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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: S3W-16196

Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Jim Mather on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of local authority housing department staff is comprised of black and minority ethnic employees, broken down by local authority.

Question reference: S3W-16197

Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Jim Mather on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of local authority senior staff posts are filled by black and minority ethnic employees, broken down by local authority.

Question reference: S3W-16182

Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of the Scottish population is comprised of black and minority ethnic people, broken down by local authority area.

The most recent complete information is available from the last census, in 2001, when black and minority ethnic people were 2 per cent of the population of Scotland.

A breakdown by local authority area is given in table, Black and minority ethnic groups by Scottish local authority area (percentage of population), available in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 46538). The percentage of black and minority ethnic people ranged from 0.4 per cent in Orkney Islands to 5.5 per cent in Glasgow City.

Question reference: S3W-16195

Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by Jim Mather on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of local authority social work staff is comprised of black and minority ethnic employees, broken down by local authority.

The following table provides a breakdown of the percentage of local authority social work services staff who were reported as being of an ethnic minority in the Annual Local Authority Social Work Services Staffing Census for October 2007.

The ethnic minority group includes the following ethnic backgrounds: Mixed, Asian, Asian: Scottish, Asian: British, Asian: Indian, Asian: Pakistani, Asian: Bangladeshi, Asian: Chinese, Asian: Other, Black, Black: Scottish, Black: British, Black: Caribbean, Black: African, Black: Other, Other Ethnic Group

Also supplied is the percentage of staff for each local authority who were reported as having an unknown/not disclosed ethnicity.

Local Authority	Ethnic Group
Local Authority	Minority (%)	Not Known/Not Disclosed (%)
Aberdeen City Council	1.4	47.2
Aberdeenshire Council	0.3	47.6
Angus Council	0.0	2.3
Argyll and Bute Council	0.9	17.0
Clackmannanshire Council	0.6	10.9
Dumfries and Galloway Council	1.0	0.0
Dundee City Council	0.0	100.0
East Ayrshire Council	0.0	0.0
East Dunbartonshire Council	1.2	14.0
East Lothian Council	0.7	7.8
East Renfrewshire Council	0.6	0.3
City of Edinburgh Council	3.0	2.7
Comhairle nan Eilean Siar	0.0	100.0
Falkirk Council	0.1	36.1
Fife Council	0.8	7.3
Glasgow City Council	2.0	5.0
The Highland Council	0.0	100.0
Inverclyde Council	0.3	1.1
Midlothian Council	1.3	4.4
The Moray Council	0.2	69.3
North Ayrshire Council	0.1	38.9
North Lanarkshire Council	0.3	1.5
Orkney Islands Council	0.0	13.4
Perth and Kinross Council	0.5	8.1
Renfrewshire Council	1.4	0.0
Scottish Borders Council	0.1	24.3
Shetland Islands Council	0.7	37.1
South Ayrshire Council	0.1	0.0
South Lanarkshire Council	0.6	1.8
Stirling Council	1.0	19.4
West Dunbartonshire Council	0.0	100.0
West Lothian Council	1.1	19.4
Scotland	1.0	21.6

Source: Staff of Scottish Local Authority Social Work Services, 2007.

Notes:

Figures reported in the table should be treated with caution for the following reasons.

1. Overall for Scotland, the ethnicity of just over one fifth of staff (21.6%) was unknown/not disclosed in October 2007.

2. Information regarding the ethnic background for all staff in Dumfries and Galloway, Dundee City, Eilean Siar and West Dunbartonshire is currently not known/disclosed.

Question reference: S3W-16199

Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of its workforce is comprised of black and minority ethnic employees, broken down by directorate.

The following percentages of minority ethnic staff were employed by Scottish Government directorates at 1 September 2008.

Directorates	% of Minority Ethnic Staff
Economy	0.99
Education	1.02
Environment	0.64
Finance and Corporate Services	1.35
Health	0.44
Justice	1.39
Permanent Secretary	0.00
Total	0.99

Question reference: S3W-16198

Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 23 September 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what measures it is taking to achieve fair representation of black and minority ethnic employees in the local authority workforce, including fair representation in promoted posts.

Question reference: S3W-15738

Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 21 August 2008
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 26 August 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive, with a view to encouraging people to become active citizens and to empower them through language skills, whether it plans to extend classes in English for speakers of other languages for refugees and women and long-term residents from abroad.

The adult english for speakers of other languages (ESOL) strategy for Scotland, launched in March 2007 is for all Scottish residents for whom English is not a first language. This includes migrant workers, asylum seekers and refugees as well as settled minority ethnic communities.

In 2007-08 additional funding of £5 million was made available to colleges and community learning and development partnerships which has provided over 5,000 new ESOL places. Further additional funding of £9 million over the three-year period from 2008-11 is expected to create a further 7,000 places. Providers have therefore extended classes to the aforementioned groups of residents.

Question reference: S3W-13941

Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 05 June 2008
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 16 June 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive how many people have received direct payments for social care in each of the last five years, broken down by local authority area.

This information is available from the latest statistics release, Direct Payments Scotland 2007, which was published on the Internet on 25 September 2007. The document can be found using the following link:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Health/Publications.

A copy is also available in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 43799).

The Scottish Government is committed to radically improving the uptake of self-directed support. I recently convened a roundtable on self-directed support to inform government strategy in this area which will consider practical tools to achieve this aim.

Question reference: S3W-13232

Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 20 May 2008
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 29 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive when it intends to implement the recommendations on disclosure contained in Review of the Law and Practice of Disclosure in Criminal Proceedings in Scotland.

Question reference: S3W-13233

Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 20 May 2008
Current Status: Answered by Frank Mulholland on 28 May 2008

To ask the Scottish Executive what progress has been made in implementing recommendations 29 and 30 of The ACPOS and Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service working group formed to develop joint protocols, as recommended in the Bonomy Report.

Both recommendations relate to the disclosure of evidence in criminal proceedings by the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) and the Scottish police.

Recommendation 29 suggested that the police and COPFS should commit to a process of full disclosure in all solemn cases in connection with the implementation of High Court Reform in 2005.

Recommendation 30 suggested that COPFS should consider a pilot for routine disclosure of a summary of the Crown case in summary cases.

I am pleased to confirm that both recommendations have been implemented in full, Recommendation 29 was implemented in November 2004 when the then Lord Advocate Lord Boyd issued a Crown Practice Statement in relation to the disclosure of evidence by the Crown in High Court Cases.

The Crown Practice Statement took full effect from 1 January 2005 and continues to apply to all High Court cases indicted on or after 1 April 2005 and was extended to all solemn cases from 1 September 2005.

In relation to Recommendation 30, a successful pilot was conducted in Dumfries and Galloway in 2007 and the new process was rolled out nationally in September 2007 to support the Summary Justice Reform programme. All summary complaints now include a summary of evidence against the accused.