Questions and answers

Question reference: S4W-23367

Asked by: Claudia Beamish, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 24 November 2014
Current Status: Answered by Aileen McLeod on 3 December 2014

To ask the Scottish Government what publications it considers constitute the Scottish Biodiversity Strategy in terms of section 2(1) of the Nature Conservation (Scotland) Act 2004.

Question reference: S4W-23368

Asked by: Claudia Beamish, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 24 November 2014
Current Status: Answered by Aileen McLeod on 3 December 2014

To ask the Scottish Government whether it considers that improved ecosystem service delivery and performance against natural capital indices would, in themselves, constitute the successful conservation of biodiversity in Scotland.

We are at the early stages in both measuring natural capital and understanding the role of biodiversity in the delivery of ecosystem services. There is a lot of evidence that supports the idea that biodiversity is critical to ecosystem resilience and hence to both ecosystem health and its capacity to deliver high quality services now and into the future. We are continuing to develop the indices to ensure that they capture the critical aspects of that complexity.

The Scottish Biodiversity Strategy defines success in relation to its three aims, and uses a range of indicators to monitor progress. The Natural Capital Asset Index is one of these, but there are a number of other indices - including the breeding bird index, seabird index etc. Taken together, these define success in conserving Scotland’s biodiversity.

Question reference: S4O-03691

Asked by: Claudia Beamish, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 November 2014
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 13 November 2014

To ask the Scottish Government how it supports Creative Scotland in supporting talent and diversity among the arts and creative industries in South Scotland.

The Scottish Government will provide over £48 million in core and
ring-fenced funding to Creative Scotland in the 2015-16 budget for support for the arts, screen and creative industries across Scotland.

Funding decisions about individual projects are a matter for Creative Scotland.

Creative Scotland recently announced regular funding support for organisations in South Scotland including Ayr Gaiety, The Stove Network, Wigtown Festival Company and Catherine Wheels Theatre Company.

Question reference: S4O-03632

Asked by: Claudia Beamish, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 29 October 2014
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 5 November 2014

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions the Cabinet Secretary for Finance, Employment and Sustainable Growth had with the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Food and the Environment regarding the Carbon Assessment of the 2015-16 Draft Budget.

Question reference: S4O-03585

Asked by: Claudia Beamish, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 01 October 2014
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 8 October 2014

To ask the Scottish Government how it supports people in remote areas into further education and lifelong learning.

Question reference: S4W-22441

Asked by: Claudia Beamish, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 21 August 2014
Current Status: Answered by Paul Wheelhouse on 1 October 2014

To ask the Scottish Government what resources it is allocating to ensure that the data sets for the indicators in its biodiversity strategy report for 2011-13 are up-to-date and relate to the period of time specified for reporting.

The 2011-13 report contains tables of biodiversity indicators that were initially developed for the 2004 Scottish biodiversity strategy. Not all of these indicators have been updated within the 2011-13 reporting period. The reasons for this vary between indicators but in many cases the cycles of data collection are not aligned with the three yearly report to Parliament requirement because data collection frequency reflects the pace of change affecting the indicator.

The table below provides information on update status of the current indicators.

Most of the indicator datasets are being collected by bodies such as the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency, Forestry Commission Scotland and Scottish Natural Heritage for other purposes without the need for additional resource. Some of the current indicators are being reviewed or re-developed to reflect the strategy or legislation to which they are associated, this especially affects fresh water, marine and woodland indicators.

Some datasets which were used for the suite of indicators for the 2011-13 report are no longer being updated or came from one-off research reports and will therefore not be used for future reporting. However the suite of indicators required for the purposes of the 2020 challenge is being considered by the Science and Technical Group for the Scottish Biodiversity Committee in conjunction with the development of a suite of new ecosystem health indicators.

