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-19789

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 20 November 2018

To ask the Scottish Government which agency is responsible for monitoring the effectiveness of road safety measures, and how often these checks are carried out.

Reported Road Casualties Scotland 2017, recently published, confirmed that last year casualties on Scotland’s roads were at their lowest levels since records began.

Transport Scotland, as custodian of Scotland’s Road Safety Framework to 2020, is responsible for monitoring the effectiveness of road safety measures, delivered by our road safety partners under the Framework. How often these checks are carried out depends on the nature of the measures themselves. For example, projects funded by the Framework are independently evaluated only once completed. Transport Scotland review the safety performance of our trunk roads on an annual basis, and road safety engineering schemes are evaluated when 3 years after completion data is available.

Local authorities have responsibility for assessing the effectiveness of their own road safety initiatives.

Question reference: S5W-19739

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 01 November 2018
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 15 November 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has carried out of the support available to NHS employees who have dyslexia.

The Scottish Government is working with representative organisations across the Scottish economy, including organisations representing those who have been diagnosed with dyslexia, to assess the support that is needed to enable people to move into and stay in work.

All NHS Scotland boards have fully delegated responsibilities in relation to recruitment, retention and the provision of employee support, underpinned by the NHS Scotland Staff Governance Standard and our suite of Partnership Network policies.

We expect all boards to undertake individualised assessments of employees’ workplace needs and to provide tailored workplace adjustments where necessary, in line with their legal obligations under the Equality Act 2010.

Question reference: S5W-19239

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 05 October 2018
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 2 November 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how much each local authority has raised through non-domestic rates in each of the last five years.

Question reference: S5O-02521

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 31 October 2018
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 7 November 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how much has been raised by the large business supplement since 2016.

Question reference: S5W-19238

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 05 October 2018
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 29 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what information it has regarding how many people in Scotland have paid income tax in each of the last three years, broken down by band.

Audited outturn data on the number of Scottish taxpayers liable to non savings non dividend (NSND) income tax is currently only available for 2016-17. The table below, which was published as part of HMRC’s “Scottish Income Tax HMRC Annual Report” and provided to the Finance and Constitution Committee (see page 50) -

http://www.parliament.scot/S5_Finance/Meeting%20Papers/Meeting_Papers_Public_3_Oct_2018.pdf

provides a detailed breakdown of the 2.53 million Scottish taxpayers by band:

Marginal Rate	Number of Scottish taxpayers
Basic rate	2,221,100
Higher rate	294,000
Additional rate	13,300
All Scottish taxpayers	2,528,400

Outturn data for 2017-18 will not be published until July 2019.

Any estimates of the number of Scottish taxpayers prior to 2016-17 are based on survey data which is not directly comparable to the published outturn figures.

Question reference: S5W-19240

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 05 October 2018
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 25 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many businesses in each local authority area have paid non-domestic rates in each of the last five years.

The following table presents estimates of the number of ratepayers by local authority for the years 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016 and 2018. Calculations are based on the Assessors' Valuation Roll and Local Authority property-level billing information. Since no property-level billing information is available for the years 2014 and 2017 these years have been omitted.

Local Authority	2012	2013	2015	2016	2018
Aberdeen	5,900	5,700	5,900	6,000	7,000
Aberdeenshire	4,200	4,200	4,300	4,600	5,800
Angus	1,900	1,800	1,700	1,800	2,100
Argyll & Bute	3,200	3,000	2,900	3,100	3,800
Clackmannanshire	700	700	700	700	900
Dumfries & Galloway	3,600	3,400	3,400	3,300	3,600
Dundee City	3,300	2,900	2,800	2,900	2,900
East Ayrshire	1,800	1,800	1,800	1,800	1,900
East Dunbartonshire	1,300	1,300	1,200	1,300	1,200
East Lothian	1,400	1,400	1,400	1,400	1,400
East Renfrewshire	900	900	800	900	900
Edinburgh, City of	12,300	12,400	11,900	12,000	13,400
Eilean Siar	700	700	800	800	1,000
Falkirk	2,600	2,600	2,400	2,400	2,700
Fife	6,200	5,900	5,900	6,300	6,000
Glasgow City	14,000	13,400	12,800	13,200	14,300
Highland	6,900	6,400	6,400	6,500	8,800
Inverclyde	1,100	1,100	1,100	1,100	1,200
Midlothian	1,500	1,600	1,500	1,500	1,700
Moray	1,800	1,600	1,700	1,800	2,300
North Ayrshire	2,000	1,900	2,100	2,100	2,200
North Lanarkshire	5,800	5,200	5,400	5,400	5,300
Orkney Islands	600	600	600	600	700
Perth & Kinross	3,500	3,400	3,600	3,600	3,900
Renfrewshire	3,100	3,000	3,000	3,300	6,700
Scottish Borders	2,500	2,500	2,400	2,500	2,800
Shetland Islands	700	700	700	700	1,000
South Ayrshire	2,300	2,200	2,200	2,200	2,300
South Lanarkshire	5,200	5,200	5,200	5,500	6,000
Stirling	2,200	2,100	2,300	2,200	2,500
West Dunbartonshire	1,400	1,500	1,400	1,600	1,500
West Lothian	3,100	3,200	3,200	3,400	3,600
Scotland	108,000	104,200	103,400	106,400	121,100

