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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-25537

Asked by: Alison Johnstone, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 27 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 10 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what it is doing to better support people with Alzheimer’s.

The Scottish Government continues to take national action through our 2017-2020 National Dementia Strategy to improve services and supports for everyone with dementia, including those with Alzheimer’s disease.

This includes national workforce development support through our two national dementia workforce programmes, Promoting Excellence and Connecting People, Connecting Support , to help staff and services provide care across all care settings in accordance with the national dementia care standards.

As part of the 21 commitments set out in the aforementioned strategy, we are also supporting Integration Joint Boards in the delivery of the national dementia post-diagnostic HEAT Standard; we are taking national action to continue to improve the quality of dementia care in care homes; and we are supporting modernisation of specialist NHS dementia care in accordance with the independent expert report we commissioned which was published in 2018.

We are also supporting expansion of the Dementia Champions programme to help improve dementia care at the front line of acute hospital care, and in partnership with Health Boards and Alzheimer Scotland we are continuing to fund a Dementia Nurse Consultant in each Board to support Board-wide improvements in acute and associated dementia care.

In addition, we are piloting the provision of dementia post-diagnostic support in primary care in Edinburgh, Nithsdale and Shetland; and we are piloting intensive, integrated home care for people with complex dementia and other health and social care needs in Inverclyde. Both pilot projects will be independently evaluated.

Programme for Government 2019-2020 set out the Scottish Government’s plans to develop a fourth National Dementia Strategy; and to establish a national Brain Health Centre to lead on promoting brain health literacy as a public health objective for the first time.

Question reference: S5W-25539

Asked by: Alison Johnstone, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 27 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 10 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the recommendations in the Fair Dementia Care Commission report, Delivering Fair Dementia Care For People With Advanced Dementia.

We have welcomed Alzheimer Scotland’s report Delivering Fair Dementia Care For People With Advanced Dementia as an important contribution to how we understand the care and support needs of people with advanced dementia.

The healthcare needs of people with dementia are provided free by the NHS, and are working with partners to progress a national programme to support reform of adult social care as outlined in the 2019-2020 Programme for Government. We will consider Alzheimer Scotland’s recommendations on social care charging as part of that work.

The Alzheimer Scotland report also calls for more consistency and transparency on social care charging and the reform programme for adult social care support is also looking at those issues.

Question reference: S5W-25540

Asked by: Alison Johnstone, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 27 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Aileen Campbell on 8 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the roll-out of the Healthier Wealthier Children scheme and similar schemes across Scotland.

The Scottish Government provided funding of £250,000 to the 14 territorial Health Boards in 2018-19 to support the creation or enhancement of income maximisation services in health settings, with a further investment of £250,000 made in 2019-20.

The funding was provided to support local activities in the following four areas:

create local capacity in Health Board areas to establish or enhance referral pathways
plan and deliver training on child poverty, money matters and referral pathways for universal maternity and health visiting workforce
develop formal referral pathways (including consideration of electronic referrals)
negotiate additional capacity with local advice services.

Reporting on how the funding has been used should be included in Local Child Poverty Action Reports (LCPARs). We reviewed the first round of LCPARs submitted to date. Most of them include references to this work. However, a few remain silent on the creation or enhancement of formal income maximisation referral pathways and we have asked for this be rectified in reporting for next year.

Question reference: S5O-03657

Asked by: Alison Johnstone, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 October 2019
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 10 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to ensure that assistants in schools for pupils with additional needs have the appropriate training or qualifications.

Question reference: S5O-03619

Asked by: Alison Johnstone, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 September 2019
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 3 October 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how many convictions for vicarious liability have been made under provisions in the Wildlife and Natural Environment (Scotland) Act 2011.

Question reference: S5F-03572

Asked by: Alison Johnstone, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Monday, 23 September 2019
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 26 September 2019

Question to be taken in Chamber.

Question reference: S5W-25206

Asked by: Alison Johnstone, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 06 September 2019
Current Status: Answered by Roseanna Cunningham on 23 September 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the downgrading of the conservation status of mountain hares to "unfavourable" as a result of new data published by the EU showing a significant population decline, and what consideration it has given to increasing protection for this native species.

The EU Article 17 report under the Habitats Directive, which records that mountain hares in the UK are in unfavourable conservation status, reflects a recent assessment by Scottish Natural Heritage of all the published data and knowledge accumulated since the previous Article 17 report six years ago.

The Scottish Government commissioned an independent review of grouse moor management, chaired by Professor Alan Werritty, which includes examining whether further regulation of mountain hare management in Scotland is required.

We will carefully consider the findings and recommendations of the Grouse Moor Management Group when its report is submitted, together with the assessment reflected in the Article 17 report and any other relevant information. It would not be sensible to take any decisions on mountain hare management in advance of receiving Professor Werritty’s report.

Question reference: S5F-03516

Asked by: Alison Johnstone, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Monday, 02 September 2019
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 5 September 2019

Question to be taken in Chamber.

