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-16178

Asked by: Stuart McMillan, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what funding has been made available to local authorities for the specific purpose of road safety.

Support for local authority roads is provided through the core local government finance settlement. It is however for the local authorities themselves to determine the level of spending for road safety in their area.

Generally it is the responsibility of each local authority to allocate the total financial resources available to it on the basis of local needs and priorities, having first fulfilled its statutory obligations and the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities including the Scottish Government''s key strategic objectives and manifesto commitments.

Question reference: S3W-16202

Asked by: Stuart McMillan, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Jim Mather on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what practical support it is giving to encourage small and medium-sized enterprises to reduce carbon emissions.

We are funding the Carbon Trust in Scotland, the Energy Saving Scotland advice network and Envirowise Scotland to encourage small and medium-sized enterprises to reduce carbon emissions. They provide a number of practical support measures including:

Free and impartial information and advice;

Free on-site energy, waste and water audits;

Practical guides and best practice literature;

Low carbon, clean fuel and renewable technologies;

Green fleet reviews and sustainable travel planning;

Relevant training and seminars, and

Signposting to financial support schemes.

Question reference: S3W-16181

Asked by: Stuart McMillan, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what new road safety projects there have been in (a) East Dunbartonshire, (b) Inverclyde, (c) Renfrewshire, (d) North Ayrshire, (e) West Dunbartonshire and (f) East Renfrewshire in each year since 2002.

Question reference: S3W-16177

Asked by: Stuart McMillan, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what measures it has put in place to make roads safer.

The Scottish Government takes road safety very seriously and is committed to making the roads safer for all road users.

We are developing a 10-year road safety strategy for Scotland and have set up a panel of experts to advise on possible measures. The strategy will be published in late 2008.

The Scottish Government provides funding to Road Safety Scotland (RSS) for the production of key road safety education initiatives and publicity messages. RSS brings together the main organisations interested in road safety, including local and central government, the police, fire and rescue service, motoring organisations and voluntary organisations.

Amongst other initiatives the Scottish Government provided funding totalling nearly £50 million between 2003 and 2008 to local authorities for 20mph schemes outside schools and related safety projects, including safer routes to school and home zones.

The implementation of road safety projects is a matter for relevant roads authorities, Transport Scotland for the trunk road network and local authorities for the local roads network.

Question reference: S3W-16204

Asked by: Stuart McMillan, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Jim Mather on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive how it is measuring or plans to measure the success of the new streamlined approach to Scottish Enterprise.

Question reference: S3W-16203

Asked by: Stuart McMillan, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Jim Mather on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what financial support it is giving to encourage small and medium-sized enterprises to reduce carbon emissions.

Question reference: S3W-16174

Asked by: Stuart McMillan, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Fergus Ewing on 18 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive how many motorists have been caught speeding in (a) Greenock, (b) Gourock, (c) Port Glasgow, (d) Inverkip (e) Wemyss Bay, (f) Bishopbriggs, (g) Kirkintilloch, (h) Bearsden and (i) Paisley in each year since 2002.

Question reference: S3W-16175

Asked by: Stuart McMillan, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Fergus Ewing on 18 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive how many motorists who were caught speeding in each year since 2002 lived in (a) Greenock, (b) Gourock, (c) Port Glasgow, (d) Inverkip, (e) Wemyss Bay, (f) Bishopbriggs, (g) Kirkintilloch, (h) Bearsden and (i) Paisley.

Question reference: S3W-15748

Asked by: Stuart McMillan, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 22 August 2008
Current Status: Answered by Stewart Maxwell on 18 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive how much money it has spent on its central heating programme per local authority area in each of the last five years.

In the private sector the information is not held by local authority areas, but for Scotland as a whole. For Scotland as a whole, the information is shown in the following table:

Financial Year	Expenditure (£ Million)
2003-04	30.34
2004-05	43.46
2005-06	52.20
2006-07	37.64
2007-08^1,2	48.06
Total	211.70

Notes:

1. The expenditure for 2007-08 is an estimate as the accruals process has still to be finalised.

2. The original budget allocation for the central heating programme in 2007-08 was £40.6 million. Around £8 million in additional resources was provided to meet the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing''s Winter Waiting Time Initiative and install the highest number of systems ever installed in the private sector in any one year.

In the public sector the Programme ended for local authorities in March 2004 and, therefore, no installations were undertaken by local authorities in 2004-05. The information covering 2003-04 is shown in the following table.

Local Authority Area	Expenditure (£ Million) 2003-04
Argyle and Bute Council	0.01
Dundee City Council	0.69
East Ayrshire Council	0.03
East Renfrewshire	0.28
Fife Council	0.60
Inverclyde Council	0.06
Midlothian Council	0.01
Orkney Council	0.01
Renfrewshire Council	0.10
Shetland Council	0.04
South Lanarkshire Council	2.0
West Dunbartonshire Council	0.05
Total	3.88

With the exception of Glasgow Housing Association (GHA), the programme for housing associations ended in December 2004. Therefore, the information provided covers 2003-04 and 2004-05, the final year the programme was in place for housing associations, and is shown in the following table:

Local Authority Area	Expenditure (£ Million) 2003-04	Expenditure (£ Million) 2004-05
Aberdeen City Council	0.005	0.0025
City of Edinburgh	0.85	0.30
Glasgow City Council	2.69	0.95
Highland Council	0.0025	0
Renfrewshire Council	0.073	0.0025
Total	3.62	1.25

For GHA, the Programme ended in March 2007. Therefore, all the installations were undertaken in the Glasgow City Council area and the information shown in the following table covers the period 2003-04 until 2006-07.

Year	Expenditure (£ Million)
2003-04	2.99
2004-05	4.12
2005-06	4.80
2006-07	8.22
Total	20.13

Question reference: S3W-15936

Asked by: Stuart McMillan, MSP for West of Scotland, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Jim Mather on 17 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what plans there are to provide financial assistance to the marine leisure industry.

Scottish Enterprise (SE) will be providing support for sailing infrastructure developments in Stranraer and Largs. SE continues to work with Clyde Waterfront Strategic Partnership to exploit opportunities to increase marine leisure opportunities on the Clyde. Further information on these projects can be found at www.clydewaterfront.com

The marine leisure sector is recognised by Highlands and Islands Enterprise as a growth sector and a product development opportunity in line with the tourism framework for change strategy. Future plans include a European project to develop sailing between Ireland and the west coast of Scotland, 12 projects, mainly infrastructure, for Argyll and Lochaber, work by Scottish Development International to attract appropriate inward investment and a study to identify the opportunities for marina destination infrastructure developments within Scotland.

VisitScotland will continue to market Scotland''s sailing product through marketing and PR activity such as their dedicated website, http://sail.visitscotland.com/, the production of a sailing brochure, specific advertising campaigns, and promotion of sailing events.