Source: Assessors' Valuation Roll, Local Authority Billing Information

Question reference: S5W-19241

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 05 October 2018
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 25 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how much has been raised through the large business supplement in each local authority area in each of the last five years.

The following table presents estimates of the net income raised by the large business supplement for 2014-15, 2015-16, 2016-17, 2017-18 and 2018-19. The sums are calculated from the rateable value of properties (from the Assessors' Valuation Roll) and reliefs information (from local authority property-level billing information). The Scottish Government collects aggregate revenue information from Local Authorities on an annual basis, and in most years also collects property-level billing information. Since no property-level billing information is available for 2014-15 and 2017-18, an aggregate figure has been provided for these years.

Local Authority	2014-15	2015-16	2016-17	2017-18	2018-19*
Aberdeen		4,822,900	9,873,500		11,906,300
Aberdeenshire		2,013,900	4,253,200		5,131,000
Angus		559,000	1,148,200		1,030,800
Argyll & Bute		640,600	1,333,800		1,612,200
Clackmannanshire		335,300	671,600		708,800
Dumfries & Galloway		919,700	1,907,800		2,036,500
Dundee City		1,545,500	3,173,400		2,945,300
East Ayrshire		633,400	1,293,800		1,152,700
East Dunbartonshire		518,900	1,021,300		1,072,800
East Lothian		506,100	1,031,000		1,021,600
East Renfrewshire		290,500	585,600		580,600
Edinburgh, City of		8,696,200	16,862,400		16,349,200
Eilean Siar		141,800	307,400		311,600
Falkirk		1,668,800	3,358,100		3,494,200
Fife		4,121,700	8,366,000		7,611,400
Glasgow City		8,495,100	17,554,100		16,038,900
Highland		2,655,100	5,492,400		6,192,800
Inverclyde		473,800	969,600		987,700
Midlothian		678,700	1,282,000		1,373,400
Moray		821,500	1,681,800		1,970,800
North Ayrshire		881,100	1,784,900		1,841,200
North Lanarkshire		2,546,800	5,188,600		4,714,900
Orkney Islands		187,600	387,100		389,800
Perth & Kinross		1,145,300	2,235,700		2,306,900
Renfrewshire		2,261,200	4,625,000		5,974,300
Scottish Borders		619,400	1,320,500		1,399,300
Shetland Islands		410,000	1,111,600		1,287,300
South Ayrshire		893,400	1,850,300		1,872,600
South Lanarkshire		7,051,600	14,249,300		16,398,100
Stirling		950,500	1,896,900		1,819,500
West Dunbartonshire		1,919,500	3,837,400		4,059,300
West Lothian		2,023,000	4,220,800		3,661,500
Scotland	52,138,600	61,427,800	124,874,900	127,424,900	129,253,100

Source: Assessors' Valuation Roll, Local Authority Billing information

* Figures for current financial year as at June 2018; subject to change.

Question reference: S5W-19199

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 October 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 25 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has carried out of the condition of the A811 between Stirling and Balloch.

Question reference: S5W-19197

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 October 2018
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 25 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on whether the A811 should be designated as a trunk road.

Question reference: S5W-19198

Asked by: Dean Lockhart, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 October 2018
Current Status: Answered by Kevin Stewart on 24 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what minimum building standards and requirements must be met for all proposed developments in the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park.

Proposed development of buildings in the Loch Lomond and The Trossachs National Park would be subject to requirements under national building regulations and under the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997 as per development elsewhere in Scotland. Additionally, national parks are subject to the requirements of the National Parks (Scotland) Act 2000. The standards, guidance and processes that form the building standard system in Scotland are published at www.gov.scot/bsd.