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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-05946

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Thursday, 27 January 2022
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 7 February 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what action Police Scotland is taking to reduce the number of police officer and staff working days lost due to poor mental health.

The provision of Health and Wellbeing services, for the police workforce, is a matter for the Chief Constable.

Police officers and staff can access a range of services to care for their psychological, physical, social and financial wellbeing through Police Scotland's “Your Wellbeing Matters” programme. Police Scotland have a network of ‘Wellbeing Champions’ who offer Officers and Staff guidance and signposting to the most appropriate support available to them. These support services include occupational health and the HELP employee assistance programme which offer counselling, specific interventions and guidance. Police Scotland offer post traumatic support for all police officers and members of police staff who are directly involved in potentially traumatic incidents through the Trauma Risk Management programme (TRiM). Mental health is also very much the focus of health and wellbeing training offering at present, Police Scotland are working with 2 delivery partners, ELEOS and Lifelines Scotland, on a weekly schedule of training activity. The training aims to raise awareness and support the emotional and psychological wellbeing of the Police workforce.

Question reference: S6O-00753

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 February 2022
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 10 February 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on when it expects college and university students to be able to return to full-time face-to-face learning.

Question reference: S6W-05818

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 January 2022
Current Status: Answered by Patrick Harvie on 2 February 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many homes have received energy saving help from it in each of the last five years, also broken down by (a) local authority area and (b) the government schemes involved in providing the help or fuel poverty relief.

The Scottish Government has provided support to households for energy saving measures through a number of support and advice schemes over the last 5 years. Home Energy Scotland, administered on behalf of the Scottish Government through Energy Saving Trust, acts as a single point of access for advice on sustainable energy and fuel poverty support in Scotland. We also offer support and advice through other Scottish Government schemes providing energy saving help or fuel poverty relief to households. The information on these schemes has been provided to the Scottish Parliament Information Centre at BIB number 63123.

Question reference: S6W-05192

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 12 January 2022
Current Status: Answered by Tom Arthur on 24 January 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether newspaper publishing businesses will be eligible for the business rates relief extension announced by the Cabinet Secretary for Finance on 10 December 2021 and, if not, what financial support will be available to such businesses from March 2022.

Since the start of the pandemic, businesses in Scotland have benefitted from more than £4.4 billion in support. This includes COVID-19 non-domestic rates reliefs which have saved businesses around £1.6 billion in reduced rates bills since 1 April 2020.

The Scottish Budget maintains a generous non-domestic regime in Scotland for 2022-23 and supports a package of reliefs worth an estimated £802 million. This includes for businesses in the retail, hospitality and leisure sectors continuing relief at 50% for the first three months of 2022-23, capped at £27,500 per ratepayer. This responds to a key ask from the business community to avoid a cliff edge return to full rates liability for those businesses on 31 March 2022. The property uses eligible for this relief in 2022-23 will be unchanged from 2021-22. Properties used wholly or mainly for news publishing will continue to be eligible for this relief.

Question reference: S6W-05655

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 11 January 2022
Current Status: Answered by Mairi McAllan on 19 January 2022

To ask the Scottish Government (a) whether it has provided or (b) when it will provide a full response to the previous parliamentary session's Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform Committee’s Inquiry into Regional Marine Planning, as committed to in the Minister for Rural Affairs and the Natural Environment’s letter to the Committee of 23 March 2021.

We welcomed the previous Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform (ECCLR) Committee’s Inquiry report into regional marine planning. This report and its 29 recommendations have been carefully considered to help inform our future approach to regional marine planning. There will be a formal response to the ECCLR inquiry, with individual responses to each recommendation, made in advance of an announcement about the next steps for marine planning in Spring 2022.

Question reference: S6O-00623

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 22 December 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 13 January 2022

To ask the Scottish Government when it last met NHS Orkney and what issues were discussed.

Question reference: S6O-00633

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 12 January 2022
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 19 January 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the date by which self-referral for over-70s to the breast screening programme will resume.

Question reference: S6W-05102

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 13 December 2021
Current Status: Answered by Graeme Dey on 5 January 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how much Highlands and Islands Airports Limited's (HIAL) Air Traffic Management System project has cost to date.

Question reference: S6W-05103

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 13 December 2021
Current Status: Answered by Graeme Dey on 5 January 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether Highlands and Islands Airports Ltd (HIAL) procurement under the Air Traffic Management System project has been cancelled and, if so, for what reason.

HIAL’s Air Traffic Management 2030 Strategy (ATMS) is a long-term programme consisting of numerous different individual projects. Some of these projects include one or more procurement exercises. Across the programme as a whole some procurement exercises have concluded, some are ongoing and some have not started yet.

Following the announcement of the joint agreement between HIAL and Prospect to establish a new way forward, HIAL contacted those companies involved in the Remote Tower procurement to confirm that the tender exercise had been cancelled. HIAL felt it would be inappropriate and unfair to expect tenderers to remain engaged in the procurement process in circumstances where the timescale for, and scope and extent of possible future remote air traffic provision is unclear.

Question reference: S6W-04874

Asked by: Liam McArthur, MSP for Orkney Islands, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 06 December 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 20 December 2021

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-04128 by Humza Yousaf on 30 November 2021, whether it will provide a specific date for the expected availability of COVID-19 booster vaccination information on the vaccine passport app, and through the NHS Portal.