- Asked by: Liz Smith, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 17 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Shona Robison on 2 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the Scottish Retail Consortium’s suggestion in its Retail industry recommendations for the 2025-26 Scottish Budget paper, that spending restraint rather than tax rises should form the bulk of the measures to plug the projected gap in devolved government finances.
Answer
Prolonged Westminster austerity, the economic damage of Brexit, a global pandemic, the war in Ukraine, and the cost of living crisis have all placed enormous and growing pressure on the public finances.
For example, Brexit has reduced the size of the UK economy by 2.5 per cent, equating to a £2.3 billion annual cut in revenue in Scotland.
Decisions for 2025-26 will be published as part of the 2025-26 Scottish Budget on 4 December. Scottish Income Tax policy for 2025-26 will be announced during the annual Budget process.
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Current Status:
Withdrawn
- Asked by: Jamie Greene, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 19 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Angela Constance on 1 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government what steps it will take to improve efficiency within the justice system, in light of the reported comment from the chief constable of Police Scotland that as many as 500 police officers each day are taken off Scotland's streets to appear at court.
Answer
The citation of witnesses is a matter for Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Office. As outlined in the 2022 Vision for Justice, and Programme for Government 2024-25 Serving Scotland, the Scottish Government is supporting justice partners to drive key areas of reform to make our criminal justice system more efficient and work better for everyone who experiences it.
Our vision is our criminal justice system will work better for everyone who experiences it, cases will take less time, more cases will conclude early, and fewer witnesses will have to come to court. Summary Case Management (SCM), which provides a new approach to summary criminal cases and aims to improve the summary criminal process to benefit justice users; and DESC (Digital Evidence Sharing Capability), which is a critical enabler for criminal justice reform and allows digital evidence to be collected and shared at every stage of a criminal case at the earliest opportunity are two of the key programmes the Scottish Government is working together with justice partners to deliver this vision.
- Asked by: Jamie Greene, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 19 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Natalie Don-Innes on 1 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government how it plans to address the issues raised in the University of Stirling study, Permanently Progressing? Building secure futures for children in Scotland, which states that, among other findings, more than one in 10 children in care were still in temporary placements a decade after entering the care system.
Answer
The Scottish Government is dedicated to Keeping The Promise, by ensuring that all care experienced children and young people grow up safe, loved and respected.
We welcome the Permanently Progressing report and are committed to ensuring permanent homes are secured for children and young people in timescales that are right for them.
We are funding the Association of Fostering, Kinship and Adoption to produce a series of Good Practice in Permanence Guides. These guides will support the workforce to deliver change in the way children, young people and families experience their care journey. This will include promoting consistent and effective practice within children’s services to ensure that permanence is achieved quickly for children, where this is in their best interest.
- Asked by: Jamie Greene, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 19 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 1 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the Transform Scotland report, In Reverse, which found that the Scottish Government had failed to meet seven out of 10 commitments made over the past five years to invest in, and prioritise, sustainable transport.
Answer
I recognise Transform Scotland’s valuable contributions to sustainable transport through research and briefing such as their "In Reverse" report, and I met with them on 16 July.
During 2024-25 we will spend over £3.87 billion on transport across Scotland, with almost £430 million in funding for concessionary travel and bus services. We will also invest over £1.6 billion to operate, maintain and improve Scotland’s railway and are continuing to support Scotland’s trunk road network, providing over £1 billion for our critical safety, adaptation, maintenance and improvement priorities. We are also investing £526 million to expand our vital support for rural and island connectivity.
We continue to take decisive climate action and work towards our commitment of reducing car use by 20% by 2030 by supporting making sustainable travel a more attractive option including providing up to 2.3 million people in Scotland with access to free bus travel. Over 150 million journeys have been made by under 22s across Scotland who are now benefitting from this. We will publish the updated route map to achieving car use reduction this autumn. On active travel, we have already distributed over £145 million of our 2024-25 budget to delivery partners for infrastructure and schemes which will work to transform communities and reduce barriers to everyday walking, wheeling and cycling.
