Chamber and committees

The loan arrangement between Hearthstone and Castle Rock Edinvar Housing Association was a commercial arrangement which Scottish Government was not party to. We are unable to provide information on the terms of the loan.

Castle Rock Edinvar Housing Association operates across a number of Local Authority areas in Scotland. In reference to the Hearthstone scheme, the relevant Local Authorities are Stirling, Clackmannanshire and Falkirk. The most recent meeting between Scottish Government officials and these local authorities were: Falkirk Council (11 October 2018), Clackmannanshire Council (15 August 2018) and Stirling Council (6 September 2018).

Under the current legislation arrears of child maintenance or aliment existing at the commencement of insolvency proceedings will rank with other equivalent debts and will be repaid from any available estate recovered by the trustee. Any balance remaining following the completion of the trustee’s administration is written off. This does not apply where child maintenance arrears or aliment are payable by virtue of a court order and in these circumstances the debt will survive the bankruptcy. An individual declared insolvent is required to meet their on-going liabilities for child maintenance or aliment.

The current arrangements on the treatment of maintenance in bankruptcy were covered in the consultation undertaken prior to the bankruptcy reforms that came into force in April 2015. The consultation responses received at that time supported a continuation of the existing arrangements in relation to the treatment of child maintenance debts. A forthcoming public consultation and policy review focusing on the impact of the 2015 bankruptcy reforms will seek further views on this issue.

The Accountant in Bankruptcy does not hold the information requested. The reason for this is that data held on debts discharged on the closure of proceedings under the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act 1985 and the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act 2016 do not distinguish between aliment and child maintenance arrears that are written off and those that survive bankruptcy.

AiB captures creditor information and the type of debt involved in each self-nominated bankruptcy awarded following a debtor application. In bankruptcies arising from court procedure following a creditor petition, the format of information provided to AiB does not enable specific creditor information to be extracted. In order to provide some context, debtor application bankruptcies awarded in financial years 2015-16, 2016-17 and 2017-18 include 136 cases where child maintenance debts have been recorded. Of these, the bankrupt person has been discharged in 113 cases (as of October 2018). This equates to 1.5% and 1.2% respectively of debtor application bankruptcies awarded during this period. Over the same period, two debtor application bankruptcies included aliment debts and neither the bankrupt person nor the trustee are discharged in these cases.

We have been working with the Chief Officers of Integration Joint Boards on the development of this commitment. This includes obtaining further detailed workforce plans to provide information on workforce allocation, location of workforce for 2018-19 and details on the trajectory toward the 800 total by 2021-22. From these plans, 30 out of 31 Integrated Joint Boards have now begun the process of recruiting additional mental health workers under this commitment.

The following table shows the number of students enrolled (full person equivalent) in either (a) a PGDE or (b) an undergraduate degree programme who have allocated Business Studies as their chosen subject, since academic year 2012/13.

Student enrolments in Education with Business Studies in Scotland

The details surrounding audio recording as part of the assessment process will be developed as part of forthcoming service design work, with input from people with lived experience of disability assistance assessments. Policies related to audio recordings will be designed in line with the relevant data protection legislation.

I refer the member to the answer to S5W-19124 on 17 October 2018. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx .

Other than Health & Safety Executive guidance there are currently no regulations which govern the storage and preparation of deceased persons prior to a funeral taking place or where funerals may be conducted.

The Scottish Government, in extensive consultation with relevant stakeholders, is currently drafting a statutory Funeral Director Code of Practice. Provision for such a document is set out within the Burial and Cremation (Scotland) Act 2016.

This code will set out the standards and practices in relation to care of the deceased which funeral director businesses must adhere to. The code will include measures for the appropriate storage and preparation of the deceased before a funeral.

The content of this code will be publicly consulted upon later this year.

The Scottish Government does not hold the information on the number of state secondary school pupils entered for National Qualifications for 2018-19. Data on the number of pupils entered for Accountancy at National 5, Higher and Advance Higher for the last 10 years was provided in response to S5W–18830 on 15 October 2018. Data on 2018-19 entries is not yet available. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.