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: S5W-26380

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 13 November 2019
Current Status: Answered by Paul Wheelhouse on 27 November 2019

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has completed its outline business case for its proposed publicly-owned energy company and, if not, by what date it will do so.

Question reference: S5W-26404

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 November 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 22 November 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how it monitors satisfaction levels among patients who have made a complaint against the NHS, and whether it will publish the results of satisfaction levels recorded, broken down by NHS board.

Question reference: S5O-03730

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 30 October 2019
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 7 November 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to improve public safety at popular tourist sites.

Question reference: S5O-03681

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 23 October 2019
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 30 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what support it is giving to Business Improvement Districts.

Question reference: S5W-25596

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 01 October 2019
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 18 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a breakdown of the funding that has been delivered by the Scottish Growth Scheme in each year, also broken down by the proportion that was delivered by (a) European funding streams and (b) Scottish Enterprise and other public sector bodies in Scotland.

To 31 August 2019, under the Scottish Growth Scheme, some £149.5 million has been invested in 233 companies.

The following table contains a breakdown by year of the funding delivered by the Scottish Growth Scheme and also the proportion that was delivered by (a) European funding streams and (b) Scottish Enterprise and other public sector bodies in Scotland.

Year	Funding delivered	European funding streams (a)	Scottish Enterprise/other public sector bodies in Scotland (incl SG) (b)	Private sector leverage
	£m	£m	£m	£m
2017	22.7	2.3	3.3	17.1
2018	83.5	8.2*	15	60.3
2019	43.3	4.5*	6.6	32.2
Total	149.5	15	24.9	109.6

* _{The specific SEGCP investment contribution made by the European Investment Fund in deals completed (£0.5m in 2018 and £2.3m in 2019) is designated as “European resource” as it is part of a an official European programme rather than a direct investment, which would normally be deemed as private sector.}

Question reference: S5W-25253

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 10 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 27 September 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what regulations are in place to ensure the appropriate maintenance of category (a) B and (b) C listed buildings.

All building owners have a general responsibility to maintain their property.

There is no specific obligation on the owner of a listed building to maintain their buildings, but there are statutory powers available to Ministers and local authorities to take action where listed buildings have deteriorated. These powers allow them to carry out urgent works for the preservation of listed buildings, to serve ‘repairs notices’ and to compulsorily acquire listed buildings in need of repair. The much better alternative is, of course, effective management and maintenance.

The key legislation is as follows:

Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 – Section 42: Compulsory acquisition of building in need of repair.

Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 – Section 43: Repairs notice as preliminary to acquisition under Section 42.

Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 – Section 49: Urgent works to unoccupied listed buildings.

In addition to listed building legislation local authorities are also empowered under the terms of Section 28 of the Building (Scotland) Act 2003 to serve a ‘defective building notice’ on the owner of any building requiring them to rectify such defects in the building as the notice may specify in order to bring the building into a reasonable state of repair having regard to its age, type and location.

Question reference: S5O-03599

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 26 September 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to improve mental health waiting times in NHS Fife.

Since 2016, the Scottish Government has invested nearly £2.4 million in NHS Fife for capacity building and workforce development to improve mental health waiting times. All Boards, including NHS Fife, now have improvement plans in place setting out milestones over the next two years. We continue to work closely with NHS Fife to agree their Annual Operational Plan, and a performance trajectory setting out how they will deliver the waiting times standards by December 2020. Senior officials will be meeting with NHS Fife shortly in order to agree next steps and an acceptable trajectory, and the Board's mid year review which the Minister for Public Health and Sport will take will be held next month.

Question reference: S5W-25199

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 05 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 19 September 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how many people have received support from the Digital Start Fund.

Launched on 29th May 2019, the Digital Start Fund is designed to offer those on low or no incomes the opportunity to develop new digital skills and fill one of the many vacancies in digital occupations in Scotland. Four providers have been awarded contracts through a tender process and training programmes are due to commence mid-to end of September 2019.

From the regular tender submissions and contract management profiling to date, it is projected that around 120 individuals will be supported by the Digital Start Fund by 31 March 2020.

Question reference: S5W-25198

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 05 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 18 September 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how it plans to simplify and streamline support for research development, and when a single application route for businesses will be operational.

Question reference: S5W-25196

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 05 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 17 September 2019

To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to review how Scottish legislation takes account of cryptoassets and other related technologies.