Update status

Annual	Multi-year	Review/ Redevelop	Pending	No longer collected
Terrestrial breeding birds	Vascular plant diversity	Terrestrial insect abundance – moths	Marine fish at full reproductive capacity	BAP priority species
Wintering waterbirds	Otter	Freshwater macroinvertebrates		BAP priority habitats
Breeding seabirds	Visits to the outdoors	Woodland diversity		Marine plankton
Terrestrial insect abundance – butterflies	Involvement in biodiversity conservation	Invasive non-native species		Marine fish at full reproductive capacity
Condition of notified species	Membership of biodiversity NGOs	Estuarine fish diversity		Timing of seasonal events
Condition of notified habitats	Information Provision	Attitudes to biodiversity		Tourism
Green space	Built development	River quality
Improve the condition of protected nature sites 2014	Visual influence of built development
	Increase people’s use of Scotland’s outdoors 2013

Question reference: S4W-22442

Asked by: Claudia Beamish, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 21 August 2014
Current Status: Answered by Paul Wheelhouse on 1 October 2014

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking (a) through the Scotland Rural Development Programme and (b) generally to reverse the reported decline of vascular plant diversity in order to protect the number of pollinators that was identified in the biodiversity strategy report for 2011-13.

(a) Around £33 million was approved for pollinator-friendly options in the 2007-13 Scotland Rural Development Programme (SRDP). The principal types of pollinator-friendly management that have been supported under SRDP are:

Creating wildflower-rich mosaics and increasing the diversification of flowering habitats at the appropriate landscape scale, maintaining or restoring permanent or short-term flower-rich habitats such as unimproved grassland and field margins, creating permanent species-rich grassland habitats including a mixture of grasses and wild flowers.

Actions directed at grassland are particularly important for pollinators. The most important options for pollinators in the 2007-13 SRDP were, conversion and maintenance of organic farming, habitat mosaic management, species-rich grassland management and cropped machair.

These options are being rolled forward into the new programme and pollinators will continue to be one of the beneficiaries as the arable options are designed to have as much ‘multifunctioning benefit’ as possible.

It is anticipated that the benefit to pollinators will increase as the total SRDP agri-environment budget for 2014-20 has increased by around £10 million per year in comparison to the last programme.

From 2015 farmers will also need to comply with new greening requirements in return for their full pillar 1 payment. These include a requirement to ensure that an area equivalent to 5% of eligible arable land is ecological focus area, which has the potential to benefit pollinators.

The reported decline in vascular plant diversity is also being addressed through a range of other actions to restore ecosystems under the Scottish Biodiversity Strategy 2020 Challenge. Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) is developing a route map to 2020 that addresses the key drivers of biodiversity loss and identifies the responses required, including those to address vascular plant diversity decline.

Current activities to address vascular plant decline also include:

a peatland action plan being developed by SNH, native woodland being increased under the Scottish Forestry Strategy and habitat networks are expanding through initiatives such as the Central Scotland Green Network, the Scottish Government’s 10 year ‘Honey Bee Health Strategy for Scotland’ which has the overall aim to achieve a sustainable and healthy population of honey bees for pollination and honey production in Scotland; and a ‘Pollinator strategy - a plan for the conservation of wild bees (excluding honey bees) and other insect pollinators in Scotland’ being developed by SNH with a view to publishing this by the end of 2014.

Question reference: S4O-03516

Asked by: Claudia Beamish, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 17 September 2014
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 24 September 2014

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on NHS homeopathic and complementary medicine arrangements in South Scotland.

Question reference: S4W-22519

Asked by: Claudia Beamish, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 August 2014
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 17 September 2014

To ask the Scottish Government how much has been paid to farmers on Islay under (a) the single farm payment scheme, (b) the less favoured area support scheme and (c) other CAP funding streams in each of the last five years; how many recipients there were, and what the average payment was under each stream.

The information requested is provided below as follows:

(a) The single farm payment scheme – see table 1.

(b) The less favoured area support scheme – see table 2.

(c) Other CAP funding streams – see tables 3, 4, and 5.

Table 1 - Single Farm Payment Scheme Payment Information

YEAR		Single Farm Payment Scheme
2009	Spend (A)	£3,096,339.91
	Number of Recipients (B)	110
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£28,148.54
2010	Spend (A)	£3,049,831.61
	Number of Recipients (B)	110
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£27,725.74
2011	Spend (A)	£3,185,223.47
	Number of Recipients (B)	108
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£29,492.81
2012	Spend (A)	£3,044,159.30
	Number of Recipients (B)	106
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£28,718.48
2013	Spend (A)	£1,991,747.30
	Number of Recipients (B)	104
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£19,151.42
All Years – Average	Spend (A)	£14,367,301.59
	Number of Recipients (B)	538
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£26,705.02

