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: S4W-25060

Asked by: Neil Findlay, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 23 March 2015
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 8 June 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how much funding it provides to (a) local authorities and (b) the voluntary sector for non-formal adult learning, in addition to that allocated for colleges and in employability funds.

The Scottish Government funds local authorities through the block grant. Decisions on the provision of non-formal adult learning are made at local level. Non-formal adult learning is part of community learning and development (CLD). Three year plans for CLD are required to be published by local authorities by 1 September 2015. These plans should be a future source of information.

Education Scotland manages the Scottish Government funding for non-formal adult learning to the voluntary sector; they have awarded a total of £2,161,100 over the three years 2013 to 2016.

Question reference: S4W-25700

Asked by: Neil Findlay, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 May 2015
Current Status: Answered by Fergus Ewing on 5 June 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how it ensures that companies in receipt of regional selective assistance (a) pay their employees the living wage and (b) employ all staff on permanent full-time contracts.

Question reference: S4W-25702

Asked by: Neil Findlay, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 May 2015
Current Status: Answered by Fergus Ewing on 5 June 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how many companies that have been awarded regional selective assistance in each year since 2010 have entered administration.

Question reference: S4W-25701

Asked by: Neil Findlay, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 May 2015
Current Status: Answered by Fergus Ewing on 5 June 2015

To ask the Scottish Government what scrutiny it carries out of companies in receipt of regional selective assistance to ensure that they maintain or develop employment at the levels promised in their application.

Question reference: S4W-25691

Asked by: Neil Findlay, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 May 2015
Current Status: Answered by Fergus Ewing on 5 June 2015

To ask the Scottish Government what scrutiny it carries out of the financial state of companies when considering whether to award regional selective assistance.

Question reference: S4W-25699

Asked by: Neil Findlay, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 May 2015
Current Status: Answered by Fergus Ewing on 5 June 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how many companies since 2010 that have been in receipt of regional selective assistance have (a) paid all their employees at least the living wage and (b) set working conditions that are consistent with the Fair Work Agenda.

Question reference: S4W-25795

Asked by: Neil Findlay, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 28 May 2015
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 4 June 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how many staff each local authority needs to recruit to meet government teacher number targets and how much funding it is providing them with to support this, also broken down by local authority.

All local authorities have committed to maintain as a minimum the total number of teachers they employ at 2014-15 levels and also the maintenance, as a maximum, of the pupil teacher ratio for schools within their authority at the 2014-15 levels as reported in the pupil and teacher census published in December 2014. Therefore local authorities will not need to recruit any additional teachers to maintain their teacher numbers. The numbers of additional teachers required to maintain the pupil teacher ratio will depend on the pupil numbers in each local authority as recorded in the pupil census taken in September and published in December.

The following table shows individual councils’ share of the £41 million previously added to the annual local government finance settlements to support the teacher numbers commitments and already included in the 2015-16 funding allocations plus their indicative share of the additional £10 million which they will receive upon satisfactory delivery of the commitments. The £10 million share allocation is based on the numbers of teachers in each local authority as recorded in the teacher census published in December 2014 and will be updated following publication of the 2015 teacher census.

Local Authority	Councils allocation of the £41 million already included in the settlement (£ million)	Illustrative share of additional £10 million (£ million)
Aberdeen City	1.331	0.337
Aberdeenshire	2.177	0.533
Angus	0.958	0.226
Argyll and Bute	0.722	0.173
Clackmannanshire	0.397	0.101
Dumfries and Galloway	1.274	0.303
Dundee City	1.196	0.278
East Ayrshire	0.967	0.227
East Dunbartonshire	0.979	0.241
East Lothian	0.774	0.188
East Renfrewshire	0.976	0.241
Edinburgh, City of	2.634	0.647
Eilean Siar	0.293	0.064
Falkirk	1.243	0.316
Fife	2.895	0.696
Glasgow	3.956	0.963
Highland	2.035	0.468
Inverclyde	0.634	0.144
Midlothian	0.675	0.174
Moray	0.730	0.175
North Ayrshire	1.101	0.269
North Lanarkshire	2.919	0.713
Orkney	0.214	0.052
Perth and Kinross	1.101	0.271
Renfrewshire	1.281	0.317
Scottish Borders	0.914	0.215
Shetland	0.318	0.065
South Ayrshire	0.931	0.217
South Lanarkshire	2.545	0.636
Stirling	0.778	0.186
West Dunbartonshire	0.758	0.182
West Lothian	1.604	0.382
Scotland	41.310	10.000

Question reference: S4W-25697

Asked by: Neil Findlay, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 May 2015
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 4 June 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how much funding it has provided to colleges in each year since 2007-08.

The following table shows funding invested by the Scottish Government in colleges.

Year	Resource Funding (£ million)	Capital Funding (£ million)
2007-08	534	122
2008-09	523	92
2009-10	584	107
2010-11	591	109
2011-12	556	50
2012-13	546	28
2013-14	522	28
2014-15	522	27
2015-16	526	25.5

In addition, through the Non-Profit Distributing pipeline, we are already supporting investment of over £300 million in three new college campuses (City of Glasgow College, Ayrshire College (Kilmarnock Campus) and Inverness College) and have committed to provide a further £140 million to deliver new campuses at Fife and Forth Valley Colleges.

Question reference: S4W-25737

Asked by: Neil Findlay, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 May 2015
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 3 June 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how many posts in each public body covered by its technical guidance on public sector pay policy for staff pay remits for (a) 2014-15 and (b) 2015-16 attract recruitment and retention allowance or other market-based pay supplements, broken down by (i) age, (ii) gender and (iii) geographical area.

Question reference: S4W-25738

Asked by: Neil Findlay, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 26 May 2015
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 3 June 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how much is paid in recruitment and retention allowance or other market-based pay supplements by each employer covered by its technical guidance on public sector pay policy for staff pay remits for (a) 2014-15 and (b) 2015-16.