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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-09619

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 05 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 19 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what data and information it collects on (a) remediation and (b) removal of combustible cladding from affected householders and property factors outside of the Single Building Assessment programme.

Question reference: S6W-09543

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 01 July 2022
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Keith Brown on 18 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many cases the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland (Housing and Property Chamber) has (a) received and (b) closed in each year since 2016.

Question reference: S6W-09457

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 29 June 2022
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 13 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many (a) open market and (b) new supply shared equity properties it has supported the purchase of, broken down by equity in increments of 5%.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-09064 on 21 June 2022 which includes a link to the Affordable Housing Supply Housing Programme annual out-turn reports.

Incremental equity changes are not recorded and Scottish Government systems show properties where Ministers have an equity stake at what that equity stake is at the current time.

All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

Question reference: S6W-09458

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 29 June 2022
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 13 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many (a) open market and (b) new supply shared equity applicants have been (i) first-time buyers, (ii) people aged 60 and over, (iii) social renters, (iv) disabled people, (v) members of the armed forces, (vi) veterans who have left the armed forces within the last two years and (vii) widows, widowers and other partners of service personnel for up to two years after their partner has lost their life while serving, in each of the last five years.

The following table shows the number of properties purchased in the last 5 years in each category under the Open Market Shared Equity scheme. This information is voluntarily provided by the purchaser and in some cases, purchasers may fall into more than one category.

	2017-18	2018-19	2019-20	2020-21	2021-22
First time buyer	1347	1547	1032	611	823
Aged 60 and over	1	8	4	8	14
Social Renters	146	180	101	77	90
Disabled	8	11	16	9	6
Serving Armed Forces	3	7	3	2	1
Veterans	0	1	0	1	2
Widows of Armed Forces	0	1	1	1	1

The New Supply Shared Equity scheme, is delivered via registered social landlords on behalf of the Scottish Government as part of the Affordable Housing Supply Programme. Applicants status would be declared at the point of application assessment and is not centrally held within the Scottish Government.

Question reference: S6W-09500

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 30 June 2022
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 13 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-08560 by Shona Robison on 25 May 2022, for what reason it did not list Rent Service Scotland as a data source for monitoring exit.

Question reference: S6W-09542

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 01 July 2022
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 13 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government (a) how many and (b) what total value of (i) open market and (ii) new supply shared equity property purchases it has supported in each (A) local authority and (B) year since 2016.

Question reference: S6W-09562

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 01 July 2022
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 13 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to improve public perception of the affordable housing supply programme, in light of Shelter Scotland's recent survey findings, conducted by YouGov, which reportedly found that 60% of adults in Scotland think that it is unlikely that the Scottish Government will deliver on its target of providing 110,000 affordable homes by 2032.

Scotland has led the way in the delivery of affordable housing across the UK with 111,750 affordable homes now delivered since 2007, over 78,000 of which were for social rent, including 19,339 council homes.

Despite the well documented global issues, not only have we met our previous 50,000 affordable homes target, we have now started to deliver against our commitment to deliver 110,000 affordable homes by 2032, 70% of which will be for social rent and 10% in remote, rural and island areas. More than £3.6 billion funding is being made available in this Parliamentary term, continuing to ensure the right homes in the right places.

Many thousands of people across Scotland have already benefitted from safe, warm, accessible homes that meet their needs, in a place where they can be part of a thriving community, and others will continue to benefit well into the future.

Question reference: S6W-09499

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 30 June 2022
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 13 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-08560 by Shona Robison on 25 May 2022, how many landlords (a) have informed Rent Service Scotland that they have exited the market when the service has requested data from the sector and (b) it has requested data from, in each year since 2016.

Question reference: S6W-09501

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 30 June 2022
Submitting member has a registered interest.
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 13 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-08560 by Shona Robison on 25 May 2022, whether Rent Service Scotland (a) requests and (b) records information from landlords detailing whether they have exited the market, as part of its data collection processes.

Question reference: S6W-09270

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 23 June 2022
Current Status: Answered by Patrick Harvie on 12 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what consideration it has given to the NESTA report, Estimating the willingness to pay for a heat pump, in determining the level of financial support that it will provide to householders, and the contribution of heat pumps, to meet its target for the rate of zero carbon heating system installations in new and existing homes and buildings to double every year from the current baseline to at least 64,000 installations in 2025.

Over the course of this parliament, we have committed to investing £1.8 billion into zero emissions heating and energy efficiency across Scotland. This includes the Scottish Government’s Home Energy Scotland Loan and Cashback scheme which currently provides households with up to £17,500 of combined loan and cashback funding for the installation of zero emissions heating systems.

The current Home Energy Scotland loan scheme has been operational and supporting households for some time, with the cashback element introduced in 2020. Through the Heat in Buildings Strategy we have also committed to replacing the cashback element of the scheme with a standalone grant during the course of 2022-23.

In developing the new grant scheme and setting grant levels, we are examining a range of evidence. This consideration will include the recent reports published by Nesta. This report and follow up report ‘how to increase the demand for heat pumps’ published in June 2022 by Nesta raises many informative findings, amongst them that a combination of incentives was found to be the most effective in increasing heat pump uptake, in particular a grant combined with lower running costs of the system.

The Scottish Government aims to make the installation of zero emissions heating systems both desirable and achievable for households across Scotland, and the future development of the Home Energy Scotland Loan and Grant scheme will play a large part in this.