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: S6W-03715

Asked by: Finlay Carson, MSP for Galloway and West Dumfries, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 13 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 22 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the cat ID chipping scheme currently being rolled out in England to help track any improvements in kitten breeding and trading following the new licensing of breeding regulations, whether it plans to introduce the scheme in Scotland.

The Scottish Government Code of Practice for the Welfare of Cats recommends that all cat owners should consider neutering and microchipping their pets as the best way of being reunited with them should they be separated.

The Scottish Government is aware of the Defra call for evidence and recent public consultation on the microchipping of cats. We will give full consideration to the results of this consultation and the details of any proposed legislation when they are available.

We remain willing to consider areas where consistent changes to legislation in all GB administrations will improve the welfare of kept animals.

Question reference: S6W-03061

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 05 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 22 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-00882 by Mairi Gougeon on 7 July 2021, whether it will provide an update on the number of landings that have been reported by wrasse fishers through (a) their standard reporting requirements and (b) the new weekly reporting required under the point 11 of the licence conditions applying to the harvesting of wrasse, since 1 May 2021.

As referenced in my response to S6W-03059 on 28 September 2021 Marine Scotland does not collect information from wrasse fishers on the number of individual landings by creek or aquaculture facility. The data that is collected by Marine Scotland is outlined in my previous answer.

I am unable to provide the level of detail you seek, as that may lead to individuals vessels being identified, but between 1 May and 9 October 2021, reports were received by Marine Scotland that the number of individual Wrasse landed totalled 365,826. Please note that these figures are provisional and may be subject to change.

You may be interested to know that once the season has ended and provisional figures have been finalised, Marine Scotland intend to report on data collected relating to Wrasse fishing over the course of this season.

All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

Question reference: S6W-03583

Asked by: Sharon Dowey, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 07 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 22 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what support it will provide to South Ayrshire Council, including from any emergency funds, to tackle the reported increase in applications from people presenting as homeless in the area.

In 2021-22, South Ayrshire Council has been allocated £176,000 from the Ending Homelessness Together Fund. To date, South Ayrshire Council has been allocated an additional £30 million to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic over and above its regular grant payments. It is the responsibility of individual councils to allocate the financial resources available to them on the basis of local needs and priorities.

However, South Ayrshire Council has reported that there has not been an increase in homelessness applications and that they are continuing to support people through the system and into settled accommodation as quickly as possible.

Question reference: S6W-03579

Asked by: Katy Clark, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 07 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Jamie Hepburn on 22 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government, in relation to Year One of the National Training Transition Fund, how many applications for training in the transport sector (a) have been (i) approved and (ii) rejected and (b) are yet to be processed, and whether it will provide an update on when the final delivery figures will be published.

The National Transition Training Fund (NTTF) is being delivered through various sector-based projects which will have different application procedures. The data below sets out information on course participants in Year One as far as it is currently available.

In Year One of the NTTF, support for the Aviation sector was provided through Scottish Union Learning. Unite the Union developed a programme which continues this year to enable Aviation workers – many of whom were furloughed - to upskill to help support job retention. This provided a variety of training opportunities for ground and air crew.

In addition, Strand One of NTTF, which was managed by Skills Development Scotland, supported driver training, including Driver CPC, LGV with CPC and PCV with CPC.

In terms of NTTF college delivery, The college figures for 2020-21 are yet to be finalised as collection of college data only concluded on 12 October 2021 and still require to be quality assured before publication as Official Statistics in January 2022.

I have previously advised that a final report on NTTF Year One will be made available this year. As the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) will not publish data until January 2022, I intend to issue a report immediately after the SFC publication is released. I do however, intend to update Parliament in November on anticipated outturns.

Question reference: S6W-03593

Asked by: Daniel Johnson, MSP for Edinburgh Southern, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 07 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Jamie Hepburn on 22 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government how many people have been supported through the National Transition Training Fund since the fund was introduced.

We continue to await final confirmed data on college and university based projects, delivery of which continued until the end of the academic year and I hope to provide an update on final anticipated figures for Year One shortly. However, to date, based on available data and anticipated final college and university numbers, at least 7,500 i ndividuals have received training through the programme across a range of sectors including Tourism and Hospitality, Rural, Creative Industries, Aviation and Aerospace.

In Year Two we have broadened the scope of NTTF. While retaining the focus on recovery from the economic impact of Covid-19, we are also supporting sectors affected by Brexit as well as those sectors with significant skills transitions such as the transition to net zero. Year Two data is not yet available.

Question reference: S6W-03869

Current Status: Withdrawn

Question reference: S6W-03438

Asked by: Paul Sweeney, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 01 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 21 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the comment in its correspondence to the Economy, Energy and Fair Work Committee in 2020 that Scotland’s enterprise sector was working with the Enterprise and Skills Strategic Board Analytical Unit to improve the measurement of performance of Scotland's enterprise agencies, whether it will provide an update on progress with this work.

The Strategic Board works with the enterprise and skills agencies to improve performance measurement in a number of ways:

The Board produces its Annual Analysis to coincide with its Strategy Day. This includes a comprehensive analysis of Scotland’s performance against relevant National Performance Framework indicators. Importantly the report also includes consideration of agencies contribution to the outcomes and detail on the agencies progress on delivery of the Board’s missions.
The Board ensure the agencies plans are aligned - with each other, with Scottish Government and Board strategic direction and with the National Performance Framework. Each of the agency operational plans now share a vision, one which supports the Strategic Board’s Plan and Scottish Government priorities. In addition, the agency operational plans now use common planning assumptions shaped by common economic analysis as well as making clear how agency activity supports the outcomes of the National Performance Framework.
Additionally, the Board has overseen specific analytical work to help improve performance measurement in relation to key areas of agency activity. The Board’s work on Innovation (working jointly with the Analytical Unit, Scottish Government and agencies) has identified a number of specific cross-agency actions to improve the monitoring and evaluation of activity – including developing consistent approaches and addressing data gaps.

Question reference: S6W-03637

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 11 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 21 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government how many cyberattacks have taken place on public bodies in each year since 1999.

In December 2017, the Scottish Government introduced a cyber incident reporting procedure to notify the Scottish Government, Police Scotland and the National Cyber Security Centre of cyber incidents with the purpose of providing support to affected Scottish public sector bodies.

The Scottish Government cannot confirm the number of incidents prior to 2018 as there was no equivalent process in place encouraging Scottish public sector organisations to report cyber incidents to the Scottish Government.

Table 1. Number of incidents reported to the Scottish Government by the Scottish public sector bodies under the Notifiable Scottish Public Sector Cyber Incidents procedure since 2018

Year

2018

2019

2020

2021

up to 13 October

Number of incidents reported

Question reference: S6W-03346

Asked by: Jamie Greene, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 28 September 2021
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 21 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the estimated final cost of the MV Glen Sannox ferry upon completion.

Question reference: S6W-03345

Asked by: Jamie Greene, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 28 September 2021
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 21 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the timetable for the delivery of the MV Glen Sannox ferry.