Table 2 - Less Favoured Area Support Scheme Payment Information

YEAR		Less Favoured Support Scheme
2009	Spend (A)	£1,148,022.63
	Number of Recipients (B)	111
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£10,342.55
2010	Spend (A)	£1,273,638.33
	Number of Recipients (B)	106
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£12,015.46
2011	Spend (A)	£1,319,922.76
	Number of Recipients (B)	106
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£12,452.10
2012	Spend (A)	£1,317,298.52
	Number of Recipients (B)	110
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£11,975.44
2013	Spend (A)	£1,320,463.69
	Number of Recipients (B)	100
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£13,204.64
All Years - Average	Spend (A)	£6,379,345.93
	Number of Recipients (B)	533
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£11,968.75

Table 3 - Other Funding Streams - Part 1 - Payment Information

YEAR		Scottish Beef Calf Scheme/Scottish Beef Scheme
2009	Spend (A)	£259,630.80
	Number of Recipients (B)	65
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£3,994.32
2010	Spend (A)	£244,875.48
	Number of Recipients (B)	64
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£3,826.18
2011	Spend (A)	£200,511.89
	Number of Recipients (B)	60
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£3,341.86
2012	Spend (A)	£202,822.56
	Number of Recipients (B)	64
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£3,169.10
2013	Spend (A)	£198,141.36
	Number of Recipients (B)	61
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£3,248.22
All Years - Average	Spend (A)	£1,105,982.09
	Number of Recipients (B)	314
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£3,522.24

Table 4 - Other Funding Streams - Part 2 - Payment Information

YEAR		Rural Priorities	Land Mangers Contract Menu Scheme/Land Mangers Options
2009	Spend (A)	£25,740.00	£189,915.81
	Number of Recipients (B)	2	71
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£12,870.00	£2,674.87
2010	Spend (A)	£797,034.57	£161,319.01
	Number of Recipients (B)	26	71
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£30,655.18	£2,272.10
2011	Spend (A)	£1,015,667.59	£109,629.65
	Number of Recipients (B)	33	67
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£30,777.81	£1,636.26
2012	Spend (A)	£1,824,707.84	£67,218.63
	Number of Recipients (B)	36	45
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£50,686.33	£1,493.75
2013	Spend (A)	£1,094,220.80	£76,541.03
	Number of Recipients (B)	35	49
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£31,263.45	£1,562.06
All Years - Average	Spend (A)	£4,757,370.80	£604,624.13
	Number of Recipients (B)	132	303
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£36,040.69	£1,995.46

Table 5 - Other Funding Streams - Part 3 - Payment Information

YEAR		Crofting Counties Agricultural Grants Scheme	Legacy Agri-Environment Schemes
2009	Spend (A)	£1,408.50	£193,522.95
	Number of Recipients (B)	1	85
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£1,408.50	£2,276.74
2010	Spend (A)	Nil	£105,261.57
	Number of Recipients (B)	Nil	39
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	N/A	£2,699.01
2011	Spend (A)	£3,492.98	£67,095.19
	Number of Recipients (B)	2	43
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£1,746.49	£1,560.35
2012	Spend (A)	£6,905.74	£24,013.26
	Number of Recipients (B)	4	7
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£1,726.44	£3,430.47
2013	Spend (A)	£29,527.30	£13,956.10
	Number of Recipients (B)	6	12
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£4,921.22	£1,163.01
All Years - Average	Spend (A)	£41,334.52	£403,849.07
	Number of Recipients (B)	13	186
	Average payment (A ÷ B)	£3,179.58	£2,171.23

Question reference: S4W-22053

Asked by: Claudia Beamish, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 08 July 2014
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 6 August 2014

To ask the Scottish Government what economic analysis was carried out to inform its decision regarding coupled support for sheep production and whether it included the potential loss of ecosystem services due to overgrazing.

The economic analysis of coupled support for sheep considered business level changes in total direct payments in 2019 compared with 2011, in sectors and in geographic regions.

The analysis did not include potential loss of ecosystem services due to overgrazing, however coupled support is only allowed in order to maintain and not to increase the numbers of livestock. If the number of sheep in Scotland were to increase under voluntary coupled support then the scheme would need to be modified – or stopped - to reduce the incentive to increase primary production.

The design of these EU schemes is such that site-specific management of grazing pressures cannot be delivered through this coupled support option under Pillar 1 of the common agricultural policy. It is however addressed through other policy measures such as those under the Pillar 2 Scotland Rural Development Programme.

Chamber and committees