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 19 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Paul McLennan on 1 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government what information it holds on how many currently
licensed short-term lets there are in the Lothian region; how many short-term
lets in the Lothian region have been found to be in breach of the short-term
let licensing regulations, either for not holding the appropriate license or
another reason; for what reasons other than not holding the appropriate licence
any such properties have been found to be in breach of regulations since the
regulations came into force, including any civil and criminal citations,
arrests and charges, and how many short-term lets have been visited or placed
under investigation by Police Scotland in this period.
Answer
I have provided answers to the information you are seeking in previous parliamentary replies and refer you to these as follows:
- how to access the Scottish Government’s official statistical publications on short-term let licensing application data (S6W-24548 responded to on 30 January 2024 and S6W-27007 responded to on 30 April 2024)
- how to access information about short-term let licences on local authority public registers (S6W-23003 responded to on 4 December 2023)
- what the Scottish Government holds about licence breaches and Police Scotland investigations (S6W-28008, S6W-28009 and S6W-28010 responded to on 11 June 2024 and S6W-28120 responded to on 18 June 2024, some of which also refer members to S6W-27902 answered on 11 June 2024).
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.”
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 19 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Angela Constance on 1 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government how many data breaches that contained private or
personal information of UK citizens have occurred within Police Scotland since
figures were last disclosed through a Freedom of Information request in 2023,
and whether any such information was related to alleged or convicted crimes.
Answer
The Scottish Government does not hold the information requested. It is for the Chief Constable to determine Police Scotland’s approach to data management and to ensure there are policies and controls in place to ensure the organisation complies with the wide range of obligations required to discharge its statutory and regulatory responsibilities regarding the processing of data, with oversight and scrutiny undertaken by the Scottish Police Authority Board.
- Asked by: Annie Wells, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 19 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Maree Todd on 1 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government how much of the £12.8 million reduction in the Mental Health Services budget announced in its Pre-Budget Fiscal Update will be taken from NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde's budget.
Answer
The recent reduction in mental health budget provision relates to the Scottish Government’s direct programme budget in 2024-25, not NHS Board baseline allocations.
Through the overall 2024-25 budget, NHS Boards and the Scottish Government will continue to spend in excess of £1.3billion on mental health.
The reduction in the Scottish Government’s budget has been identified through programmes being adapted, or which have come to an end. In some cases work has been re-profiled where this has been possible.
Whilst any reduction is regrettable, we remain committed to taking forward our work across mental health, working closely with key partners. Our collective focus has to be on making as much difference as possible with our funding.
As part of this, we have allocated £120million to NHS Boards and Integrated Joint Boards for the Enhanced Mental Health Outcomes Framework in 2024-25, which will be baselined from April 2025. This flexible funding stream means local areas have choices in how services are configured and organised in order to deliver better outcomes. This will enable mental health services to deliver the long-term services reforms required that will help us work towards a more sustainable and improved system.
- Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Alasdair Allan on 1 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-29523 by Alasdair Allan on 16 September 2024, how it accurately monitors the total installed solar capacity, of all types, approved by local authorities.
Answer
The approval, construction and installation of Solar photovoltaic projects over 150kW is monitored through the Renewable Energy Planning Database (REPD). Information is provided both as a spreadsheet and as an interactive map which provides the location and capacity of all renewable energy projects within the planning system.
Renewable Energy Planning Database | DESNZ & Barbour ABI (barbour-abi.com)
The electricity capacity and generation provided by all grid-connected renewable projects is monitored through UK Renewables Energy Trends.
Energy Trends: UK renewables - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Both these data sources are updated on a quarterly basis and summary data is provided within Scotland's quarterly energy statistics publication.
Quarterly energy statistics Scotland - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)
Details of all small-scale renewable energy installations in the UK are available from the MCS data dashboard
About the MCS Data Dashboard - MCS (mcscertified.com)
- Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 September 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 1 October 2024
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-27663 by Fiona Hyslop on 3 June 2024, whether it is committed to retaining the 2035 deadline for the removal of diesel passenger trains in any refreshed Decarbonisation Action Plan.
Answer
The refresh of the Rail Services Decarbonisation Action Plan will examine how and when the traction elements of rail transport can best be achieved. The order and programme in which decarbonisation can be achieved is and remains dependent on business cases and available budgets.
