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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Displaying 2014 questions Show Answers

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Question reference: S7W-01869

Asked by: Maggie Chapman, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 July 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 18 August 2026

To ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking to ensure that Police Scotland officers investigating rape and serious sexual offences have sufficient time and resources to deliver trauma-informed investigations and maintain meaningful communication with victims throughout the investigative process, and what measures are in place to ensure that victims and survivors of rape receive appropriate support where investigations are delayed because of investigative capacity or workload pressures.

Question reference: S7W-01780

Asked by: Jenny Young, MSP for Central Scot and Lothians West, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 July 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 18 August 2026

To ask the Scottish Government what proportion of secondary school pupils eligible for free school meals has been recorded as being persistently absent from school in each year since 2017-18, and what analysis it has commissioned or carried out on the impact that this might have on the likelihood of them subsequently having the status of being classified as not being in employment, education or training (NEET) aged 16 to 24.

Question reference: S7W-01886

Asked by: Steven Bonnar, MSP for Uddingston and Bellshill, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 July 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 18 August 2026

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with the UK Government regarding a coordinated oversight framework for large-scale data centre and AI infrastructure developments, in light of the cross-cutting issues that such developments raise across devolved planning powers and reserved matters, including energy and digital infrastructure.

Question reference: S7W-01871

Asked by: Ross Greer, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 July 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 18 August 2026

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the risk that post-2027 drone class-marking requirements could lead to otherwise safe and operational drones being prematurely replaced, resulting in increased electronic waste.

Question reference: S7W-01779

Asked by: Jenny Young, MSP for Central Scot and Lothians West, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 July 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 18 August 2026

To ask the Scottish Government what proportion of disabled 16- to 24-year-olds in each year since 2010-11 were classified as not being in employment, education or training (NEET).

Question reference: S7W-01880

Asked by: Paul McLennan, MSP for East Lothian Coast and Lammermuirs, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 July 2026
Current Status: Answer expected on 18 August 2026

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the implementation of provisions contained within the Fireworks and Pyrotechnic Articles (Scotland) Act 2022 and whether the Minister for Victims and Community Safety would consider a ban on the public sale of fireworks as part of her next steps.

Question reference: S7W-01697

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Edinburgh and Lothians East, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 14 July 2026
Current Status: Answered by Alison Thewliss on 21 July 2026

To ask the Scottish Government how many adult day care facilities and services have operated in each local authority area in each year since 2021.

The Scottish Government does not routinely collect comprehensive information on the number of adult day care facilities and services operating in each local authority area.

However, between 2022 and 2024, the Scottish Government carried out four surveys of adult day care services at a national level. The surveys were initially undertaken to establish the extent to which services had returned to pre-pandemic operating levels.

Two collections were undertaken in 2022 to capture service provision before and after the removal of social distancing measures. The figures provided for 2022 reflect the later of these two collections. Further surveys undertaken in 2023 and 2024 continued to monitor the extent to which services had returned to pre-pandemic levels.

Adult day care services are typically commissioned through Health and Social Care Partnerships, and the information is reported on that basis.

The figures presented include only those services identified through survey returns as being open or open with reduced capacity. A figure of zero should not be interpreted as indicating that no adult day care facilities or services were operating in that area. In some cases, a zero may reflect a nil return, an incomplete return, or differences in local reporting rather than an absence of services.

HSCP	2022	2023	2024
Aberdeen City	0	2	2
Aberdeenshire	7	7	9
Angus	9	11	10
Argyll and Bute	13	13	10
Clacks and Stirling	2	2	13
Dumfries and Galloway	10	10	9
Dundee	6	0	7
East Ayrshire	2	5	3
East Dunbartonshire	7	7	7
East Lothian	0	0	20
East Renfrewshire	2	2	0
Edinburgh	34	38	33
Falkirk	1	1	8
Fife	19	20	18
Glasgow	27	28	31
Highland	0	13	0
Inverclyde	0	5	6
Midlothian	9	8	8
Moray	11	7	0
North Ayrshire	3	6	8
North Lanarkshire	12	13	7
Orkney	4	4	4
Perth and Kinross	10	10	11
Renfrewshire	8	9	10
Scottish Borders	6	0	0
Shetland	2	9	2
South Ayrshire	0	2	5
South Lanarkshire	15	25	16
West Dunbartonshire	3	3	1
West Lothian	11	11	11
Western Isles	6	7	6

Question reference: S7W-01562

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh North Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 06 July 2026
Current Status: Answered by Siobhian Brown on 21 July 2026

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the Scottish National Party manifesto commitment of expansion of childcare provision for children from nine months old, (a) whether this will this be subject to a phased introduction and (b) when will two-year-olds receive expanded provision.

The Scottish Government has committed to expanding childcare support to children from nine months through to the end of primary school over the course of this Parliament. We are at the early stages of developing our plans for expansion and, as this progresses, we will work with all parts of the childcare sector, parents, carers and children, to ensure that any expansion delivers a system which meets the needs of children and families across Scotland and supports a sustainable, resilient and high quality childcare sector. We will set out a detailed programme in due course, to enable Parliament and the public to monitor progress.

While we develop those plans, we are continuing to support families most in need, for example through our £15 million childcare support fund which helps with childcare costs, specifically targeting low-income households and families living in, or at risk of living in poverty. We are also continuing to invest £3 million in 2026-27 to fund breakfast clubs through the Bright Start Breakfasts Fund alongside an additional investment of £15 million to phase delivery of a national breakfast club offer from August 2027.

These measures, which we are putting in place now, will help to address the affordability and flexibility of childcare, helping families to manage costs and support participation in education and training, with wider benefits including supporting access to work.

Question reference: S7W-01535

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 03 July 2026
Current Status: Answered by Alison Thewliss on 21 July 2026

To ask the Scottish Government what progress has been made towards implementing the 55 recommendations set out in the 2023 report, Independent Review of Audiology Services in Scotland, and what the expected timeline is for their full delivery.

A national programme of work to address recommendations of the Independent Review of Audiology Services in Scotland (IRASS) was concluded in 2025. A final report was produced which sets out how recommendations have either been implemented and completed, or embedded in longer term work programmes within the health and social care system.

This report is available at: Implementing-the-Recommendations-from-the-IRASS-March-2025.pdf.

Our 100 days prospectus includes a commitment to convene government, NHS Heads of Service, community audiology providers and stakeholders to set out an agreed plan to enhance community audiology services. This reflects our ongoing commitment to working with partners to determine how best to shift audiology care into the community.

Question reference: S7W-01544

Asked by: Emma Roddick, MSP for Inverness and Nairn, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 06 July 2026
Current Status: Answered by Alison Thewliss on 21 July 2026

To ask the Scottish Government how it ensures that funding for hospices reaches the organisations delivering hospice care.

The Scottish Budget for 2026-27 includes £9.4 million of investment to support independent hospices to provide pay parity with NHS levels for staff who deliver essential palliative care services.

We are working with the Scottish Hospice Leadership Group (SHLG) to gather relevant information from hospices to help ensure our governance and approval procedures are correctly followed prior to any allocation of funding being agreed.

This funding will be provided to hospices via allocations to NHS boards, with the clear expectation set that this funding should be immediately paid onward to the hospices.

We will continue to engage with SHLG and NHS boards to ensure that all independent hospices receive the funding as intended.