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: S4O-02558

Asked by: Mary Fee, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 30 October 2013
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 7 November 2013

To ask the Scottish Government how the Help to Buy (Scotland) shared equity scheme will stimulate the house-building industry and help people become homeowners.

Question reference: S4W-17610

Asked by: Mary Fee, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 October 2013
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 29 October 2013

To ask the Scottish Government what criteria it requires local authorities to comply with to ensure that rural communities receive support from the Home Energy Efficiency Programmes for Scotland.

Among other criteria, to access HEEPS funding local authority area-based schemes should:

clearly target fuel poor areas beginning with those households in most need of assistance;

be designed to maximise carbon reductions; and

support the local economy and use local installers as far as possible.

Further information on the criteria for accessing HEEPS funding is available on the Scottish Government website at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Built-Environment/Housing/warmhomes/uhis/heepsguidance.

All 32 local authorities, including rural and island authorities, have received offers of grant funding for 2013-14.

Question reference: S4W-17609

Asked by: Mary Fee, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 October 2013
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 29 October 2013

To ask the Scottish Government how many homes in rural areas not connected to mains gas or the electricity grid it expects to receive support from the Home Energy Efficiency Programmes for Scotland.

We do not hold information on the number of homes in rural areas expected to receive support from the Home Energy Efficiency Programmes for Scotland (HEEPS).

The method agreed with COSLA to distribute HEEPS funding for area-based schemes includes a needs-based element which takes into account levels of fuel poverty within councils. This ensures that funding is distributed across Scotland and that rural local authorities receive the funding required to tackle fuel poverty.

Question reference: S4W-17611

Asked by: Mary Fee, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 October 2013
Current Status: Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 29 October 2013

To ask the Scottish Government how it will ensure that homes not connected to mains gas will receive funding to replace inefficient heating systems under stage 4 of the Energy Assistance Package.

Customers of the Energy Assistance Scheme (which replaced stage 4 of the Energy Assistance Package in April 2013) requiring gas connections as part of the installation currently get any gas connection costing less than £2,022.25 for free (as this is funded by Scotland Gas Networks). For more expensive connections, the customer has to pay a contribution. Alternatively, customers may opt for an electric dry heating system for which no customer contribution is required, unless an electric load upgrade is needed.

Question reference: S4O-02473

Asked by: Mary Fee, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 October 2013
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 9 October 2013

To ask the Scottish Government how its small business bonus scheme has helped businesses in West Scotland.

Question reference: S4O-02452

Asked by: Mary Fee, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 September 2013
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 2 October 2013

To ask the Scottish Government what action it will take to ensure that looked-after children who have been in multiple placements have access to a stable education.

Question reference: S4W-15853

Asked by: Mary Fee, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 June 2013
Current Status: Answered by Frank Mulholland on 6 September 2013

To ask the Scottish Government how many charges of alleged assault on police officers have been dropped in each year since 2007.

The following figures reflect the number of charges which have been discontinued in each year since 2007 in relation to section 41(1)(a) of the Police (Scotland) Act 1967. The figures relate to assaults on police officers as opposed to resisting, obstructing, molesting or hindering police officers.

In terms of prosecution policy, there is a strong presumption against accepting pleas of not guilty to charges involving assaults on police officers, however there are limited circumstances in which accepting a plea of not guilty to these charges would be appropriate. No action is taken in cases for a variety of reasons which include there being insufficient admissible evidence.

Prosecutors have recently been reminded of the robust prosecution policy in this area.

2007-08	2,613
2008-09	2,297
2009-10	1,896
2010-11	1,817
2011-12	2,057
2012-13	1,458

The information has been extracted from the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal’s Service case management database. The database is a live, operational database used to manage the processing of reports submitted to Procurators Fiscal by the Police and other reporting agencies.

Question reference: S4W-15855

Asked by: Mary Fee, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 June 2013
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 16 July 2013

To ask the Scottish Government how many charges have been dropped by police crime managers in each year since 2007.

Question reference: S4W-15852

Asked by: Mary Fee, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 June 2013
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 16 July 2013

To ask the Scottish Government how many alleged offences have been recorded by the police in each year since 2007.

Question reference: S4W-15850

Asked by: Mary Fee, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 June 2013
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 16 July 2013

To ask the Scottish Government how it collates crime statistics.

The statistical return, from which most of the figures in the annual statistical bulletin are taken, is a simple count of the numbers of crimes and offences recorded, and cleared up, by the police in Scotland. One return is made for each council area in Scotland and these are aggregated to give a national total. Returns from the eight Scottish home forces are included in the annual bulletin.

On 1 April 2013, the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012 brought together the existing eight police forces into a single Police Service of Scotland. While data will no longer be returned by eight police forces, 2013-14 data will still be collected for the single Police Service of Scotland. As a result, the geographical levels at which data are presented in future statistical bulletins will be reviewed.

Further details are provided in Section 7 of the statistical bulletin Recorded Crime in Scotland, 2012-13 which was published on 18 June 2013 and is available via the following web link:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2013/06/9697