Chamber and committees

£15 million will be made available in this academic year and Ministers expect that local authorities will move to recruit additional pupil support assistants.

Decisions about the recruitment and training of these assistants will be made by individual local authorities.

The Additional Support for Learning Act 2004 (as amended) places duties on education authorities to identify, provide for and review the additional support needs of their pupils.

It is for individual authorities to determine the training and qualifications required by those staff providing support to children and young people to help pupils reach their full potential.

Standing Orders require that questions to the Scottish Government must relate to a matter for which the First Minister, the Scottish Ministers or the Scottish Law Officers have general responsibility.

Where questions raise matters falling within the day to day responsibility of other bodies, and relevant information is not held centrally by the Government, answers will advise the Member of the body responsible for the matter concerned. Where questions relate to operational matters for which a Scottish Government Agency is responsible, the relevant Chief Executive would normally provide the substance of the response.

The Scottish Ministerial Code is clear on Ministers’ accountability to Parliament and Ministers respect these principles in terms of all answers given to parliamentary questions. All such answers are published by the Parliament and it is open to any Member to lodge further questions, or use other established mechanisms to hold Ministers to account, should they consider that to be appropriate.

As this is an operational matter relating to account management information, I have asked the Chief Executive of Scottish Enterprise to respond to you directly.

Our enterprise agencies have advised that they have not supported any project to develop or produce munitions. New guidelines have led to the introduction of additional human rights checks that are being applied to all requests for support. Those checks will also be applied to companies with existing relationships when they make a new request for assistance.

Glasgow Prestwick Airport is operated on a commercial basis and at arm’s length from the Scottish Government in compliance with European Union State Aid rules. The Scottish Government does not hold information on the purpose of any flight using Scottish airports. The UK Government is responsible for determining which airline or country is allowed to operate flights into the UK.

We have committed to review the use of Co-ordinated Support Plans to ensure that children and young people with the most significant additional support needs are receiving the support that they need to reach their full learning potential. We have begun to take forward work with partners to scope out this work and will provide an update in due course.

As previously stated in the answer to question S5W-19766 on 15 November 2018, our definition of munitions includes parts or technology which form an integral and essential component of the munition. 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 .

As this is an operational matter relating to account management information, I have asked the Chief Executive of Scottish Enterprise to respond to you directly.

Blue light services can be defined as police, fire services, and emergency responders, in the UK and elsewhere, which, in case of an emergency, are allowed to turn on flashing blue lights indicating traffic priority over other motorists.