Questions and answers

Question reference: S5W-18204

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 August 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Russell on 30 August 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many meetings its ministers have had with the Secretary of State for International Trade since the EU referendum.

Question reference: S5W-18201

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 August 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Russell on 30 August 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many meetings its ministers have had with UK Government ministers to discuss trade matters since the EU referendum.

Since the EU Referendum Scottish Ministers have met with UK Government ministers total of ten times specifically discussing trade matters.

Throughout our engagement with the UK Government we continue to highlight the real costs of Brexit to our economy and reiterate Scotland’s clear position that membership of the single market and the customs union would be the least damaging future relationship with the European Union.

Question reference: S5W-18203

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 August 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Russell on 30 August 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many meetings its ministers have had with the Minister of State for Trade and Investment or Minister of State for Trade since the EU referendum.

Since the EU Referendum Scottish Ministers have met with the Secretary of State for International Trade, Minister of State for the Department of International Trade and Minister of State for Trade at the Department of International Trade four times.

Throughout our engagement with the UK Government we continue to highlight the real costs of Brexit to our economy and reiterate Scotland’s clear position that membership of the single market and the customs union would be the least damaging future relationship with the European Union.

Question reference: S5O-02321

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 29 August 2018
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 6 September 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to tackle overcrowding on rail services between Edinburgh and Dunblane.

Question reference: S5W-17652

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 10 July 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 1 August 2018

To ask the Scottish Government when it will make a decision on which projects will be awarded funding from the Local Rail Development Fund.

Question reference: S5W-17302

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Monday, 18 June 2018
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 30 July 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what progress it is making in addressing marine pollution issues caused by plastic microfibres.

The marine pollution issues caused by plastic microfibres are not yet clear. It is evident that plastic microfibres can be found throughout the marine ecosystem, however their long-term effects are not yet known. At this time, the Scottish Government's focus is to reduce the amount of plastic entering our waters, and to better understand how this can be achieved in the case of microfibres which may have many sources.

Question reference: S5W-17504

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 June 2018
Current Status: Answered by Paul Wheelhouse on 9 July 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-16950 by Paul Wheelhouse on 12 June 2018, whether (a) it will use its new powers to withdraw the two existing fracking licences at the earliest opportunity and (b) PEDL 162 will not be renewed when it expires on 30 June 2018.

The Scottish Government welcomes the devolution of the powers to issue and manage onshore oil and gas licences to Scotland from
9 February 2018.

While Energy Policy remains a reserved matter under the Scotland Act 1998, the licence powers transferred to Scotland through sections 47 to 49 of the Scotland Act 2016, and related subordinate legislation, devolve to Scottish Ministers a range of powers over the administration of onshore oil and gas licences.

I can confirm the Scottish Government received a request for an extension to PEDL 162 from licence-holders INEOS Upstream Ltd. and Reach Coal Seam Gas Ltd. in late April 2018. As a competent licensing authority, it would be a dereliction of our responsibility not to consider this request, taking into account all the relevant factors and to assess the application under the legislation that is currently in force.

Having done so, an extension for a period of 12 months from 1 July 2018 has been agreed. The extension of the licence maintains the current position whilst the statutory Strategic Environmental Assessment and the Business Regulatory Impact Assessment on our preferred policy of not supporting unconventional oil and gas development are undertaken. I anticipate that these are likely to be concluded by the end of the current calendar year.

In the meantime, a moratorium on UOG planning consents is in place which means no local authority can grant planning permission and Ministers would defer any decision on any planning application that did come forward until the policymaking process is completed. The practical effect of the current moratorium and the policymaking process, which I announced last October and which is now well underway, to finalise our position is that no fracking or other UOG activity can take place in Scotland while the Scottish Government’s preferred policy position is subject to the aforementioned statutory procedures. To be clear, I anticipate that the statutory assessments should be concluded within the timescale described above, enabling a finalised policy position to be reached. In the event that the SEA and BRIA are supportive of the Government’s preferred position, then our finalised policy will be to not support UOG in Scotland.

Question reference: S5W-17458

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 22 June 2018
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 5 July 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what analysis it has carried out of the impact of Scotland's growing waste incineration capacity on recycling targets.

Question reference: S5W-17301

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Monday, 18 June 2018
Current Status: Answered by Andy Wightman (on behalf of the SPCB) on 26 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body whether the system used for the selection of members to ask portfolio questions is operating as planned.

The randomised draw system that is used to allocate General and Portfolio questions is working as expected and in accordance with the Parliament's requirements. The Chamber Desk routinely monitors each draw to ensure that there are no discrepancies or unusual patterns arising that would suggest any problems, and has not identified any issues in this regard. A verification of the system was also undertaken in January 2018 by BIT, which found that the randomized functionality works as expected. As a matter of good practice, the Presiding Officer has asked for a full statistical analysis of draw results to be undertaken in the summer recess by SPICe.

Question reference: S5W-17155

Asked by: Mark Ruskell, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 08 June 2018
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 21 June 2018

To ask the Scottish Government which Scottish National Heritage sites have been delisted as national nature reserves in each of the last 10 years, and for what reason.

‘De-listed’ is not a formal event recorded by Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH). Instead, the information in the following table is based on the dates of statutory de-declaration when SNH formally withdrew the National Nature Reserve accolade.

Year	Number of NNRs de-declared	NNRs de-declared	Reasons for de-declaration
2018-19	6	Ben Lui	Poor fit with 2013 criteria
		Kirkconnell Flow	Poor fit with 2013 criteria
		Monach Isles	Poor fit with 2013 criteria
		Rona and Sula Sgeir	Poor fit with 2013 criteria
		Silver Flowe	Poor fit with 2013 criteria
		Whitlaw Mosses	Poor fit with 2013 criteria
2017-18	0
2016-17	0
2015-16	0
2014-15	0
2013-14	1	Rassal Ashwood	Fail to meet 2002 purposes
2012-13	3	Keen of Hamar	Fail to meet 2002 purposes
		Cragbank Woods	Fail to meet 2002 purposes
		Den of Airlie	Fail to meet 1995 purposes
2011-12	7	Braehead Moss	Fail to meet 2002 purposes
		Mealdarroch	Fail to meet 1995 purposes
		Nigg and Udale Bays	Fail to meet 1995 purposes
		Claish Moss	Fail to meet 2002 purposes
		Glencripesdale	Fail to meet 2002 purposes
		Loch Druidibeg	Fail to meet 2002 purposes
		Rannoch Moor	Fail to meet 2002 purposes
2010-11	1	Glen Diomhan	Fail to meet 1995 purposes
2009-10	2	Inchnadamph	Fail to meet 2002 purposes
2009-10	2	Eilean na Muice Duibhe (Duich Moss)	Fail to meet 1995 purposes

Notes:

NNR = National Nature Reserve.

The NNR Partnership’s current criteria for selection of land to be awarded the NNR accolade are available at: https://www.nnr.scot/Partnership .

Copies of earlier criteria/purposes are available on request from SNH [email protected] .

The above excludes de-declaration of Abernethy Forest NNR which was subsumed and re-declared as Abernethy NNR in 2010-11.

In addition to the reasons given above, in many cases the relevant private owners were unwilling to enter new nature reserve agreements to allow Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) to meet the relevant criteria and/or purposes. Relevant sites are not identified as this could identify the individuals involved.

The SNH Board has approved a further four SNH nature reserves for de-declaration and these are no longer promoted as NNRs. For various reasons the formal de-declarations have not been progressed.

Chamber and committees