Questions and answers

Question reference: S2W-05387

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 08 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 19 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive, in light of the impact on the East Lothian public private partnership schools project of Ballast plc being placed in administration, what steps it will take to ensure that sub-contractors receive the money that they are due and whether it has any plans to introduce provisions to allow public sector clients to make payments direct to any sub-contractor adversely affected by external factors, such as companies being placed in administration.

Wherea main contractor has been placed in administration, payments due to the maincontractor will usually form a part of that contractor’s assets and it is forthe administrator to determine whether any further sums are due from theconsortium.

The Executive does notconsider that any new provisions are required. In a public private partnership situation it is important to preserve the transfer ofrisk to the consortium which lies at the heart of the public private partnership contract and is the basis of value for money for thetaxpayer. Direct payments to sub-contractors would not be consistent with thesefundamentals.

Question reference: S2W-05384

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 08 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 19 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will make any representations to Her Majesty's Government in support of an investigation into the circumstances surrounding Ballast plc being placed in administration, in light of the impact of this matter on the East Lothian public private partnership schools project.

Question reference: S2W-05385

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 08 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 19 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will publish, or direct the local authority to publish, the contract documents in relation to the East Lothian public private partnership schools project contract with Ballast plc.

Publication of contracts isa matter for each client authority. The Scottish Executive encourages public authoritiesto comply with best practice on openness, for example, public authorities areexpected to publish final business cases. Information should only be withheldwhere disclosure would cause real harm to the legitimate commercial or legalinterests of suppliers, contractors, the public sector client or any otherrelevant party.

Question reference: S2W-05431

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 12 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Peter Peacock on 19 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive, in relation to the announcement of a #69 million programme to fund outdoor pursuits for children, how the total of #69 million was calculated, who will be responsible for implementing this programme, whether there will be a policy to avoid duplication of facilities, such as avoiding building new facilities where public, voluntary or private facilities exist, what attempts have been made to ensure that existing centres of excellence in this field are used, what consultation there has been, or will be, at community level about the programme and to what extent the operation of the scheme will involve teachers.

The Scottish Executive has been committed to providing support for out of school hourslearning activities since 1999. The £69 million referred to in a recent mediaarticle is the amount of funding being made available to local authorities upto 2005-06 by the Scottish Executive (£34 million under the National Priorities ActionFund) and the New Opportunities Fund (£35 million from the Activities Programmeof the PE and Sport in Schools Initiative), as part of that on-goingcommitment. It is for the local authorities to determine how best to use thatfinancial support in the light of local needs and circumstances.

Question reference: S2W-05232

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 05 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Robert Brown on 16 January 2004

To ask the Presiding Officer whether the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body (SPCB) will make a detailed response to the report by the Auditor General, The 2002-03 Audit of the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body (SPCB), (SE/2003/346) and, in particular, (a) when the report was made public and by what means, (b) whether the SPCB will give details of the 290 items that were unreconciled which totalled some #5.3 million, (c) why properly authorised standing financial instructions set by the Principal Accountable Officer in agreement with the SPCB and its Advisory Audit Board are not yet in place, (d) why staff below Head of Finance level were able to write off debts and, if this practice has now been altered, whether a review of such debts has been, or will be, undertaken and whether the SPCB is satisfied that such debts should have been written off and (e) why the cash balance as at 31 March 2003 was #20 million and whether any financial loss either to the Parliament or to the Scottish Consolidated Fund may have arisen as a result of premature draw down of funds from the consolidated fund.

The Principal Accountable Officer will make a detailed response to the report by the Auditor General when he gives evidence to the Audit Committee.

In respect of the particular questions you raise:

(a) The SPCB received the report from the Auditor General on Friday 19 December 2003 and delivered it to Scottish ministers on the same day. The report was formally laid before Parliament by Scottish ministers on the next working day, Monday 22 December 2003, together with the SPCB’s 2002-03 Accounts. Both documents were published on the Parliament’s website on 23 December 2003.

(b) The Principal Accountable Officer will report to the Audit Committee on the progress by then in clearing the reconciling items that had not been fully resolved at the time of the audit.

(c) As Audit Scotland reported in its evidence to the Audit Committee on 6 January 2004 (Official Report, col. 266), the SPCB is a young and evolving organisation. Although it does not currently have a full set of formally approved standing financial instructions, it has various procedures that it inherited from previous arrangements and has also adopted various new procedures to meet the changes arising from new finance systems and other developments. As reported by the Auditor General to the Audit Committee, the SPCB is currently preparing a set of financial instructions for implementation in March 2004.