Question reference: S5W-24355

Asked by: Alison Johnstone, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Monday, 15 July 2019
Current Status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 29 August 2019

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-23423 by Mairi Gougeon on 10 July 2019, how many individual animals were licenced to be killed in 2018, and how many of these were killed, broken down by species.

The following table provides a breakdown of licences issued by Scottish Natural Heritage in 2018, including the number of individual animals that were licensed to be killed.

Species	Number of individual animals licensed to be killed	Unit description	Number of licences issued that form the total	Recorded as taken under licence
Barnacle Goose	8734	Birds	38	*
Blackbird	47	Birds	3	*
Blackbird	As many as required	Birds	3	*
Black-headed Gull	60	Birds	1	38
Blue Tit	As many as required	Birds	1	*
Buzzard	1	Birds	1	50
Buzzard	As many as required	Birds	6	50
Canada Goose	400	Birds	2	*
Carrion crow	As many as required	Birds	2	*
Chaffinch	As many as required	Birds	1	*
Collared Dove	8	Birds	1	*
Common Gull	46	Birds	5	7
Common Teal	As many as required	Birds	1	*
Cormorant	128	Birds	35	86
Cormorant	As many as required	Birds	1	86
Feral pigeon	112	Birds	2	*
Golden Plover	As many as required	Birds	1	1
Goosander	308	Birds	28	86
Greater Black-backed Gull	As many as required	Birds	1	*
Grey Heron	4	Birds	2	2
Grey Heron	As many as required	Birds	2	2
Grey Partridge	As many as required	Birds	2	4
Greylag Goose	8202	Birds	128	3920
Greylag Goose	As many as required	Birds	1	3920
Herring Gull	17	Birds	1	13
House Martin	As many as required	Birds	1	*
House Sparrow	65	Birds	6	2
House Sparrow	As many as required	Birds	2	2
Lesser Black-backed Gull	5	Birds	1	12
Magpie	160	Birds	2	11
Magpie	As many as required	Birds	1	11
Meadow Pipit	5	Birds	1	*
Mute Swan	As many as required	Birds	1	*
Oystercatcher	As many as required	Birds	1	*
Pheasant	1	Birds	1	37
Pheasant	As many as required	Birds	3	37
Pied Wagtail	As many as required	Birds	1	*
Pink-footed Goose	475	Birds	39	174
Pink-footed Goose	As many as required	Birds	3	174
Raven	921	Birds	138	589
Red-breasted Merganser	51	Birds	13	19
Ringed Plover	As many as required	Birds	1	40
Robin	11	Birds	6	2
Robin	As many as required	Birds	2	2
Rook	20	Birds	1	*
Skylark	10	Birds	1	*
Skylark	As many as required	Birds	1	*
Song Thrush	12	Birds	1	*
Sparrowhawk	1	Birds	1	1
Starling	156	Birds	10
Starling	As many as required	Birds	3
Swallow	7	Birds	3	4
Swallow	As many as required	Birds	3	4
Swift	As many as required	Birds	3	*
Woodpigeon	128	Birds	2	*
Brown Hare	1308	Individuals	22	565
Brown Hare	As many as required	Individuals	2	565
Mountain Hare	867	Individuals	10	749
Common Lizard	5	Individuals	1	*
Powan	50	Individuals	1	*
Deer (Night Shooting)	As many as required	Individuals	330	21861
Deer (Out of Season)	As many as required	Individuals	248	21035
Deer Out of Season (Females only) (2017/18)	As many as required	Individuals	1	28
Deer (General)	As many as required	Individuals	1	No returns requested

Where licences are granted in order to take “as many as required” these are usually for circumstances where public health and safety is at risk, for example at airports or at food production facilities, or for deer species where there has been no concern raised over the local populations. Where more than one entry for a species of bird is listed in the table it is to distinguish between a licence which has been issued that restricts how many birds can be killed and a licence which enables the licensee to take as many birds as is necessary.

The two licences for brown hares that were issued for “as many as required” were related to airport safety.

The licences that were issued for powan and common lizard were for the purpose of science, research and education.

* The absence of information regarding animals ‘Recorded as taken under licence’ is because many of the 2018 licences are running for a longer period (into 2019) or the requirement to submit returns to Scottish Natural Heritage extend well into 2019.

Question reference: S5W-24150

Asked by: Alison Johnstone, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 02 July 2019
Current Status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 13 August 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how many welfare inspections have been carried out in each calendar year since 2012 of poultry holdings with egg-laying hens that have (a) less than 1,000 and (b) 1,000 or more birds.

APHA conducts inspections for welfare non-compliance issues at poultry holdings on behalf of the Scottish Ministers and maintains the records of such inspections. The Scottish Government understands, from figures provided by APHA, that 144 inspections of poultry holdings with egg laying hens has been carried out since 2014 and is not broken down by flock size. Due to the change in systems of recording outcomes by APHA, records are not readily available for 2012 and 2013.