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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: S5W-18932

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 September 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 3 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what public transport access there is to Social Security Scotland offices in (a) Dundee and (b) Glasgow, and whether these are accessible to disabled people.

Social Security Scotland’s interim headquarters at Dundee House in Dundee and the Glasgow office at 220 High Street are both situated close to main bus routes and mainline rail stations.

Proximity to public transport links, frequency and volume of services and the availability of ground floor public spaces were key criterion in the analytical process which rated the shortlisted buildings in each city.

The interim Headquarters in Dundee and Glasgow office are fully compliant with Equalities Act legislation.

Question reference: S5W-18928

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 September 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 3 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish the materials detailing the outline service requirement, the procurement process and the support available to potential tenderers that were provided or displayed at the Supplier Awareness Event on 11 September 2018 for its notice, Provision of Agile Service Design to deliver Social Security Assessments Function.

Question reference: S5W-18938

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 September 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 3 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the finding from its Consultation on Social Security in Scotland that the most mentioned terms that respondents disliked were, welfare, claimant, benefit, customer or client, sanction and scrounger, and whether (a) its Social Security Directorate and (b) Social Security Scotland has been instructed to use alternative language, where necessary.

We are carrying out ongoing user research and we have also conducted research through our Experience Panel of people with lived experience of social security. A report on this research will be published in November 2018.

Both the Social Security Directorate and Social Security Scotland internal guidance on language is taking account of the emerging findings. These findings include feedback that ‘benefits’ is the most widely and easily understood term for a form of social security assistance and the word ‘client’ is the preferred word for someone in receipt of a benefit.

Question reference: S5W-18820

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 17 September 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 3 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government for what reason the eligibility criteria for the Best Start Grant (Pregnancy and Baby Grant) do not align with the eligibility criteria for free school meals.

The eligibility criteria for Best Start Grant (BSG) ensure that low income families in Scotland who would have received a Sure Start Maternity Grant continue to receive support where they would not if eligibility was narrowed to match that for free school meals. Free school meals are universally available to pupils in primary 1-3 at all publicly funded schools in Scotland. For pupils above primary 3, free school meal eligibility is dependent on whether the pupil’s parents or carers, or the pupil themselves are in receipt of specified qualifying benefits, which are set out in legislation. There is an income threshold set in the qualifying benefits for free school meals where there isn’t for BSG. This means that BSG is paid to people on higher incomes than free school meals, including those experiencing in work poverty.

Question reference: S5W-18815

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 17 September 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 3 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of Table 5: Indicative BSG expenditure and caseload in Scotland for 2018-19, in the Scottish Fiscal Commission report, Supplementary Costings: Social Security Best Start Grant (Pregnancy and Baby Grant) September 2018, and whether it will commit to delivery from 1 November 2018.

The Scottish Government will deliver Pregnancy and Baby Grant payments before Christmas 2018. We will publicise the start date in due course.

The Scottish Fiscal Commission have chosen to present indicative forecasts for costs in 2018-19 based on potential delivery from 1 November 2018 or 1 December 2018 as the start date is still unconfirmed. This illustrates a range of possible costs in 2018-19, depending on when payments start.

Question reference: S5W-18929

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 September 2018
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 2 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government how many Public Contracts Scotland tender notices it has issued in each year since 2015-16, including the current year to date, that were subject to a non-disclosure agreement, and what proportion this was of the total number of notices it issued.

Scottish Government has published 2161 notices since 2015-16. The breakdown for each calendar year is as follows: 2015: 477; 2016: 511; 2017: 615; 2018: 558. Of this number we are aware of 3 notices being subject to NDA. We are also aware of a further 6 procurement exercises which used an NDA although there was no requirement for a contract notice in these instances. Complete data on the use of NDA across Scottish Government is not centrally held and confirmation of the actual number could only be provided at disproportionate cost.

Question reference: S5W-18866

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 18 September 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 2 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government whether the use of the definition of "disability", within the meaning of section 6 of the Equality Act 2010 in the Scottish Tribunals (Eligibility for Appointment) Amendment Regulations 2018, is to be considered as the definition of "disability" for the purposes of the Social Security (Scotland) Act 2018.

Question reference: S5W-18819

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 17 September 2018
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 1 October 2018

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide details of each (a) public information and (b) advertising campaign it (i) ran in 2017-18 and (ii) has run or plans to run in 2018-19, also broken down by length of campaign.

Question reference: S5W-18812

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 17 September 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 27 September 2018

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the statement by the First Minister on 4 September 2018 (Official Report, c. 22), what systems it has asked the DWP to put in place to deliver the Best Start Grant; on what date it requested these, and for what reason they were not in place prior to this announcement.

The Scottish Government have been engaging with DWP over re-use of key systems over the last 2 years which culminated in a formal request over the Summer of 2017 to utilise DWP’s Central Information System (CIS) and Central Payment System (CPS). The implementation plan for CPS is running to schedule. A new CIS plan was received from DWP on 21 September which showed that agreed dates for the implementation of CIS are not going to be met. Officials are now working through this plan, despite the challenges arising from missed deadlines by DWP, to ensure that our work remains on track to deliver the Best Start Grant before Christmas.

Question reference: S5W-18942

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 September 2018
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 27 September 2018

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish the full commencement schedule for the provisions in the Social Security (Scotland) Act 2018, and which provisions it expects to commence in the next (a) three, (b) six, (c) nine and (d) 12 months.