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: S5W-13441

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 December 2017
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 21 December 2017

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with (a) the UK Government and (b) external organisations regarding continued membership of the European Environment Agency after the UK withdraws from the EU.

There have been no discussions with UK Government on future membership of the European Environment Agency. Continued participation in the work of the EEA would offer benefits in terms of continued access to long-term data sets, monitoring information and expertise, with benefits for Scottish organisations including our research institutions. I have not had specific discussions with other stakeholders on this issue.

Question reference: S5W-13449

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 December 2017
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 21 December 2017

To ask the Scottish Government what consideration it has given to recent statements made by the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in relation to the need to address the environmental governance gap and the loss of functions carried out by EU bodies, and what conclusions it has reached.

Question reference: S5W-13440

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 December 2017
Current Status: Answered by Michael Russell on 21 December 2017

To ask the Scottish Government what analysis has been conducted with respect to the time required to enact secondary legislation in each ministerial portfolio to ensure that Scottish legislation is fit for purpose after the UK withdraws from the EU.

The Scottish Government has been working to identify the legislative consequences for devolved legislation of the UK withdrawal from the EU. This exercise will identify issues in devolved legislation that will need to be fixed, either in time for UK withdrawal from the EU, or after withdrawal. We are working at official level with Scottish Parliament officials to ensure that we share as much information as we have about the scale and programme of Scottish Statutory Instruments and UK statutory instruments required, including the timetabling of such secondary legislation.

Question reference: S5W-13448

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 December 2017
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 21 December 2017

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is considering taking to respond to the environmental governance gap arising from the loss of functions carried out by the European Court of Justice after the UK withdraws from the EU.

Question reference: S5O-01638

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 December 2017
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 11 January 2018

To ask the Scottish Government by what date the National Trauma Network will be fully operational.

Question reference: S5O-01633

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 13 December 2017
Current Status: Answered by Fergus Ewing on 20 December 2017

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has made plans on the basis that the UK will remain in the common fisheries policy under the terms of any transitional agreement following Brexit, and whether it has discussed this matter with UK ministers.

To protect Scotland’s interests in all circumstances, the Scottish Government is preparing for a range of Brexit scenarios.

We have sought to discuss the terms of any transitional agreement with the UK Government but our efforts have been hampered by a lack of clarity from the UK Government on its intentions and position on a range of key issues, including transition.

We do continue, however, to promote Scotland’s interests in our regular engagements with the UK Government; emphasising, in particular, the clearly devolved nature of fisheries and for this Parliament’s consent to be sought where Scotland’s interests are at stake.

The Prime Minister announced that the UK will leave the Common Fisheries Policy on 29 March 2019 in the UK Parliament on 18 December. Given that the EU has clearly and repeatedly said that agreement to a transition period is contingent on the UK adhering to all rules and obligations of EU membership during such a period, it is for the UK Government to clarify how this seeming contradiction can be overcome.

Scotland’s fishing industry and coastal communities need certainty and clarity – their jobs, businesses and livelihoods are, after all, at stake. They don’t need this constant muddle from a UK government which appears to make it up as it goes along.

Question reference: S5W-13132

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 04 December 2017
Current Status: Answered by Michael Russell on 18 December 2017

To ask the Scottish Government by what date it will publish the dossier that it received on 27 November 2017 on the impact of leaving the EU on the economy.

Question reference: S5W-13131

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 04 December 2017
Current Status: Answered by Michael Russell on 18 December 2017

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has reached an agreement with the UK Government regarding the publication or release of the dossier that it received on 27 November 2017 on the impact of leaving the EU on the economy and, if so, whether it will publish the details of the agreement.

The Scottish Government has been clear that the UK Government’s sectoral analysis reports as a whole should be made public. I wrote to the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, the Rt. Hon David Davis MP, on 28 November. I also wrote again to the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union on 5 December 2017 asking that he provide the Scottish Parliament and its members with the same access to this material as their counterparts in the UK Parliament and members of the House of Lords and reaffirming the view that the reports should be made public. I have not yet had a response to those letters. It is disappointing that the UK Government has persisted in keeping this information from being publically available and have shared with us on the basis that we do not release it into the public domain. The Scottish Government continues to urge the UK Government to reconsider this approach.

Question reference: S5O-01587

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 06 December 2017
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 13 December 2017

To ask the Scottish Government how it will ensure fair and adequate funding for all of Scotland’s local authorities.

Question reference: S5W-12922

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 22 November 2017
Current Status: Answered by Annabelle Ewing on 6 December 2017

To ask the Scottish Government how many landlords have (a) had action taken against them and (b) been (i) prosecuted and (ii) convicted each year under the Housing (Scotland) Act 2014 for failing to register as landlords, broken down by local authority area.

The latest available information in our Criminal Proceedings database is for 2015-16 and this shows there have been no prosecutions under the Housing (Scotland) Act 2014 since it was introduced.

Information for 2016-17 will not be available until publication of the Criminal Proceedings in Scotland, 2016-17 Statistical Bulletin. This is due to be published in early 2018.

The dates of all Scottish Government Official and National Statistics publications are pre-announced, and the up to date list of future publications can be found at: http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics