Chamber and committees

The Single Survey is designed to improve the information available to potential purchasers on property condition, reduce wasted expenditure on multiple valuations and surveys and address artificially low upset prices. The pilot of the Single Survey in 2004-05 demonstrated that there had been no market-driven solution. There were insufficient incentives for sellers to participate on a voluntary basis. The rationale for the policy remained strong, however, and so I announced in March 2005 our intention to introduce a mandatory scheme through the current Housing (Scotland) Bill.

The number of fatal accident inquiries held in each year since 1990 is shown in the following table.

Financial Year	No. of Fatal Accident Inquiries Held
1990-91	112
1991-92	132
1992-93	131
1993-94	143
1994-95	127
1995-96	96
1996-97	133
1997-98	117
1998-99	141
1999-2000	80
2000-01	79
2001-02	64
2002-03	58
2003-04	55
2004-05	76

 

The Scottish Executive does not provide specific advice on public procurement contracts but gives advice and guidance on policy issues relating to public procurement contracts.

Local authorities, who are responsible for their own procurement activities, receive advice and guidance on procurement policy by means of local authority procurement circulars issued by the Executive.

The Executive uses a number of methods to convey and embed procurement policy and best practice to its departments and executive agencies, including the Scottish public finance manual, the procurement policy manual and the procurement toolkit.

The Scottish Executive does not provide specific advice to NHSScotland on public procurement contracts but gives advice and guidance on policy issues relating to public procurement contracts.

NHS boards are responsible for their own procurement activities locally, with Scottish Healthcare Supplies (a division of NHS National Services Scotland) leading on national procurement activities.

The Executive uses a number of methods to convey and embed procurement policy and best practice to NHSScotland including the Scottish Public Finance Manual, the Procurement Policy Manual and the procurement toolkit.

The full balance of the Scottish Consolidated Fund is held within HM Office of Paymaster General.

The balance on the account at the end of each month is shown in the following table:

Scottish Consolidated Fund, Month End Balances July 1999 to October 2005

	1999-2000 (£ Million)	2000-01 (£ Million)	2001-02 (£ Million)	2002-03 (£ Million)	2003-04 (£ Million)	2004-05 (£ Million)	2005-06 (£ Million)
April	n/a	67	295	344	883	77	48
May	n/a	67	295	349	884	53	60
June	n/a	69	295	350	883	72	74
July	36	71	298	351	875	78	73
August	47	74	299	351	889	85	77
September	40	76	307	353	885	85	94
October	27	78	308	354	302	91	102
November	93	85	316	370	315	91	-
December	93	88	318	389	332	115	-
January	89	89	325	436	235	121	-
February	98	98	349	986	236	135	-
March	296	296	333	880	53	61	-

 

The balance on the General Reserve of the Scottish Consolidated Fund does not necessarily represent an amount available for appropriation by a Budget Act or other means as there may be sums due to the Scottish Executive or other funded bodies and/or sums due to the Department of Constitutional Affairs for onward transmission to the UK Consolidated Fund.

During 2003-04 the Executive took action to reduce the significant balance that was in the account at the end of financial year 2002-03. Action taken has resulted in £818 million of the balance on the account at the 31 March 2003 being utilised by the bodies directly funded by the Fund, through a reduction in the sum drawn down from the Department of Constitutional Affairs.

When I advised that the Scottish Executive is in regular contact with the UK Government on a wide range of issues, I can confirm that this includes the Work and Families Bill.

£220 million that has not yet been allocated to portfolios or public expenditure programmes is currently held by HM Treasury on behalf of the Executive. This figure excludes the resources required to fund the announced reduction in business rates in 2006-07 and 2007-08.

This money will be required for a list of known and potential pressures that the Executive may face over the remainder of the current spending review period.

The £95 million will be met from the Education and Enterprise, Transport and Lifelong Learning budgets. The answer to question S2W-20527 on 21 November 2005 specifies how this money will be spent. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.

The following table gives a breakdown of the £95 million allocated for additional support needs. This money has been announced previously.

Funding	Comments	2004-05 (£ Million)	2005-06 (£ Million)
Additional Support for Learning Act, 2004	To support the education of pupils with additional support needs. Breakdown:   04-05: £8m (LAs); £3m (Health); £1m (held centrally for Tribunals, code etc)   05-06: £9.5 (LAs); £3m (Health); £1.5m (held centrally for code, training, Tribunals etc)	12	14
Inclusion	To support the inclusion of pupils in the widest sense – covers all pupils with additional support needs.	25	25
Accessibility Strategies	To improve physical accessibility and curricular accessibility for disabled pupils.	17	17
In-Service Training	For staff development for all staff (teachers, auxiliaries, and psychologists) working with pupils with additional support needs. Can also be used for multi-disciplinary training involving eg health service therapists.	8.4	8.4
Discipline/behaviour, alternatives to exclusion	Includes funding made available through the Discipline Task Group and to support initiatives relating to alternatives to exclusion.	21	21
Supporting transition from school to post-school	Inclusiveness developments including Post-school Psychological Services Pathfinders for 16 to 24 year olds.   Careers Scotland key worker support.   Further Education inclusiveness developments and BRITE initiative.	1.675         5.8     2.0	1.875         5.8     2.0
	Total	92.88	95.08

 

A total of 759 firms were on the civil legal aid register and 637 on the criminal register as at 7 November 2005.