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-12657

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 30 November 2022
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 8 December 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether there are any plans to remove any Hikvision cameras that are currently being used within the Police Scotland estate.

Question reference: S6W-12421

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Thursday, 24 November 2022
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 8 December 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it is the case that only 70% of the 2022-23 funding for the treatment of Long COVID has been made available to NHS boards, and, if this is the case, when it will provide the remaining 30%.

Question reference: S6W-12660

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 30 November 2022
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 7 December 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what the timeline is for the removal of any Hikvision cameras that are installed within the Scottish Government estate.

Question reference: S6W-12661

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 30 November 2022
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 7 December 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has any plans to prevent the use by Police Scotland of cameras and other items manufactured by (a) Hikvision and (b) Dahua Technology.

Question reference: S6W-12658

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 30 November 2022
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 7 December 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has any plans to provide local authorities and its agencies with support to uninstall any Hikvision cameras that are currently installed across Scotland.

Question reference: S6W-12659

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 30 November 2022
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 7 December 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has any plans to introduce tighter rules regarding local authorities, its agencies and businesses partnering with security and technology firms that are reportedly linked to the Chinese government, such as Hikvision and Dahua Technology.

Question reference: S6F-01613

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 05 December 2022
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 8 December 2022

To ask the First Minister when the Cabinet will next meet.

Question reference: S6W-12511

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 23 November 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jamie Hepburn on 5 December 2022

To ask the Scottish Government when it will next review the cap on funding for Scottish students seeking to study at Scottish universities.

The Scottish Government works closely with the SFC and Scottish Universities on an annual basis to review and deliver sustainable funding for universities and the whole tertiary sector when setting the budget allocation. This flexibility allows the numbers of funded places for eligible students to respond to university and student demands, so that in 2022-23 there are 121,917 full-time equivalent funded places, compared to 115,987 for 2019-20, the last academic year prior to the pandemic.

Scottish Universities are autonomous institutions and as such, with the exception of controlled subjects, the Scottish Government and Government Ministers do not direct individual universities on the number of funded places made available for specific subjects for eligible Scottish and EU domicile students. Universities are allocated a finite amount of money and it is then for the universities themselves to decide: how to distribute these places between faculties; the courses they offer; and how many of the total funded places will be available on each course. To give universities additional flexibility in student recruitment, the Scottish Funding Council allows universities to recruit up to 10% above the number of funded places awarded.

The Scottish Government firmly believes that access to university should be based on the ability to learn and not the ability to pay, however there is a need to exert a level of control over the higher education budget, which means that the number of students able to access a funded place is not unlimited. Our commitment to free tuition means that, unlike elsewhere in the UK, Scottish students studying in Scotland do not incur additional debt of up to £27,750, and average student loan debt for Scottish students is the lowest in the UK.

Question reference: S6W-12422

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 21 November 2022
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 5 December 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has any plans to procure the C-19 YRS app to help people with Long COVID manage their symptoms.

NHS National Services Scotland is currently conducting a procurement process to robustly assess digital products available to support the assessment and screening of people with long COVID, and determine which one is best placed to meet the needs highlighted by NHS Boards.

This national procurement process is expected to identify a preferred supplier shortly, after which licences for the selected product would be procured.

Question reference: S6W-12251

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Thursday, 17 November 2022
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 2 December 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will correct and republish Scotland's National Strategy for Economic Transformation, originally published on 1 March 2022, which incorrectly states that Scotland has "a quarter of Europe’s wind potential".