- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 20 November 2007
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Current Status:
Answered by Stewart Stevenson on 3 December 2007
To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S3W-4775 by John Swinney on 22 October 2007, whether it will consider introducing set criteria for designating land as greenspace.
Answer
The ScottishGovernment’s policy on open space is contained in
Scottish Planning Policy(SPP) 11: Open Space and Physical Activity, published earlier this month,available at:
www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2007/11/12152424/0.SPP 11 requires local authorities to prepare anaudit and strategy for open space. The development plan should identify andprotect open spaces which are valued and functional, or capable of beingbrought into functional use, and any other open space which contributes tolocal amenity, biodiversity or other planning objectives. Planning AdviceNote (PAN) 65: Planning and Open Space includes a typology of open spaceand can be viewed at www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2003/01/16188/16553.There is no intention at present to introduce further criteria for designatingland as greenspace.
- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 19 November 2007
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Current Status:
Answered by Maureen Watt on 28 November 2007
To ask the Scottish Executive how it ensures that people with learning difficulties are involved in the formulation of anti-bullying strategies.
Answer
Respectme, Scotland’s anti-bullying service, provides information, advice and training to supportthose working with children and young people on all aspects of bullying. Respectmehas developed a toolkit to support training, including an outline of specific issuessuch as bullying related to disabilities. Respectme is working with Enable,the voluntary organisation which represents children and young people with learningdisabilities and will continue this work to develop specific elements of the toolkitwhich will address bullying of people with learning disabilities in more detail.This toolkit will inform the development of anti-bullying policies across Scotland.
- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 19 November 2007
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Current Status:
Answered by Maureen Watt on 28 November 2007
To ask the Scottish Executive what support is available to children with learning difficulties who experience bullying in school.
Answer
Respect
me, Scotland’s anti-bullying service, provides advice, information and training to supportthose who work with children and young people in dealing effectively with incidentsof bullying.
In addition, the ScottishGovernment provides funding to ChildLine Scotland for the bullying helpline which offers free advice and support to thosebeing bullied.
Scottish local authoritiesand schools have a range of methods of supporting children and young people whoare bullied in school. In some circumstances being bullied or bullying another pupilmay affect a pupil’s education and a need for additional support may arise. TheEducation (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004 provides a framework for the provision of this support.
- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 19 November 2007
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Current Status:
Answered by Maureen Watt on 28 November 2007
To ask the Scottish Executive how many reports of bullying of children with learning difficulties were reported in each year since 2002, broken down by local education authority.
Answer
The information requestedis not held centrally.
- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 07 November 2007
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Current Status:
Answered by Nicola Sturgeon on 15 November 2007
To ask the Scottish Executive whether the planned provision of accident and emergency units in Glasgow will be reviewed in light of the recent forecast of a higher than expected rise in the Scottish population.
Answer
I have made it clearthat there will not be a general review of service changes that have already beenmade in the NHS. NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde’s proposals for the modernisation of hospital services in Glasgow, which will also see the reconfiguration of accidentand emergency services, are now well underway.
The board’s strategyis intended to provide an appropriate network of emergency services in modern fit-for-purposefacilities. The board still has some way to go until its proposals are fully implementedand I expect it to continue to keep factors affecting demand for health care services,such as population change, under review as it takes this work forward.
- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 12 October 2007
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Current Status:
Answered by Fergus Ewing on 7 November 2007
To ask the Scottish Executive how many convictions for offences under the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 there have been in each year since 1999.
Answer
The available informationis given in the following table.
Persons with a ChargeProved for an Offence Under the Dangerous Dogs Act 19911, 1999-2000 -2005-06.
| | Number of Persons |
| 1999-2000 | 47 |
| 2000-01 | 36 |
| 2001-02 | 26 |
| 2002-03 | 37 |
| 2003-04 | 48 |
| 2004-05 | 52 |
| 2005-06 | 48 |
Note: 1. Wheremain offence.
- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 October 2007
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Current Status:
Answered by John Swinney on 5 November 2007
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has undertaken or will undertake a comparative study of the savings that would have been made to existing PFI/PPP projects by using a Scottish futures trust.
Answer
As part of our workon developing the Scottish futures trust (SFT) initiative, we have been comparingthe cost of existing PFI/PPP projects with what we consider may be available throughthe SFT. This has confirmed our view that the “standard form” of PFI is expensive,and it justifies our continuing efforts to introduce an alternative which will deliverbetter value arrangements for major public infrastructure projects.
- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 October 2007
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Current Status:
Answered by John Swinney on 5 November 2007
To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S3W-3715 by John Swinney on 11 September 2007, what the total cost to the taxpayer will be of all existing PFI/PPP projects, broken down into (a) capital construction, (b) lifecycle maintenance and (c) facilities management.
Answer
As you mention, thetotal cost of all PPP projects over the whole length of their contracts (the unitarycharge) was provided in a previous answer, and that figure was £22.3 billion. Theunitary charge is the amount paid by the public sector procuring body to the privatesector consortium for all the integrated services it provides over the length of the contract. The services include capital construction, lifecycle maintenance andfacilities management, as well as the upfront construction cost of the asset.
The information requestedfor every existing PPP project is not held centrally.
- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 October 2007
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Current Status:
Answered by John Swinney on 5 November 2007
To ask the Scottish Executive what savings are envisaged through the use of a Scottish futures trust.
Answer
Our Scottish FuturesTrust (SFT) initiative will seek to deliver better value arrangements for majorpublic infrastructure projects. I am confident that through SFT we will deliverinfrastructure investment cheaper than using the expensive “standard form” of PFI.Work on the SFT is continuing.
- Asked by: Bill Kidd, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 October 2007
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Current Status:
Answered by Jim Mather on 1 November 2007
To ask the Scottish Executive what the associated costs are of the provision of private health care by Westfield Health to staff of Scottish Enterprise.
Answer
The provision of benefitsto staff within the total reward package is an operational matter for Scottish Enterprise.
I have asked the Chief Executive at Scottish Enterprise to write to you on this matter.