(d) Procedures for authorisation of losses, special payments and write offs have been in place since May 2000 and are based on the Scottish Public Finance Manual. These procedures specified that all such entries should be approved by the Finance Office, but did not specify particular levels. As reported by the Auditor General to the Audit Committee, we are reviewing these levels as part of the development of formally approved standing financial instructions. In practice, all significant entries covered by this procedure in 2002-03 were authorised at Head of Finance level. Most are simply the result of a financial housekeeping exercise to clear out unsubstantiated accounting entries from 2001-02 and prior years. The net impact of these entries was a credit of £30,000 and all the entries have been audited by Audit Scotland. The SPCB has now instructed that no such write offs take place without its authority.

(e) The cash balance as at 31 March 2003 of £20 million arose as a result of the draw down of cash from Treasury on 1 March 2003 to meet the forecast expenditure on the Holyrood project. Forecasts for the monthly drawdown of cash require to be prepared some two months beforehand and, in the event, some of the money was not required until April. No financial loss arose to any party as a result of this as the funds remain within the Office of the Paymaster General until they are actually spent. Cash balances since March have been much reduced.

Question reference: S2W-05303

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Andy Kerr on 15 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive, in the light of reports in The Herald on 2 and 3 January 2003 that nearly one third of its suppliers are not paid within its target period of 30 days, what the precise reasons are for this; what steps it has taken, and what further steps it will take, to address this situation; what estimate it has made of the impact of late payments of these bills on businesses in Scotland, and whether any late payments have resulted in interest being added onto such unpaid bills and, if so, at what rate and in what proportion of cases.

Irecognise the importance to business of prompt payment of invoices. This is whyour policy is to aim for payment within 30 days. The Scottish Executive’s 2002-03 accounts reported that 68.5% of invoices were paid within thetarget period that year. This reflected difficulties some staff had in makingpayments following the introduction of a new computerised financial andaccounting system. The Executive acted promptly to deal with the difficulties,and continues to take specific action when particular problems arise. As theaccounts record, performance had improved to almost 80% by March 2003, and hassince improved further, with over 87% of invoices paid within 30 days inDecember, very similar to the average performance in 2001-02. I am keen toimprove the performance even more.

It is not possible to assessaccurately the impact of delays on business, because of the variability in thenature of the businesses, and the different delays that might be encountered.No late payments resulted in interest being added to unpaid bills.

Question reference: S2W-05339

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 07 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Frank McAveety on 15 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive what its position is in respect of the statement by Historic Scotland that Castle Tioram in Moidart should be “ruins in a landscape” and whether it has any plans to allow the castle to be restored and, if so, what steps it will take to facilitate the restoration.

Castle Tioram is a scheduled monument and thus of national importance for its archaeological and historicinterest. At the public local inquiry held in 2001 into an application forscheduled monument consent for the restoration of the castle, Historic Scotlandargued the case for consolidation. Scottish ministers subsequently refusedscheduled monument consent for the application.

Any future application forscheduled monument consent in respect of the castle would be considered on itsmerits and in line with Scottish Executive policy.

Question reference: S2W-05247

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Monday, 05 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Frank McAveety on 15 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive whether the rules governing the consideration of applications to sportscotland for capital funding under the Lottery Fund have altered and, if so, when such alteration was made; whether the maximum capital limit for any single application under the sports facilities programme has been, or will be, altered under such rules and, if so, what the alterations were; what representations the Executive has made to Her Majesty's Government in connection with any such change, and whether such representations will be made public.

Question reference: S2W-05308

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 14 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will publish the civil service advice to ministers in respect of the relocation of Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH), with particular reference to the choice of Inverness as the location for the new headquarters for SNH and the input of SNH and its consultants in connection with this matter.

The advice given to ministersis exempt from disclosure under Part 2 of the Code of Practice on Access to Scottish Executive Information (Internal discussion and advice). This is in line with thelong standing convention that it is in the public interest to maintain theconfidentiality of exchanges between officials and ministers concerning policyadvice and to protect the processes by which government reaches a collectiveview.

Question reference: S2W-05307

Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 January 2004
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 14 January 2004

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answers to questions S2W-919 on 1 August 2003, by Allan Wilson and S2W-1693 by Ross Finnie on 1 and 26 August 2003, whether it will reconsider its decision not to publish the cabinet papers and other documents requested.

Chamber and committees