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-09996

Asked by: Alexander Burnett, MSP for Aberdeenshire West, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Patrick Harvie on 16 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what plans are in place to amend the Mobile Homes Act 1983 (Amendment of Schedule 1) (Scotland) Order 2013 to use CPI rather than RPI as the measure of inflation for the purposes of annual reviews of pitch fees for park homes.

Question reference: S6W-10007

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 16 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the volume of carbon emissions associated with the electrification of Scotland's rail network, as set out on page 8 of the Rail Services Decarbonisation Action Plan, by 2035.

Question reference: S6W-09994

Asked by: Alexander Burnett, MSP for Aberdeenshire West, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Patrick Harvie on 16 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether there will be review of the 10% maximum commission of the price of a mobile home upon sale, and, if so, when this review will take place.

Question reference: S6W-10041

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Mairi McAllan on 16 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will consider the introduction of the full registration of all non-native gamebird releases for monitoring purposes.

Question reference: S6W-10008

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 16 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking to encourage a modal shift of HGV traffic to rail, as per the Rail Services Decarbonisation Action Plan.

The Scottish Government’s leadership in support for rail freight is outlined in our rail freight strategy and put into practice with significant investment and a first of a kind regulatory growth target. Our £25 million ring-fenced fund for rail freight for the period 2019-24 is unique to Scotland and we continue to offer Freight Facilities Grants unlike some other parts of the UK. These funding opportunities are generating private investment in rail freight facilities and unlocking opportunities for rail freight across the country.

Our rolling programme of efficient electrification, detailed in the Rail Decarbonisation Action Plan, will also encourage and facilitate modal shift to rail freight as it brings significant environmental benefits, improves connectivity and creates additional capacity supporting the key role rail freight has to play in helping us achieve our transport emission targets.

Question reference: S6W-10005

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 16 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many properties have received funding to date from the £500,000 it allocated to meet the cost of installing interlinked fire alarm systems; what the average cost has been per property of those that received funding to have interlinked fire alarms installed, and how many of the systems that have been funded were connected to the mains electricity supply by a qualified electrician.

In 2021-22, total funding of £1.1 million has been provided to Care & Repair (C&R). This was, in addition to the £1 million allocated to Scottish Fire & Rescue Service (SFRS) for its Home Fire Safety Visit programme to install interlinked fire alarms in the homes of those at highest risk.

Our funding for Care and Repair has enabled them to fit interlinked fire alarms to 2,421 households, with a further 1,466 households still to be completed. C&R average costs for a supply and fit of the battery operated fire alarms for a typical 3 bedroom home was £300.

The Scottish Government funding was for battery-powered alarms, which do not require alarms to be connected to the mains electricity supply by a qualified electrician.

Question reference: S6W-09811

Asked by: Oliver Mundell, MSP for Dumfriesshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Lorna Slater on 16 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on its policy on the future use of Asulox.

The Scottish Government position is that pesticides should be authorised on a case by case basis where the available scientific evidence shows they do not pose unacceptable risks to human health, animals and the environment. An emergency authorisation for the use of the herbicide product Asulox has been approved for bracken control in 2022 in limited and controlled circumstances.

There is a need to move away from the use of emergency authorisations as the solution and look into more sustainable, long-term alternatives to Asulox. Officials have been instructed to begin talks with the other UK administrations and the Health and Safety Executive, to further engage stakeholders and those working on alternative solutions, to ensure we have more sustainable forms of bracken control going forward.

Question reference: S6W-09999

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Ash Regan on 16 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many times a solicitor has been appointed by court for an unrepresented person facing charges under section 1(1) of the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018.

The Scottish Government does not hold this information however the Scottish Legal Aid Board does record applications for legal aid in Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act (DASA) 2018 cases applied where Section 22(1)(dd) of the Legal Aid Act (Person accused of certain offences) applies.

This classification does not specify the circumstances of the grant, only that the grant was made. Therefore it cannot be determined from the data below what ratio of those applications came from court appointed solicitors. This designation under section 22(1)(dd) is also not exclusive to DASA cases but is also applicable to all cases where an accused cannot represent themselves i.e. cases involving sexual offences, child witnesses, vulnerable witnesses, Abuse Behaviour and Sexual Harm (Scotland) Act 2016, and trials in absence.

The annual figures for all section 22 (1)(dd) cases are as follows:

Financial Year	Number s.22(1)(dd) received
2018-19	152
2019-20	148
2020-21	128
2021-22	185

Question reference: S6W-09974

Asked by: Rachael Hamilton, MSP for Ettrick, Roxburgh and Berwickshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Mairi McAllan on 16 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many acres of peatlands were restored in 2021.

The Scottish Government gathers data on peatland restoration carried out by the Peatland ACTION programme each financial year in hectares (ha). The total number of restored hectares of peatlands in 2020-21 was 5,658ha; and the total number of restored hectares of peatlands in 2021-22 was 5,370ha.In 2022-23, we are on track to deliver a substantial increase in the number of hectares restored.

We are committed to further increasing the annual area of peatland we restore. To support this we are gathering evidence on the key bottlenecks as well as how we can best target restoration activity to deliver maximum value for money in terms of carbon, biodiversity and just transition outcomes.

Question reference: S6W-09976

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 16 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how it will address reported concerns from unpaid carers regarding access to free COVID-19 lateral flow tests.