- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 27 February 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 10 March 2020
To ask the Scottish Government whether it is updating (a) application guidance, (b) internal information and (c) regulations to take account of the observations of the President of the Social Security Chamber in Decision Report 5.
Answer
I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-27647 on 10 March 2020. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 26 February 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 10 March 2020
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-20328 by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 12 December 2018, how it has evaluated the Universal Credit Scottish choices, and when it will publish its findings.
Answer
The Scottish Government is committed to evaluating how the Universal Credit Scottish choices are understood and experienced by people in Scotland. We have been working with the Department for Work and Pensions since 2018 to determine how the Scottish Government, and its researchers, can securely access the relevant client data. The DWP has determined that this would require new data sharing agreements, and its timeline to deliver these has led the Scottish Government to decide upon an alternative approach. An invitation to tender, commissioning qualitative research to inform the evaluation, was advertised on 5 March 2020. We intend to publish the evaluation’s findings in late 2020.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Friday, 21 February 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jamie Hepburn on 5 March 2020
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-27328 by Jamie Hepburn on 21 February 2020, when each cohort improvement activity plan commenced, and whether it will publish these plans.
Answer
The Scottish Government manages Fair Start Scotland contracts through regular performance management activities.
Current cohort activity plans were implemented in December 2019.
As performance management activities are ongoing there are no plans to release this information however, regular reports are proactively published relating to performance of Fair Start Scotland.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 27 February 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Sandra White on behalf of the Scottish Parliament Corporate Body on 5 March 2020
To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body whether it will conduct a feasibility study to investigate extending accessibility arrangements to cross party groups.
Answer
The SPCB is committed to providing accessibility support to enable members of the public to engage in parliamentary business. For instance, FMQs are currently interpreted into British Sign Language (BSL) to enable BSL users to follow the live proceedings.
However, Cross Party Groups are not a formal part of parliamentary business and the SPCB’s responsibilities to ensure the provision of resources for parliamentary purposes do not extend to CPGs.
Section 6 of the Code of Conduct for Members of the Scottish Parliament makes it clear that CPGs may use the Parliament’s facilities only where these are available for public use and that Groups may not draw on the resources of the Parliamentary staff to service meetings other than to book meeting rooms.
The Public Information office can provide guidance and advice for Members or CPGs on how to contact potential providers, including giving advice on points to note when arranging translation or interpreting.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 04 March 2020
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Current Status:
Taken in the Chamber on 12 March 2020
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the Scottish Fiscal Commission's forecast that spending on devolved employability services will be £27 million lower in 2022-23.
Answer
Taken in the Chamber on 12 March 2020
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Friday, 14 February 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 3 March 2020
To ask the Scottish Government how (a) many and (b) much in overpayments of (i) Best Start Grant, (ii) Funeral Support Payment and (iii) Carer's Allowance Supplement have been made to date, and how (A) many and (B) much were due to (aa) an official and (bb) a customer error.
Answer
Best Start Grant, Funeral Support Payments and Carer’s Allowance Supplement are administered by Social Security Scotland. Social Security Scotland currently publishes details of overpayments within their Annual Report and Accounts. The most recent Annual Report and Accounts covering the seven months to 31 March 2019 was laid before the Scottish Parliament on 26 September 2019, the latest Annual Reports and Accounts can be found at the following link: https://dgxmvz0tqkndr.cloudfront.net/production/images/general/Social-Security-Scotland-Annual-Report-and-Accounts.pdf .
Our next set of annual reports and accounts which will include details of overpayments will be published by 31st December 2020.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 20 February 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 27 February 2020
To ask the Scottish Government for what reason Best Start Grant and Carer's Allowance statistics do not include a breakdown by Scottish Parliament constituency and region.
Answer
We produce our publications in line with the Code of Practice for Statistics, which requires that we produce statistics that support society’s needs for information. Therefore, decisions on which geographical breakdowns to include in our published official statistics are based on what is most relevant to users and best meets their needs. The main geography requirement for Best Start Grant and Carer's Allowance statistics is for local authority information and, in the case of Best Start Grant, we also publish information by Health Board. We will continue to review the value of the statistics we produce and will take account of users’ needs when developing future publications.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 04 February 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jamie Hepburn on 26 February 2020
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-14632 by Jamie Hepburn on 6 March 2018, who the current (a) first delivery partners and (b) supporting contractors are for each Fair Start Scotland lot, broken down by the percentage of the contract value awarded to (i) the private sector, (ii) the voluntary sector, (iii) supported businesses and (iv) local authorities.
