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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-28685

Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 23 July 2024
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Jim Fairlie on 8 August 2024

To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to review its position on the authorisation of Asulox in bracken control, in light of reports that farmers and crofters are struggling to control the spread of bracken.

No application for the use of Asulox during 2024 was submitted.

Asulam, the active substance in Asulox, has been withdrawn in the UK for over 15 years. For 10 years Asulox was approved annually as an emergency authorisation, for limited and controlled use each season, following application by the Bracken Control Group. An application must be submitted in order for emergency authorisation to be considered. Emergency authorisation applications are then assessed on a case-by-case basis against the legislative requirements.

Question reference: S6W-28570

Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 12 July 2024
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 7 August 2024

To ask the Scottish Government by what date the MV (a) Isle of Islay and (b) Loch Indaal will be fully operational.

The planned in-service dates provided by CMAL in the June 2024 update to the NZET Committee were end November 2024 for MV Isle of Islay and end March 2025 for MV Loch Indaal.

Transport Scotland, CMAL and CalMac will keep these dates under review as the vessel builds progress. The dates will be subject to successful completion of construction, now entering the complex systems commissioning phases, and further crew familiarisation and berthing trails upon arrival in Scottish waters.

Further updates will be provided to Parliament in due course.

Question reference: S6W-28690

Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 24 July 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 31 July 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-28192 by Jenny Gilruth on 1 July 2024, whether it can confirm that there were no participants in the November 2023 Computing Science week from (a) Argyll and Bute Council, (b) Orkney Islands Council and (c) West Dunbartonshire Council.

Question reference: S6W-28256

Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 19 June 2024
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 10 July 2024

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on how many (a) public and (b) private electric vehicle charging points there currently are in each local authority area.

The Scottish Government does not hold information relating to the total number of public or private electric vehicle (EV) charge points in each local authority area. Information about public EV charge points in each of Scotland’s local authority areas can be found in the UK Government's Department for Transport’s ‘Electric vehicle charging device statistics’ which are published on a quarterly basis. The next quarterly report is scheduled for release in July 2024.

There are no publicly available statistics on the number of private charging devices in Scotland, such as those in workplaces, fleet depots and at residential properties.

Question reference: S6W-28238

Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 18 June 2024
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 4 July 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how much has been distributed to projects from the Scottish Landfill Communities Fund in each local authority area in each of the last five years.

The Scottish Landfill Communities Fund is a tax credit scheme, linked to Scottish Landfill Tax. Contributions are provided directly by landfill operators to Approved Bodies, which are then responsible for awarding funding to projects throughout Scotland. The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) regulates the fund on behalf of Revenue Scotland, which has overall responsibility for it.

SEPA reports that £28,011,069 was distributed to community projects from the SLCF over the five-year period from 2019 to 2023. The following table breaks this down by local authority area.

Local Authority Area	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023
Aberdeen City	£17,622.00	£38,400.00	£0.00	£500.00	£50,000.00
Aberdeenshire	£191,231.00	£186,247.49	£397,258.83	£227,462.59	£478,971.75
Angus	£53,073.00	£56,469.51	£28,566.72	£108,403.00	£53,442.00
Argyll and Bute	£164,430.00	£224,378.00	£211,050.26	£214,542.32	£114,000.00
Clackmannanshire	£49,941.00	£35,137.00	£82,253.00	£90,825.00	£31,392.27
Dumfries and Galloway	£175,558.80	£46,670.48	£80,736.00	£86,936.08	£56,000.00
Dundee	£50,000.00	£61,669.00	£0.00	£30,000.00	£198,480.56
East Ayrshire	£181,297.50	£524,443.00	£134,088.00	£39,955.00	£217,076.71
East Dunbartonshire	£13,466.00	£0.00	£6,336.00	£20,000.00	£0.00
East Lothian	£65,687.00	£31,322.00	£118,756.82	£73,873.00	£49,875.00
East Renfrewshire	£0.00	£0.00	£0.00	£15,000.00	£25,000.00
Edinburgh (city of)	£94,119.00	£53,148.74	£20,000.00	£114,312.00	£14,332.00
Falkirk	£449,805.75	£134,200.00	£364,091.00	£294,945.60	£572,354.00
Fife	£1,221,451.43	£876,978.52	£1,099,825.39	£864,590.13	£785,606.06
Glasgow	£567,525.24	£276,213.04	£180,980.00	£597,477.20	£1,052,507.86
Highland	£427,945.43	£291,772.15	£456,228.06	£238,308.99	£222,182.05
Inverclyde	£0.00	£23,000.00	£106,000.00	£42,614.00	£60,430.00
Midlothian	£182,673.93	£70,434.00	£226,137.00	£164,013.80	£87,319.90
Moray	£267,300.59	£57,850.00	£153,946.56	£133,695.00	£299,400.00
North Ayrshire	£356,257.00	£734,617.00	£224,929.00	£39,579.40	£231,216.00
North Lanarkshire	£319,927.01	£215,000.00	£422,225.03	£143,108.00	£261,446.84
Orkney Islands	£27,109.00	£0.00	£0.00	£0.00	£10,504.93
Perth and Kinross	£180,639.00	£174,557.00	£182,785.00	£117,339.48	£106,403.00
Renfrewshire	£96,500.00	£24,000.00	£26,250.00	£29,868.00	£89,555.89
Scottish Borders	£297,130.00	£270,556.00	£75,715.00	£21,500.00	£79,922.00
Shetland Islands	£54,851.00	£0.00	£19,502.00	£0.00	£0.00
South Ayrshire	£122,695.05	£7,820.00	£81,718.50	£45,000.00	£27,220.00
South Lanarkshire	£229,611.56	£220,192.40	£346,471.49	£329,874.81	£328,245.00
Stirling	£64,013.97	£98,126.00	£264,508.00	£133,785.00	£182,859.28
West Dunbartonshire	£125,000.00	£92,477.29	£131,121.60	£69,700.00	£104,481.00
West Lothian	£170,939.01	£234,352.90	£200,434.80	£180,127.80	£492,908.90
Na h-Eileanan an lar	£75,635.97	£56,147.20	£99,857.14	£31,899.55	£77,314.10

