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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.

Find out more about parliamentary questions

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Question reference: S6W-36130

Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow Southside, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 25 March 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 22 April 2025

To ask the Scottish Government how it plans to use its role as a climate leader to advocate for debt cancellation as part of climate justice in the run-up to COP30.

Question reference: S6W-36131

Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow Southside, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 25 March 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 22 April 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what its future plans are to further champion climate justice at international events, including in relation to the growing debt crisis faced by many climate vulnerable countries.

Question reference: S6W-36129

Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow Southside, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 25 March 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 22 April 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to attend the forthcoming Financing For Development summit in Seville.

Question reference: S6W-36128

Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow Southside, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 25 March 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 22 April 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to support calls for debt justice for any countries that are required to take on debt to recover from climate disasters and climate-related loss and damage.

Question reference: S6W-36132

Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow Southside, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 25 March 2025
Current Status: Answer expected on 22 April 2025

To ask the Scottish Government whether it supports calls for global debt cancellation to be a key pillar of the UN Loss and Damage Fund, ensuring that climate-vulnerable nations are not required to take on more debt to recover from climate disasters.

Question reference: S6W-35237

Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow Southside, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 26 February 2025
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 11 March 2025

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it is having with Glasgow City Council to secure the future of the Glasgow School of Sport.

Question reference: S6W-29653

Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow Southside, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 06 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Natalie Don-Innes on 23 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, regarding how such a policy could apply in Scotland, what assessment it has made of the Welsh Government’s legislative proposal to remove profit from the care of looked after children.

The Promise is clear that there is no place for profiting in how Scotland cares for its children and the Scottish Government supports this principle.

The Scottish Government meets with the UK Government, the Welsh Government and the Northern Ireland Executive on a regular basis to discuss children’s residential care policy, including profit from care.

Although we have not undertaken a formal assessment of the Welsh Government’s legislative proposals, we continue to engage with the Welsh Government as these develop.

The Scottish Government, working alongside COSLA and local government, will consider what further steps could be taken in Scotland, including through legislation.

Question reference: S6W-29651

Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow Southside, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 06 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Natalie Don-Innes on 23 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how many foster agencies are operational in Scotland, and, of these, how many are owned by (a) local authorities, (b) voluntary organisations and (c) private entities.

Fostering services in Scotland can be owned and operated by local authorities, or third sector not-for-profit organisations. The Care Inspectorate publish quarterly statistics, which includes the number of registered fostering agencies in Scotland. The most recent data was published on 15 August 2024, there are 57 fostering services in Scotland registered with the Care Inspectorate, made up of 32 local authority services and 25 voluntary/not-for-profit organisations.

The link to the most recent statistics is here:

Quarterly Statistical Summary Report - Qtr 1 (2024/25) (careinspectorate.com)

Question reference: S6W-29641

Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow Southside, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 06 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Natalie Don-Innes on 23 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government whether all local authorities record instances of looked after children being separated from siblings, and, if not, which local authorities do not yet do so, and by when it anticipates that all local authorities will routinely record this data.

The Scottish Government’s National Practice Guidance on siblings and the Looked after Children (Scotland) Regulations 2009 highlights the importance of recording information about a child’s brothers and sisters.

From 2023-2024, data reported by all local authorities to Scottish Government as part of their annual Looked after Children Statistics (CLAS) return will include data on the number of siblings living apart from each other.

Question reference: S6W-29643

Asked by: Nicola Sturgeon, MSP for Glasgow Southside, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Friday, 06 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Natalie Don-Innes on 23 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government which local authorities have ended the practice of excluding looked after or care experienced children from school, and by what date it anticipates that all local authorities will have done so.

The latest statistics on exclusions of looked after or care-experienced children show that there were no exclusions of children looked after in the last year in 2022-23 in Orkney Islands. Exclusions rates per 1,000 pupils who were looked after ranged from 7.4 per 1,000 to 291.2 per 1,000 in other local authority areas.

The legal power to exclude children or young people from school rests with the relevant local authority and therefore it is the responsibility of the local authority to have regard to the particular facts and circumstances of each case when deciding if exclusion is necessary. Our national guidance, Included, Engaged and Involved Part 2, is already clear that exclusion should be used as a measure of last resort and that there are particular considerations before the exclusion of care experienced young people.

The Promise Implementation Plan sets out the commitment to support attendance and reduce exclusion of care experienced children from education. To support local authorities to meet the commitment in the implementation plan, we have developed a Framework which aims to focus on improving the educational outcomes of care experienced children and young people which include increased attendance and reduced exclusion. This Framework has recently been tested in nine local authorities and the outcomes are being considered and will be discussed with COSLA and the Association of Directors of Education in due course to inform any future roll out. In addition, in August 2024, the Scottish Government published a new three-year action plan on relationships and behaviour in schools, setting out 20 actions to support efforts to improve relationships and behaviour, which will contribute to efforts to reduce exclusions by maintaining and further embedding our approach to relational approaches and promoting positive relationships and behaviour.