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: S3W-12693

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 02 May 2008
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 22 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive how many full-time students are in higher and further education and, of these, how many are not exempt from paying the council tax and what the reasons are for their not being exempt.

Question reference: S3W-12907

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 12 May 2008
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 22 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S3W-12123 by John Swinney on 30 April 2008, what its current estimate is of how much the student population in Scotland as a whole would pay under the proposed local income tax.

Question reference: S3W-12906

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 12 May 2008
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 22 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S3W-12119 by John Swinney on 30 April 2008, whether that answer indicates that it has carried out an evaluation of the proposed local income tax and its effect on students.

Question reference: S3W-12905

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 12 May 2008
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 22 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S3W-12118 by John Swinney on 30 April 2008, whether that answer indicates that it has carried out an impact assessment into the local income tax and its effect on students.

Question reference: S3W-12351

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 25 April 2008
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 19 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the First Minister’s statement on 17 April 2008 that higher education students pay council tax dependent on where they stay (Official Report c. 7686), what the relationship is between the location or type of accommodation of full-time higher education students and their liability to pay council tax

Question reference: S3W-12350

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 25 April 2008
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 19 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive whether full-time students living in shared accommodation with other full-time students are liable to pay council tax.

Question reference: S3W-12126

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 21 April 2008
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 16 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what meetings have taken place between ministers and student groups since May 2007, who attended and what was discussed.

Meetings regularly take place between Scottish ministers and student groups. The following table provides details of all meetings which have taken place between Scottish ministers and student groups since May 2007, including who attended and topics for discussion:

Minister	Meeting with	Topic	Date
Fiona Hyslop	HE, FE, student and union representatives	Roundtable Forum	6 June 2007
Fiona Hyslop	Presidents of Student Associations of each Scottish higher education institution, President of NUS and Convener of CHESS	Student Summit to discuss range of higher education issues	31 August 2007
Fiona Hyslop	HE, FE, student and union representatives	Roundtable Forum	23 October 2007
Fiona Hyslop	NUS Conference	Speech at the NUS conference	1 March 2008
Fiona Hyslop	President of NUS	Private meeting to discuss Joint Future Thinking Taskforce on Universities	6 March 2008
Fiona Hyslop	NUS and The joint Future Thinking Taskforce on Universities	NUS contribution to Taskforce	16 March 2008
Fiona Hyslop	Student representatives from around the country	Student Summit	28 April 2008
Jim Mather	UWS Student Union	Open Forum Q&A	25 February 2008
Nicola Sturgeon	Stow College Graduation Ceremony	Address and present awards	15 November 2007
Nicola Sturgeon	Meeting Dental Students Aberdeen	Attending Dental Institute	21 January 2008
Nicola Sturgeon	Addressing Glasgow Caledonian Students re. development of policy in health and social care	Address	4 April 2008
Shona Robison	Scottish Youth Parliament Health Committee	Public Health Issues	23 January 2008
Maureen Watt	National Union of Students Scotland Conference	Roles of students and how NUS can work with Government	21 November 2008
Elish Angiolini QC Lord Advocate	Law School students, University of Edinburgh	Criminal Law	6 November 2007

Question reference: S3W-12679

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 02 May 2008
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 16 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive how much funding will be provided for (a) Education and Lifelong Learning, (b) further education, (c) higher education and (d) student support in each of the next three years and how much was provided in each of the last three years.

Information relating to Education and Lifelong Learning funding can be found in the following documents:

The Scottish Budget Spending Review 2007 (Chapter 22), which covers allocations for 2007-08 and projected allocations from 2008-09 to 2010-11, at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2007/11/13092240/23.

The Scottish Executive Consolidated Accounts for the year ended 31 March 2007 (page 31, 32), at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2007/10/30102402/11 http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2007/10/30102402/12.

The Scottish Executive Consolidated Accounts for the year ended 31 March 2006 (page 30, 31), at: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2006/10/31084836/11, and http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2006/10/31084836/12.

The Scottish Government funds colleges and universities to deliver a range of levels of education and does not specify levels of provision of further or higher education. Therefore there are no specific figures for funding of further and higher education.

Colleges use their funding to deliver further education (including student support) and higher education and higher education institutions also deliver both teaching and research. It is for individual institutions to determine the balance of provision on the basis of demand and strategic direction.

Following spending review 2007, funding for schools has been transferred to revenue support grant (RSG) for allocation to local authorities.

Question reference: S3W-12680

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 02 May 2008
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 16 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what additional funding has been announced for Education and Lifelong Learning since the spending review.

The following additional funding has been made available during the 2007-08 financial year and will affect expenditure during the spending review period 2008-09 to 2010-11.

Free School Meal Pilots

In March 2008 the Government announced that it was committed to meeting the costs of extending the Free School Meal pilots from April 2008 to the end of June 2008 and made an additional £2 million available to the five authorities (Borders, Fife, Glasgow, East Ayrshire and West Dunbartonshire) undertaking these Free School Meal pilots. This funding has been made available to ensure that the 5 authorities could continue the Free School Meal pilots to the end of the school term.

£10 Million Current Funding for HEIs

£10m of Current funding was made available to the higher education institutions (HEIs) to address cost pressures within the sector at the 2008 Spring Budget Revisions (SBR).

£20 Million Current Funding for FE and HEIs

An additional £20 million of current funding has been made available, split 50%50% between the two sectors before the 2007-08 year-end.

- £10 million for HEIs to address cost pressures within the sector in addition to that made available at the SBR, and

- £10 million for further education colleges to allow further strategic investment in key priority areas, such as supporting young people who need more choices and more chances; articulation, and innovative approaches to learning delivery.

Question reference: S3W-12688

Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 02 May 2008
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 15 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will outline further details of the £38 million package of grants for part-time learners in higher education, referred to by the First Minister on 24 April 2008 (Official Report, c. 7933), showing (a) over how many years the funding will be provided, (b) the eligibility criteria for the funding, (c) the distribution mechanism used for the funding and (d) how many students will be eligible for the funding

(a) We will introduce a £500 part-time higher education (HE) grant from academic year 2008-09 for all new and existing students. Budget provision has been made for £12 million/£13 million/£13 million for this over the period of the spending review (£38 million in total). This includes an additional £1 million annually for the institutions'' discretionary funds.

(b) The eligibility criteria for the funding is that students must:

be ordinarily resident in Scotland

be over the age of 16

earn £18,000 or less or be on benefits

not be in receipt of a fee waiver from the learning provider

be studying at 50% or more of a full-time HNC, HND, or

undergraduate degree (SCQF Level 7-10).

(c) The part-time HE grant will be delivered through a simplified Individual Learning Account (ILA Scotland) model and the grant will be paid directly to the university or college.

(d) We expect that this new funding will benefit around 20,000 part-time HE students.