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: S2W-27917

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 21 August 2006
Current Status: Awaiting answer

To ask the Scottish Executive how many ministerial visits to the Scottish Borders have been made by Liberal Democrat ministers in each year since 1999.

Question reference: S2W-27918

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 21 August 2006
Current Status: Awaiting answer

To ask the Scottish Executive how many ministerial visits to the Scottish Borders by Liberal Democrat ministers are (a) scheduled and (b) under consideration to take place prior to the 2007 dissolution of the Parliament.

Question reference: S2W-27577

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 26 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Malcolm Chisholm on 21 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how much it has contributed to (a) memorials and (b) commemorations in each year since 1999, also broken down by memorial or commemoration.

Our records show that, since1999, the Scottish Executive has made the following payments towards war memorialsand commemorations.

In 2004-05, the Hearts GreatWar Memorial received £5,000 for the memorial cairn at Contalmaison in France commemoratingthe 16th Battalion, The Royal Scots. Also in 2004-05, the Scottish Executive madean ex-gratia payment of £1,000 to the 51st Highland Division Veterans PilgrimageAssociation towards the costs of erecting a memorial in Normandy.

In 2005-06, the Executive underwrotethe commemorations in Scotland organised by Veterans Scotland for the 60th anniversaryof the end of the Second World War, totalling £33,585.71. This year, 2006-07, the Executive has again assisted Veterans Scotland to commemorate veterans by providingfunding of up to £10,000 towards the costs of the National Veterans Day celebrationsthat took place in Dundee on 1 July 2006.

In addition to this, HistoricScotland, as custodians of historic buildings and monuments across the nation, carriedout repairs to the Argyll and Sutherland War Memorial at Stirling Castle in 2005-06at a cost of £14,797.80. Between 1999 and 2006 the agency has also undertaken conservationand maintenance works on the Scottish National War Memorial at Edinburgh Castle at a totalapproximate cost of £55,000. This can be broken down as follows:

1999-2006: On-going cleaningand electrical maintenance works- £14,000

2001-02: Conservation works-£2,000

2003-04: Roofing works- £19,000

2005-06: Masonry works, glassrepairs and disabled ramp works- £20,000.

For the years 2001-07, the ScottishExecutive has provided funding totalling £405,568.13 to communities across Scotland forthe commemoration of Holocaust Day. This total includes £126,280 funding for primaryand secondary school education packs. Details of this funding are as follows:

2000-01:Edinburgh- £47,288.13 (contribution to event)

2001-02:Glasgow- £20,000 (contribution to event) + £73,280 Primary Education Pack

2002-03:UKevent Edinburgh- £20,000 (contribution to event) + £53,000 SecondaryEducation Pack

2003-04:East Renfrewshire- £45,000 (contribution to event)

2004-05:South Lanarkshire- £25,000 (contribution to event)

2005-06:Edinburgh- £82,000 (fully-funded event and exhibition)

2006-07: Fife- £40,000(contribution to event).

Question reference: S2W-27486

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 18 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Robert Brown on 18 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-27082 by Robert Brown on 14 July 2006, whether it will provide “receipt based” statistics on the number of referrals to the Scottish Children’s Reporter Administration under section 52(2)(j) of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995 in each year from 1999-2000 to 2003-04 and whether it will provide “disposal based” statistics for 2004-05.

The basis for recording referralsto the Children’s Reporter prior to 2003-04 was disposal-based and therefore receipt-basedstatistics for referrals prior to this are not available. For 2003-04 the receipt-basedcount of grounds for children referred to the Children’s Reporter under section52(2)(j) of the Children (Scotland) Act was 1847.

For 2004-05 the disposal-basedcount of grounds for children referred to the Children’s Reporter under section52(2)(j) of the Children (Scotland) Act was 1,540.

Question reference: S2W-27507

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 19 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Cathy Jamieson on 18 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what monitoring is carried out in respect of the number of discharged prisoners who are homeless and the period of time that they remain homeless.

I have asked Tony Cameron, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service to respond. His response is as follows:

At the beginning of a prisoner’ssentence accommodation needs including homelessness are identified. Prior to releaseprisoners with identified needs are seen and advised on accommodation issues bya housing worker, generally funded under the rough sleepers initiative.

The SPS monitor the number ofprisoners discharged by measuring: “the numbers of prisoners that leave having securedaccommodation or that have been referred to the relevant housing provider”. Recentrecords indicate that from the 3,334 liberations in the period April 2006 to June2006, 3,040 prisoners left custody with secured accommodation and 292 with an appointmentto meet with their housing advisor.

The SPS do not monitor the periodof time that a prisoner remains homeless whilst in the community.

Question reference: S2W-27439

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 17 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Cathy Jamieson on 18 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how it measures its own performance in tackling the rising trend of persistent young offending.

On 11 July 2006, the Scottish Executivepublished a summary report outlining progress to March 2006 on the completion of the 10-point Action Plan on Youth Crime and achievements against National Standardsfor Scotland’s Youth Justice Services, including reporting againstpersistent young offender reduction target. A copy of this report has been placedin the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 40122).

Question reference: S2W-27455

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 17 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 18 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how many official complaints it has made to Scottish daily and weekend newspapers or Scottish edition newspapers in each year since 1999, broken down by publication.

Question reference: S2W-27453

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 17 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 18 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how many official complaints it has made to the BBC in each year since 1999 regarding its broadcast output in Scotland and to which programmes these complaints related.

Question reference: S2W-27454

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 17 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Tom McCabe on 18 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive how many official complaints it has made to broadcasters in Scotland, other than the BBC, regarding broadcast output in each year since 1999.

Question reference: S2W-27438

Asked by: Christine Grahame, MSP for South of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 17 July 2006
Current Status: Answered by Cathy Jamieson on 18 August 2006

To ask the Scottish Executive what additional resources it will commit to ensure that the number of persistent young offenders does not increase next year.

The Scottish Executive is fundinga range of activity to prevent and address youth crime and disorder to the extentof £63 million this year, this having increased from a £3.5 million baseline in2001.

Details of the Grant Aided Expenditure(GAE) are set out in Grant Aided Expenditure (the Green Book) for each financialyear and these are available in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib.number 39230).

Local authorities have the discretionand flexibility to distribute resources within the core settlement to meet localneeds and priorities. The total Grant Aided Expenditure (GAE) is £9 billion in 2006-07,and £9.2 billion in 2007-08. The GAE figures are used to distribute grant to localauthorities on the basis of need.

Other resources allocated bythe Scottish Executive include around £57 million from the Sure Start programmewhich is intended to provide more integrated services for our most vulnerable childrenand families and the Changing Children’s Services Fund which will provide over £65million to support the modernisation and integration of services for children. Fromthis year, £15 million from the Changing Children’s Services Fund will be includedin GAE with a further transfer of £20 million from 2007-08.

It is the responsibility of eachlocal authority to allocate its total resources to meet local needs and priorities.