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-30504

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 08 October 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 22 October 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to consult with (a) the UK Government and (b) health ministers from other devolved administrations on co-ordinating national cancer registries in the collection, analysis and reporting of blood cancer data.

The key group responsible for co-ordinating the national cancer registries of all the UK nations, as well as the Republic of Ireland, is the UK and Ireland Association of Cancer Registries (UKIACR). Achieving consistency and comparability in the collection, analysis and reporting of cancer data are among the UKIACR’s Terms of Reference. The Director of the Scottish Cancer Registry represents Scotland on this group.

The UK and Ireland cancer registries all adhere, where possible, to the recommendations of the European Network of Cancer Registries (ENCR).

Question reference: S6W-30483

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 07 October 2024
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 22 October 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what funding it will provide to Police Scotland to enable the investigation of the reported increase in incidences of online crime, including attempts to defraud individuals.

Question reference: S6W-30505

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 08 October 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jenni Minto on 22 October 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to ensure that blood cancer is routinely included as a distinct category alongside solid tumours when reporting on key metrics such as prevalence, healthcare utilisation and other appropriate benchmarks.

Question reference: S6W-30397

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 03 October 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 15 October 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how much has been spent on the clinical waste budget in each year since 2019.

The Scottish Government does not spend directly on disposal of clinical waste. However, funding for additional costs associated with delivering clinical waste services was allocated to NHS National Services Scotland to cover resilience measures as detailed in the following table.

	2019-20	2020-21	2021-22	2022-23	2023-24
Total revenue	£0	£381,300	£1,316,931	£981,037	£0

In addition, £6.9m was allocated for the purchase of the Hassockrigg Eco Park and equipment. This was done to increase the resilience of the system for disposing of NHS clinical waste and to secure its long-term future following the decision of the site’s administrator to serve notice to vacate the site on Cliniwaste Limited and to place the site for sale on the open market.

Question reference: S6W-30398

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 03 October 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 15 October 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what overspend or extra fees have arisen with the 10-year NHS waste management contract that was awarded to Tradebe Healthcare in 2019, which was initially estimated to cost £10 million per year, and what the final estimated cost of the contract is.

Question reference: S6T-02122

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 30 September 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 1 October 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to council leaders withdrawing support for its National Care Service Bill.

Question reference: S6W-29395

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 30 August 2024
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 30 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government on what dates it has met with the independent advisers on the Scottish Ministerial Code to discuss the recommendations of the Hamilton Report since it was published in March 2021.

Question reference: S6W-29394

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 30 August 2024
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 25 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to S6W-28676 by Kate Forbes on 27 August 2024, what its position is on whether its answer represents a reversal of its previous position of considering changes to the Scottish Ministerial Code and the Code of Conduct for Special Advisers, as recommended by the Hamilton Report in March 2021.

The Scottish Government set out in June 2021 its plan for implementing the recommendations of James Hamilton’s report, alongside the recommendations of the reports by Laura Dunlop QC and the Scottish Parliament Committee on the Handling of Harassment Complaints. Implementation was delivered through the Continuous Improvement Programme, which was reported regularly to the Scottish Parliament’s Finance and Public Administration Committee. The final report on the Continuous Improvement Programme was provided in January 2023, and with the agreement of the Committee, the programme was then concluded and activities were absorbed into ongoing work. In line with previous commitments, the Scottish Government considered matters relating to Special Advisors, including the Code of Conduct for Special Advisors, which is reserved to UK Government. The Scottish Government has no plans to ask the UK Government to make changes.

Question reference: S6W-29393

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 30 August 2024
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 25 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to S6W-03307 by George Adam on 5 October 2021, whether any progress has been made on revisions to the (a) Scottish Ministerial Code and (b) Code of Conduct for Special Advisers.

(a) The First Minister announced his intention to publish a strengthened Scottish Ministerial Code later this year on 4 September 2024, as part of his Programme for Government statement in the Scottish Parliament. Under his new Code, the First Minister's independent advisers will be able to launch investigations into alleged breaches of the Code whenever they feel it is warranted, without a referral from the First Minister. They will also be able to provide advice to the First Minister on appropriate sanctions should the First Minister deem that the Code has been breached. The advisers will also be given a role in scrutinizing Ministers' declarations of interests and their Terms of Reference will be published.

The 2023 Scottish Ministerial Code already set an extremely high bar in terms of standards in public life. The forthcoming updates to the Code, which, collectively, will be the most significant since independent advisers were introduced in 2008, will further increase transparency and independent scrutiny. The changes meet a number of the asks of Petition PE2093, which is currently being considered by the Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee.

(b) In accordance with PQ answer S6W-03307, the Scottish Government has considered matters relating to Special Advisors, including the Code of Conduct for Special Advisors, which is reserved to UK Government. The Scottish Government has no plans to ask the UK Government to make changes to the Special Advisers' Code. The Scottish Government’s plan for implementing the recommendations of James Hamilton’s report, alongside the recommendations of the reports by Laura Dunlop QC and the Scottish Parliament Committee on the Handling of Harassment Complaints, were published in June 2021 and implemented through the Continuous Improvement Programme, which was reported regularly to the Scottish Parliament’s Finance and Public Administration Committee.

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-29736

Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 09 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Neil Gray on 20 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the letter from the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government to the Finance and Public Administration Committee on 3 September 2024, whether it will provide a full breakdown of the £27.7 million in budget savings that were listed under the category "other" in the Health and Social Care portfolio.

On the 3 September 2024, the Scottish Government pre-budget fiscal update outlined "other" savings measures of £27.7M in the Health and Social Care budget, with funding redirected to support emerging pressures within Health and Social Care, not used for wider SG spending.

The breakdown is as follows:

Health and Social Care	Total	Reprioritisation Description
Portfolio by Level 3 Budget	£m
Early Years	2.9	Savings made across budget lines including breastfeeding and young patient family fund. Also includes reprofiling and reducing planned activity on some smaller projects.
Active Healthy Lives	1.2	Reduced activity on programmes focussing on physical activity and diet and healthy weight.
Access Support	3.2	Emerging underspends following a review of anticipated funding requirements for 2024-25.
Corporate Support and Resilience	8.8	Includes a reduction in health emergency contingency budgets amd release of historical budget to support board pressures.
Other Board Services and Misc Income	9.2	Includes reprofiling of activity in relation to women's health, innovation Fellowship Scheme and reducing contingency funding for transvaginal mesh alongside one off savings in stock and pausing investment in digital trial developments within Health Research.
Other	2.3	A range of smaller savings including anticipated 5% savings of total budget for Sportscotland, underspends in e-Pharmacy and re-profiling of digital spend.
	27.6