- Asked by: Fiona Hyslop, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 05 November 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Jim Wallace on 19 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive how many overseas students have applied for extended visas to study in Scottish universities, broken down by university and country of application.
Answer
The Scottish Executive has no functions in relation to UK immigration policy. UK Visas have confirmed that the information requested is not held centrally.
- Asked by: Fiona Hyslop, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 November 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 11 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what its definition is of targeted spend on capital projects compared to actual capital spend.
Answer
We do notuse the term “targeted spend”, so there is no formal definition within ourpublic expenditure framework.
Of course,our spending is targeted on our key priorities, as set out in the PartnershipAgreement and in Building a Better Scotland: Enterprise Opportunity and Fairness. Growing the Economy; DeliveringExcellent Public Services; Supporting Stronger, Safer Communities andDeveloping a Confident, Democratic Scotland–these are the issues that matter to the Scottish People, and it isright that this is where we should concentrate our resources.
Our capitalbudget is published in the annual budget documents, and actual spend is thenreported in the Executive’s accounts and when we report End Year Flexibilitynumbers to the Parliament.
For2003-04, the latest year for which provisional data is available, the DEL capital budget at the start of the year was £1.42 billion,and the actual spend by year end was £1.35 billion.
- Asked by: Fiona Hyslop, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 15 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Peter Peacock on 10 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive whether any restrictions exist for newly-qualified teachers gaining a probationer position in Scotland who completed their initial teacher education in England and Wales, as compared to those who completed their initial teacher education in Scotland.
Answer
Yes; only teachers who have graduated from Scottish Higher Education Institutions with a Teaching Qualification whose training has been publicly funded are eligible for a probationer post on the Teacher Induction Scheme. However, the Teacher Induction Scheme is not the only route into the teaching profession in Scotland. Newly qualified teachers from England and Wales, once registeredwith the General Teaching Council for Scotland, can apply to local authorities to work as a probationer teacher on a supply basis or on a temporary contract.
- Asked by: Fiona Hyslop, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 14 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Peter Peacock on 10 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive, with reference to news release SEed237/2003 on 10 June 2003 on its teacher induction scheme, how many of the probationer teachers referred to completed their initial teacher education course in Scotland.
Answer
All of the probationer teachers referred to in news release SEed237/2003 completed their initial teacher education course in Scotland.
- Asked by: Fiona Hyslop, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 14 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Peter Peacock on 10 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive how many Scottish students studying initial teacher education in England and Wales gained employment in Scotland in the year immediately following the completion of their course.
Answer
This information is not held centrally.
- Asked by: Fiona Hyslop, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Johann Lamont on 4 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what measures it is taking to ensure that development of brownfield sites provides for satisfactory disposal of asbestos.
Answer
We have published planning advice to local authorities on the development of contaminated land.
Where planning applications are approved, conditions should be included to ensure that any contaminated land is remediated before the commencement of any new use. In that regard, planning conditions can be used to require the safe removal of asbestos.
- Asked by: Fiona Hyslop, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 05 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Peter Peacock on 2 November 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what its estimate is of the percentage of the specific grants figure given in table 5.01 of Building a Better Scotland Spending Proposals 2005-2008 which relates to the estimated drawdown of school PPP payments for each of the years in the spending proposals.
Answer
Table 3.05 of The Scottish Executive: Draft Budget 2005-06 sets out the spending plans in support of PPP.
- Asked by: Fiona Hyslop, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Andy Kerr on 28 October 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what measures it will take to improve the accountability of NHS boards to ministers and MSPs.
Answer
NHS boards are accountable through ministers to the Parliament. To strengthen this, I recently announced that I would personally hold the annual performance review meeting for each health board in Scotland and that these meetings would take place in public. It is also important that we have strong local accountability and I want the NHS to be more open with local people. We now require that health boards must deliver improved public involvement and co-operateon a regional level.
- Asked by: Fiona Hyslop, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 05 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Peter Peacock on 28 October 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive how many of the school developments in target 6 of the Education and Young People section of Building a Better Scotland Spending Proposals 2005-2008 will be (a) PPP and (b) public sector-led.
Answer
Since the contents of many of the 29 school PPP projects are still to be finalised by education authorities, it is not possible to predict how many of the 300 new or substantially refurbished schools referred to in target 6 will be funded through PPP projects or otherwise.
- Asked by: Fiona Hyslop, MSP for Lothians, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 05 October 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Peter Peacock on 28 October 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive whether, in seeking to maintain part-time nursery provision as referred to in the Education and Young People section of Building a Better Scotland Spending Proposals 2005-2008, it will investigate the possibility of providing full-time early years education for every three and four-year-old.
Answer
The Scottish Executive keeps its policy on further developing pre-school provision under constant review. However, at this time, there are no plans to provide full-time early years education for every three and four year old.