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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: S5W-29372

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 May 2020
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 2 June 2020

To ask the Scottish Government how many unique visitors have been recorded to the managingourwaste.scot/ website on each day since it launched.

Details for number of unique visitors to the website are in the following table for date range 27 April 2020 - 27 May 2020

Date	Number of unique visitors
27 April	7,529
28 April	10,855
29 April	7,003
30 April	5,347
1 May	4,704
2 May	4,396
3 May	4,756
4 May	4,415
5 May	6,513
6 May	5,283
7 May	4,490
8 May	3,791
9 May	3,792
10 May	4,409
11 May	3,907
12 May	3,895
13 May	3,367
14 May	3,878
15 May	3,207
16 May	3,122
17 May	3,557
18 May	3,185
19 May	2,968
20 May	3,298
21 May	3,256
22 May	2,923
23 May	2,906
24 May	2,913
25 May	2,866
26 May	2,769
27 May	2,798

Question reference: S5O-04382

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 27 May 2020
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 4 June 2020

To ask the Scottish Government when a review will be carried out of the impact that the COVID-19 outbreak has had on it meeting its environmental targets.

Question reference: S5W-28966

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 11 May 2020
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 27 May 2020

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to ensure that COVID-19 support measures are made available to estate agents that are not solicitors and whose firms do not meet rateable value criteria.

The Scottish Government is determined to support businesses during this time, and we are delivering a package of support worth £2.3 billion for businesses who can now claim rates relief and apply for grants to help them deal with the impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.

Estate agents will be able to benefit from the 1.6% universal rates relief in 2020-21, which will apply automatically to their non-domestic rates bills.

Estate agents may also be eligible for the Small Business Grant scheme for premises in receipt of the Small Business Bonus Scheme (SBBS), or eligible for the SBBS but in receipt of a range of other reliefs.

In addition, the Business Support Grant scheme guidance provides an element of discretion which local authorities may use to ensure that the grant reaches those business ratepayers in need and directly affected by COVID-19. This includes the discretion to award a grant to a property if they are satisfied that it is engaged solely or mainly in the marketing of property and not the provision of financial and/or legal services, and provided other qualifying criteria are met for the grant. This is subject to the local authority being satisfied with the validity and eligibility of individual cases.

Question reference: S5W-28327

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 14 April 2020
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 12 May 2020

To ask the Scottish Government how many enquiries it has received from businesses regarding the payment of support grants on a per-property basis during the COVID-19 outbreak.

The Scottish Government has received a large volume of correspondence on a range of topics in relation to the package of support for business in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The correspondence system does not categorise individual cases in a way which would allow us to distinguish those ‘regarding the payment of support grants on a per-property basis during the COVID-19 outbreak’. In addition, few correspondents write to the Scottish Government on a single issue and it would therefore not be possible to manually categorise them all.

The administration of the scheme, and the awarding of grants, is being managed by local authorities. Queries in relation to the eligibility of additional properties should be raised with them directly.

Question reference: S5W-28326

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 14 April 2020
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 12 May 2020

To ask the Scottish Government how many multi-site businesses there are in hospitality, leisure and retail sector with a rateable value between £18,000 and £51,000, and what the average number of premises per multi-site business is within this range.

The valuation of all non-domestic property is a matter for the independent assessors, and local authorities are responsible for administering the system and the awarding of the grant schemes. Billing information is held by local authorities, and they provide this to the Scottish Government on a periodical basis for statistical purposes. This information, and property data extracted from the assessors portal, has been used to estimate the number of unique ratepayers. However, it is recognised that there are limitations in the analysis, and that individual property details may have changed since the data was provided or that different local authorities may have different contact details for the same multi-site businesses.

According to data from the valuation roll as at 1 January 2020, we estimate that there are up to 800 unique ratepayers eligible for more than one Retail, Hospitality Leisure Grant (RHL Grant). The average number of qualifying premises per multi-site business is estimated to be 3 with a maximum of 21. The grant scheme is subject to compliance with EU State Aid Rules .

Question reference: S5W-28325

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 14 April 2020
Current Status: Answered by Kate Forbes on 12 May 2020

To ask the Scottish Government how much it would cost to support multi-site businesses in the hospitality, leisure and retail sector with a rateable value between £18,000 and £51,000 to provide them with a £25,000 grant on a per-property basis during the COVID-19 outbreak.

Businesses in the Retail, Hospitality and Leisure sectors, operating in a premises with a rateable value between £18,001 and £51,000, will be eligible for a £25,000 grant on their first eligible property.

Following my announcement of Phase 2 of the Business Grants Funding Scheme on 15 April, grants of £18,750 will be available on any additional qualifying properties that a ratepayer may have. The expanded scheme opened for applications on 5 May.

The estimated total cost of the Retail, Hospitality and Leisure Grant is £275 million - this includes an estimated £30 million to extend the support and provide grants of £18,750 to any additional qualifying Retail, Hospitality and Leisure properties that a ratepayer may have.

According to data from the valuation roll as at 1 January 2020, we estimate that the cost of providing a £25,000 Retail, Hospitality Leisure Grant, per property, for multiple properties would be an additional £10 million.

Question reference: S5W-28458

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 April 2020
Current Status: Answered by Ben Macpherson on 7 May 2020

To ask the Scottish Government how many applications to the COVID-19 Business Support Fund (a) have been received and (b) are currently outstanding in each local authority area.

The number of applications to the COVID-19 Business Support Fund which have been received in each local authority area is available at: https://www.gov.scot/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-business-support-fund-grant-statistics/ . We understand councils are dealing with a large volume of invalid applications, which for example omit vital information such as bank details or addresses. As such, councils cannot robustly report the number of outstanding applications at this stage.

Question reference: S5W-28459

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 April 2020
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 7 May 2020

To ask the Scottish Government how many businesses have received a COVID-19 Business Support Fund award, and how much has been awarded, broken down by local authority area.

Question reference: S5W-28705

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 27 April 2020
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 6 May 2020

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will review the full business and regulatory impact assessment for the deposit return scheme in light of the COVID-19 outbreak.

The final Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment (BRIA) for Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme (DRS), published alongside the final DRS Regulations, sets out the strong economic case for proceeding with DRS. We do not intend to review the BRIA at this stage of the COVID-19 outbreak. However, we will continue to monitor closely the impact of COVID-19 on industry’s ability to progress the steps that are needed to bring the scheme into operation.

Question reference: S5W-28706

Asked by: Maurice Golden, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 27 April 2020
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 6 May 2020

To ask the Scottish Government what impact the COVID-19 outbreak could have on the design and implementation of the proposed deposit return scheme, and what its position is on whether there is now a case for greater flexibility in its design.