Answer
The following table contains the current prime service providers, delivery chain partners and share of delivery broken down by Lot.
Glasgow
PeoplePlus | PeoplePlus – Supplier | Private | 50% |
Momentum – Partner | Third | 25% |
The Lennox Partnership – Partner | Third | 25% |
Lanarkshire
Remploy | Remploy – Supplier * | Private | 70% |
Enable Scotland – Partner | Third | 15% |
Routes to Work South – Partner | Third | 15% |
Tayside
Remploy | Remploy – Supplier * | Private | 100% |
Forth Valley
Falkirk Council | Falkirk Council – Supplier | Public | 50% |
Clackmannanshire Council – Partner | Public | 30% |
Stirling Council - Partner | Public | 20% |
East
Start Scotland | Fedcap – Supplier | Third Sector | 77% |
Triage – Partner | Private | 8% |
Momentum – Partner | Third | 15% |
South West
Start Scotland | Fedcap – Supplier | Third Sector | 82% |
The Lennox Partnership – Supplier | Third | 18% |
North East
Momentum | Momentum – Supplier | Third | 65% |
Enable Scotland – Partner | Third | 15% |
Aberdeen Foyer – Partner | Third | 15% |
Enterprise Mentoring – Partner | Private | 5% |
Highlands
PeoplePlus | PeoplePlus – Supplier | Private | 41% |
Third Sector Hebrides – Partner | Third | 6% |
Argyll and Bute Council – Partner | Public | 18% |
Lochaber Hope – Partner | Third | 6% |
Momentum – Partner | Third | 20% |
2020 Clearview – Partner | Private | 9% |
West
The Wise Group | The Wise Group – Supplier * | Third | 56.4% |
The Lennox Partnership – Partner | Third | 25.1% |
Enable Scotland – Partner | Third | 12.0% |
Enterprise Mentoring – Partner | Third | 5.8% |
Street League – Partner | Third | 0.7% |
*Supported Business | | | |
The following table outlines the breakdown of percentage of contract value awarded to each sector in 2017.
Sector | % Share |
Private and Third Sector Partnerships | 33 |
Supported Businesses | 30 |
Private Sector (excluding supported businesses) | 26 |
Third Sector (excluding supported businesses) | 6 |
Public Sector | 5 |
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Friday, 07 February 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 25 February 2020
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the comment by the Scottish Fiscal Commission regarding Disability Assistance for Children and Young People in its paper Scotland’s Economic and Fiscal Forecasts February 2020 that "we forecast the real average award to follow a downwards trend, as has been the case for Disability Living Allowance for Children for the last four years".
Answer
In Scotland’s Economic and Fiscal Forecasts February 2020 the Scottish Fiscal Commission state that, since the Child Disability Payment is a new benefit with no existing data, the forecast of average awards is based on historical DWP data for Disability Living Allowance for Children.
The Scottish Government will ensure that clients applying for the Child Disability Payment are supported to receive the maximum level of assistance they are entitled to through the introduction of support for clients to gather information relating to their application, the delivery of a person-centred decision making framework, and publishing accessible guidance that sets out clearly the entitlement rules for the benefit.
The Scottish Government policy changes being introduced for the Child Disability Payment are forecasted by the Scottish Fiscal Commission to lead to an additional spend of £6 million in 2020-21 rising to £23 million in 2024-25 compared to the continuation of DLA for Children without any policy changes.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Friday, 14 February 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 24 February 2020
To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to release regular statistical publication of overpayments made by Social Security Scotland.
Answer
Overpayments and underpayments are used as a measure of fraud and error. The methodology which will be applied to estimating the value of fraud and error for devolved benefits is currently in development. Once this methodology has been developed we will look to release analytical publications as appropriate.
