Seòmar agus comataidhean

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

Criathragan Hide all filters

Displaying 1836 questions Show Answers

Order by |

Question reference: S6O-03875

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 23 October 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 31 October 2024

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on Police Scotland’s extension across Scotland of the north east pilot of not investigating "low-level" crime.

Question reference: S6O-03840

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 02 October 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 10 October 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what impact it anticipates that the planned closure of Grangemouth oil refinery will have on the Forties Pipeline System and associated jobs and businesses.

Question reference: S6W-29925

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 17 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Graeme Dey on 1 October 2024

To ask the Scottish Government for what reason it reportedly removed funding for upskilling and reskilling Scotland's workforce in its Budget 2024-25; what assessment it has undertaken of any impact of this on (a) equalities and (b) the future economy, and whether it has any plans to reintroduce any such funding in the remainder of the current parliamentary session.

Despite facing the most challenging fiscal position since devolution, the 2024-25 Budget allocates around £2bn to both colleges and universities – supporting their delivery of high-quality education, training and research.

In this challenging fiscal environment, decisions have been made regarding specific individual funds, in the current and previous financial years, including the Flexible Workforce Development Fund (FWDF) and the Scottish Funding Council’s Upskilling Fund. These decisions were not taken lightly but aimed to minimise the impact on frontline allocations for learning, teaching, and support for students.

Colleges and universities can continue to deliver short courses to meet employer and business needs including those developed using FWDF and Upskilling Fund resources. Across all funded delivery, we fully expect that they will continue to prioritise actions to address inequality. Despite the ongoing fiscal challenges, the Scottish Government remains committed to ensuring equalities underpin all our work.

In taking forward our long term plans for reform of post-school education, a priority will be the need for accessible, high quality learning which meets our economic, environmental and social needs and ambitions.

Question reference: S6T-02121

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 30 September 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 1 October 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how it will ensure that pensioners can afford to heat their homes this winter.

Question reference: S6W-29928

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 30 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-28938 by Fiona Hyslop on 9 September 2024, whether its restatement of the position is confirmation that it has not made an assessment of the scope of the role of Transport Scotland, including any duplication of (a) responsibility and (b) funding in the period (i) before and (ii) after the new structures were put in place regarding the nationalisation of ScotRail, and, if this is not the case, and it has made such an assessment, whether it will provide the information requested.

Transport Scotland considered carefully the respective roles of ScotRail Trains, Scottish Rail Holdings and Transport Scotland when establishing the appropriate arrangements under the requirements of the current flawed UK rail legislation.

An important consideration has been that the cost of these arrangements would be significantly less than the alternative management and contract costs associated with the previous private franchise arrangements.

Question reference: S6W-30048

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 20 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Tom Arthur on 27 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government whether the regeneration capital grant fund for the community element of the Victoria Road School project in Torry has been allowed to roll over into 2024-25.

Question reference: S6O-03755

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 September 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 25 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will set out how it measures economic growth, including what metrics it uses to assess success in economic growth.

Question reference: S6W-29416

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 02 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 17 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government how many jobs there have been in the hospitality sector in each of the last 10 years.

The Business Register and Employment Survey (BRES), produced by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), is the preferred source for jobs estimates for industry sectors. The latest available BRES jobs estimates are for 2022 with consistent time series available back to 2015. Jobs estimates for the Accommodation and Food Service Activities sector for 2015 to 2022 are shown in the following table.

Table 1: Estimated jobs in the Accommodation and Food Service Activities sector, Scotland, 2015 to 2022

YEAR	JOBS ESTIMATE
2015	210,000
2016	191,000
2017	197,000
2018	207,000
2019	214,000
2020	179,000
2021	196,000
2022	216,000

Source: Business Register and Employment Survey

Notes:

1.These data are available from Table 2.5 of the Scottish Government Industry Statistics Database: Industry statistics - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

2.Estimates are rounded to the nearest thousand.

3.Estimates include all employee jobs within VAT/PAYE registered enterprises, and also working owners of VAT/PAYE registered enterprises. However, the employment jobs estimate does not include those that are self-employed in enterprises that are not registered for VAT/PAYE i.e. the smallest sole traders/partnerships.

Question reference: S6W-29414

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 02 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Richard Lochhead on 16 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what economic assessment it has made of the recovery of the hospitality sector since the COVID-19 pandemic.

Latest data shows that both output and employment in the hospitality sector are above pre-pandemic levels. However, the sector continues to face challenges related to rising costs, squeezed household budgets and staff shortages. Whilst cost rises and recruitment difficulties have eased somewhat over the last 12 months, the sector remains more impacted than the economy overall. These challenges appear to be affecting business viability, with insolvencies and business closures in the sector rising over the past two years. However, the insolvency rate in the sector remains lower than that in the rest of Great Britain and the business closure rate remains lower than in the UK as a whole and is broadly in-line with the pre-pandemic period. The total number of businesses in the sector is growing modestly, with business births marginally exceeding closures.

The Scottish Government’s Evaluation of COVID-19 Business Support Measures in Scotland, published in June 2022, found that the Accommodation and Food Services sector had the highest proportion of firms receiving support from Scottish Government grants out of all sectors and was also one of the sectors that benefited most from the support provided by the Scottish and UK Governments, in terms of the proportion of businesses reporting that the support helped them continue trading.

The forthcoming Fair Work Convention Hospitality Inquiry Report, which will be published on 24 September 2024, includes a high-level assessment of the recovery of the hospitality sector since the pandemic and subsequent cost crisis as underpinning evidence for its more detailed assessment of fair work within the sector.

The Scottish Government wants a strong and high value hospitality sector in Scotland. We will do all we can to support businesses to be successful and resilient and will continue to engage directly with the sector, to monitor evolving impacts of the ongoing cost crisis, and to work with the UK Government to support Scottish businesses. The 2024-25 Scottish Budget delivers a competitive non-domestic rates regime with the lowest poundage in the UK for the sixth year in a row, and a package of reliefs worth an estimated £685 million, including the Small Business Bonus Scheme which continues to be the most generous relief of its kind in the UK. We estimate around half the properties in the retail, hospitality and leisure sectors are eligible for 100% Small Business Bonus Scheme relief in 2024-25.

Question reference: S6W-29421

Asked by: Liam Kerr, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 02 September 2024
Current Status: Answered by Angus Robertson on 13 September 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to its announcement on 28 August 2024 of £2.6 million being provided to Sistema Scotland, when that funding will be provided to Sistema Scotland; whether the funding will be provided in full or in tranches, and whether the Scottish Government will decide how the funding will be allocated across the Sistema organisation or whether Sistema Scotland has total control and decision-making powers.

As with any grant agreement, in providing funds to Sistema Scotland, the Scottish Government and Sistema Scotland agree how funds will be used and when payments will be made. In 2024-25 the Scottish Government will provide £2.6m to Sistema Scotland from the culture budget to sustain and develop the Big Noise programmes which give almost 4,000 children and young people the opportunity to realise their potential through music education. This will be paid in three equal tranches. The first tranche was paid in August 2024. The next 2 payments will be made in November 2024 and February 2025.