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: S6W-10601

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 25 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 20 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether funding has continued for Action Against Stalking further to the initial investment of £55,000 in the 2019-20 victim/witness support budget.

We have continued to increase our funding to Action Against Stalking since 2019. In 2020-21 we provided almost £115,000 in funding and in 2021-22 we provided £100,000.

In March 2022 we announced funding of £495,000 over the period 2022-25 from the new Victim Centred Approach Fund to enable Action Against Stalking to deliver expert support to victims, and continue their work to improve the understanding of, and response to, stalking behaviours.

We are also providing up to £230,000 a year through the Scottish Legal Aid budget, and £384,000 in 2022-23 from the Justice portfolio, to the Scottish Women’s Rights Centre to offer free legal information and advice to women experiencing gender based violence, including stalking and harassment.

Question reference: S6W-10600

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 25 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 20 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many successful prosecutions for stalking and harassment offences there have been in (a) Scotland and (b) Aberdeen in each year from 2018-19 to 2022-23 to date.

The latest available information on the number of people convicted for ‘stalking offences’ is provided in the following table.

Number of people proceeded and convicted for stalking offences (where main crime) in Scottish courts, 2018-19 to 2020-21.

	Scotland		Aberdeen
	Total prosecuted	Total Convicted	Total prosecuted	Total Convicted
2018-19	620	531	57	44
2019-20	562	496	33	25
2020-21	249	219	11	9

Source: Scottish Government Criminal Proceedings database

Please note: Information for 2021-22 will not be available until publication of the Criminal Proceedings in Scotland, 2021-22 Statistical Bulletin. This is due to be published in 2023.

We are unable to provide data on harassment. There is no specific crime of harassment and harassment can conform to a wide range of both criminal offences and civil matters. As such there are no meaningful data we can provide.

Question reference: S6W-10598

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 25 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 20 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what analysis has been undertaken in the last five years of the effectiveness of its plans to tackle stalking and harassment.

A refresh of the Equally Safe Delivery Plan outlining the joint commitment of the Scottish Government and COSLA to preventing and eradicating all forms of violence against women and girls, which includes stalking and sexual harassment, and tackling underpinning attitudes that perpetuate it, was published in June 2022. The Scottish Government also regularly monitors the effectiveness of legislation and the funding it provides to relevant support services, such as Action Against Stalking and the Scottish Women's Rights Centre.

Question reference: S6W-10599

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 25 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 20 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what specific investment it has provided to Police Scotland in support of tackling stalking and harassment offences in (a) Scotland and (b) Aberdeen in each year from 2018-19 to 2022-23.

The Scottish Government provides grant in aid funding to the Scottish Police Authority (SPA), as outlined in the Annual Budget Bills. In 2022-23 this funding totals over £1.3 billion. It is for the SPA and the Chief Constable to allocate this funding to policing priorities at a national and local level, and to also support the delivery of the Joint Strategy on Policing.

The Scottish Government has not provided any additional funding to Police Scotland specifically in support of stalking and harassment offences in the time period 2018-19 to 2022-23.

Question reference: S6O-01375

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 07 September 2022
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 22 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on transport infrastructure improvements in the north east.

Question reference: S6W-10254

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 6 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answers to questions S6W-08649, S6W-09452 and S6W-09553 by Jenny Gilruth on 23 June and 28 July 2022, whether it can provide a breakdown of the figures provided in response to each of three questions for the North East region.

ScotRail does not record passenger complaints data by region, but by rail route. The following below table shows ScotRail’s complaints data for routes which serve the North East region.

Complaint Type	April	May	June
1st Class	14	21	28
Assisted Travel	1	0	0
Capacity	8	17	26
Contact Centre	0	0	1
Customer Provisions	1	6	0
Cycles	1	1	1
Environment	6	3	2
Policy And Product	5	2	6
Staff	5	3	3
Timetable	0	5	2
Train Service Performance	1	20	19
TOTAL	42	78	88

ScotRail has confirmed that the routes detailed below were included in this data. The member should note that the data reflects complaints which may have occurred at any point on the route:

Aberdeen-Edinburgh
Aberdeen-Glasgow
Aberdeen-Inverness
Dundee-Glasgow
Edinburgh-Arbroath

Question reference: S6W-10221

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 08 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 5 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many complaints were received by ScotRail from (a) passengers and (b) staff between 1 and 31 July 2022, broken down by the reason for the complaint.

The number of passenger complaints received by ScotRail, through their official complaints process, is set out on the following table for the period 1 July to 31 July 2022. The complaints may involve incidents that occurred before 1 July 2022.

The figure for 1 July to 31 July 2022 is 1192. This complaints figure is likely to reflect the point in time when several services were impacted due to driver shortages and the subsequent reduction in services as a result of the temporary timetable in place from 23 May to 20 July 2022. In this period there was also a GB-wide strike by Network Rail staff on 27 July which significantly impacted services in Scotland, with ScotRail only able to run a very limited service as a result.

The temporary timetable that was in place until 20 July 2022 aimed to provide the best available service to as many passengers as possible.

Complaints from staff are not included in figures due to these being customer relation figures. However, ScotRail do have a system in place to record staff grievances within their HR team.

Complaint Categories	01-31 Jul 2022
Policy And Product	260
Staff	224
Train Service Performance	136
Capacity	110
Timetable	107
Environment	102
1st Class	62
Assisted Travel	25
Customer Provisions	25
Ticket Buying Facilities	22
Safety & Security	20
Information Provision	18
Contact Centre	18
Smartcard	15
Promotions	13
Station Facilities	13
Cycles	9
Rail Replacement	8
Double Debit	5
Total	1192

Question reference: S6W-10210

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 08 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Mairi McAllan on 5 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has any schemes in place to reduce the number of seagulls, particularly herring gulls, nesting in residential areas.

The responsibility for dealing with nuisance gulls on private property lies with the property owner, although local authorities can provide advice and assistance, and have powers under environmental protection legislation to tackle nuisances.

Local authorities are expected to respond to statutory nuisance complaints on council owned property, such as where the deposit of bird droppings may have an effect on public health.

Question reference: S6O-01329

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 31 August 2022
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 7 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what analysis it has done on the potential impact on the sale price of new homes of its proposal to introduce new building standards to prohibit the use of direct emissions heating systems in new builds from 2024.

Question reference: S6W-10174

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 08 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 31 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-08116 by Jenny Gilruth on 6 May 2022, whether it will provide an update on whether the "rail improvement project" referred to has now concluded option selection, and, if so, what options have been selected.

The package of enhancements identified via the option selection process is to be confirmed by Transport Scotland by the end of 2022, as part of its endorsement of the Outline Business Cases for both this project and the related project to decarbonise this route. As advised in my response to S6W-08116, the package comprises signal enhancements, improvements to station approaches and specific capacity alternations to facilitate the mixed operation of faster and slower trains on the same route.