Question reference: S6W-28237

Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 18 June 2024
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 4 July 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to reported concerns from projects in Scotland regarding an anticipated future decrease in the Scottish Landfill Communities Fund, and what action it plans to take to mitigate any loss of funding.

The Scottish Landfill Communities Fund has played an important role in funding community and environmental projects across Scotland.

The Scottish Government recognises that the forecast decline in landfill tax revenues, which reflect the policy intent to reduce the volume of waste sent to landfill, will reduce the contributions that landfill operators make to the Fund. We are therefore carefully considering future arrangements for the Fund, working with Revenue Scotland and the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency.

Question reference: S6W-28192

Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 14 June 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 1 July 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-27321 by Jenny Gilruth on 17 May 2024, whether it will provide details of the schools that participated in Education Scotland’s Computing Science Scotland Week in 2023, broken down by local authority.

Based on registrations for November 2023 Computing Science week, the numbers provided in S6W-27321 are the accurate number of schools registered for each event during this week. It is difficult to be definitive on how many schools engaged as schools may also have participated by watching the recordings of sessions or by creating their own activities.

Number of schools	CS Event
LA	Data Selfie	GD 1	Code	AI	Game 1	Game 2	Apps	GD 2	Data	1st level 1	2	3	Total
Aberdeen City Council	1	2		1		2		2		1	1	1	11
Aberdeenshire Council	2				1		4		2		1		10
Angus Council		3			1			2		1		2	9
City of Edinburgh Council	7	5	2	5	7	4	11	8	5		1		55
Clackmannanshire Council				1		1	1		2				5
Comhairle nan Eilean Siar			1										1
Dumfries and Galloway Council	1	3	1	3	5	3	2	4	2				24
Dundee City Council	1	4	1		2	2	2	2	1	2	2	2	21
East Ayrshire Council		2		2									4
East Dunbartonshire Council		3		1	2	2	1	3		1	1	1	15
East Lothian Council	3	2				1	1	2	2			1	12
East Renfrewshire Council	1	6		3	2	4	2	5	3				26
Falkirk Council	4	6	2	2	2	4	4	5	6		2		37
Fife Council	3	5		6	2	3	1	4	1		1	1	27
Glasgow City Council	3	4	1	3	2	6	3	3	4				29
Inverclyde Council	1	4	1		1	3	3	3	2	1	2	1	22
Midlothian Council	1	2		1	1	3	1	3	1				13
North Ayrshire Council	2				2	1			3				8
North Lanarkshire Council	2	2	2	5	6	14	4	4	2				41
Perth and Kinross Council	2	3	2	2	2	3	2	3	2		4	1	26
Renfrewshire Council	2	2	1	1	3	2	1	2					14
Scottish Borders Council	5	1	2	2	2	4	7		1	2	1	2	29
Shetland Islands Council				2	3	2	2		4	1	1	3	18
South Ayrshire Council	2	2	2	2	3	3	2	2	3	1	1	1	24
South Lanarkshire Council	5	5		2	4	4	6	4	8	5	6	5	54
Stirling Council	2	1		2	2	2	1		3	2	4	1	20
The Highland Council					1	2							3
The Moray Council			1		3	2					1		7
West Lothian Council	11	15	1	7	6	8	6	13	7		2	1	77
Grand Total	61	82	20	53	65	85	67	74	65	17	31	23	642

Question reference: S6W-28194

Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 14 June 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 28 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-27321 by Jenny Gilruth on 17 May 2024, what steps Education Scotland will take to encourage more schools to participate in Computing Science Scotland Week, should it proceed again in 2024.

Education Scotland will continue to work with local authorities and external partners to promote themed weeks. Dates will be promoted from August 2024, through our networks (Computing Science and Primary Computing Science networks on Glow, Local Authority National Technologies Network, professional networks such as ADICOS, Computing at Schools and CompEdnet), stakeholders and Education Scotland and Digilernscot social media.

Question reference: S6W-28193

Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 14 June 2024
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 28 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-27321 by Jenny Gilruth on 17 May 2024, whether Education Scotland will hold Computing Science Scotland Week in 2024.

Education Scotland will hold another Computing Science Event in November 2024. This year there will be 2 weeks – week 1 (4 to 8) will be targeted at computational thinking / no code/low code creative computing activities focusing on ELC and Primary and week 2 (11 to 15) will be focussed on coding activities for primary and secondary. Education Scotland will also be hosting 3 Computing Science Conferences (West, Central and North locations tbc) on 16 November 2024.

Question reference: S6W-28189

Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 14 June 2024
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Paul McLennan on 26 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government whether it still plans to undertake a review of the short-term let licensing scheme by late spring 2024 to assess how the scheme is working in practice, as it has previously committed to.

The implementation update will be published later in July instead of June. I also refer the member to the answer to question S6W-27717 on 4 June 2024 in relation to the monitoring work. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers