Question reference: S5W-09242

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 19 May 2017
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 5 June 2017

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport on 16 May 2017 (Official Report, c. 4), what contractual arrangements it put in place with Microsoft to provide customised support for Windows XP after Microsoft stopped issuing updates.

Question reference: S5W-09243

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 19 May 2017
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 5 June 2017

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport on 16 May 2017 (Official Report, c. 4), whether it will list the departments and agencies for which it has responsibility that continue to use unsupported software systems.

Question reference: S5W-09239

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 19 May 2017
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 1 June 2017

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport on 16 May 2017 (Official Report, c. 4), what instructions the cabinet secretary issued prior to the recent cyber-attacks to (a) civil servants and (b) organisations and agencies for which she has responsibility, to improve resilience against such incidents.

Question reference: S5W-09235

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 19 May 2017
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 1 June 2017

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport on 16 May 2017 (Official Report, c. 4), for what reason the NHS in Scotland was affected by the recent cyber-attacks when the NHS in Wales was not.

Question reference: S5W-09240

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 19 May 2017
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 1 June 2017

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport on 16 May 2017 (Official Report, c. 4), for what reason the NHS in Scotland still uses Windows XP.

Question reference: S5W-09238

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 19 May 2017
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 1 June 2017

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport on 16 May 2017 (Official Report, c. 4), whether it is responsible for NHS Scotland not taking sufficient action to prevent the recent cyber-attacks.

NHS Scotland have a rolling programme of system replacement (hardware and software) along with robust policies and procedures which include local patching regimes at each board. The Scottish Government provides £100 million per annum to Health boards for IT investment and cyber security resilience. Health boards spend at least the same amount per annum however we know that in 2016-17 total spend was around £257 million.

Question reference: S5W-09236

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 19 May 2017
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 1 June 2017

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport on 16 May 2017 (Official Report, c. 4), for what reason it did not take pre-emptive action, similar to that taken in Wales, which might have prevented the recent cyber-attack affecting the NHS in Scotland.

Question reference: S5F-01306

Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 22 May 2017
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 25 May 2017

To ask the First Minister, in light of her expressing the view that the NHS pay cap is "unsustainable", whether the Scottish Government will provide details of the submission it made to the pay review body.