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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-07358

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Tuesday, 22 March 2022
Current Status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 5 April 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what progress it has made on a plan B for achieving the equivalent abatement should Negative Emission Technologies fail to deliver, as recommended in the response to the Draft Updated Climate Change Plan by the Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform Committee, published on 4 March 2021.

The updated Climate Change Plan (CCPu) introduced a chapter on Negative Emissions Technologies (NETs), and accompanied this with a commitment to review progress for developing NETs. Policies in this chapter place a focus on developing the evidence base for NETs to be deployed at the end of the decade, and assessing the feasibility of various technologies.

We are making progress on developing our evidence base. As we made clear to the committee in our response in March 2021, should a need arise for a ‘Plan B’, there is flexibility to adjust sector pathways and reassign any abatement to other sectors.

We will continue to review our progress and evidence as we work towards the next full Climate Change Plan, a draft of which we will make available to Parliament by November 2023 at the latest.

Question reference: S6W-07348

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 16 March 2022
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 29 March 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether boys born before 2007 can be vaccinated for HPV via NHS services in order to protect against the spread of HPV and, if not, whether it has any plans to expand the availability of HPV vaccination for boys.

Vaccination policy in Scotland, is based on recommendations from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI).

Following the Committee’s recommendation, from August 2019 the HPV immunisation programme in Scotland was extended to adolescent boys entering their first year of secondary school (S1).

The JCVI has not recommended a catch up for older boys as evidence suggests they are already benefitting from the indirect protection built up in the population over 10 years of the girls’ HPV vaccination programme.

From 2016 HPV vaccine has been available to men who have sex with men (MSM) up to and including 45 years of age who attend sexual health or HIV clinics. The HPV MSM programme is opportunistic and offers direct protection.

The JCVI keeps its recommendations under review and if the advice on HPV vaccination was to change we would of course give this due consideration.

Question reference: S6T-00628

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Monday, 28 March 2022
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 29 March 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what urgent action it will undertake to resolve waiting time delays in A&E following recent reported estimates from the Royal College of Emergency Medicine that the delays have contributed to 240 avoidable deaths this year.

Question reference: S6W-07329

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 18 March 2022
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 28 March 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether any Hikvision cameras have been installed in any Scottish Government building since the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee report Never Again: The UK's Responsibility to Act on Atrocities in Xinjiang and Beyond was published in July 2021, which recommended that equipment manufactured by Hikvision should not be permitted to operate within the UK.

Question reference: S6W-07331

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 18 March 2022
Current Status: Answered by Ivan McKee on 28 March 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether any Hikvision cameras are currently installed in or around any Scottish Government building.

Question reference: S6W-07337

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 16 March 2022
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 25 March 2022

To ask the Scottish Government which NHS board areas have a Huntington’s disease specialist service providing home visits, where the practitioner providing the support works exclusively with Huntington’s disease cases.

Question reference: S6W-07335

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 16 March 2022
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 25 March 2022

To ask the Scottish Government, further to motion S6M-00923, which was supported by 99 MSPs from all parties, what steps it is taking in response to the motion’s call to expand specialist Huntington’s disease services in line with rising cases.

Since 2015 we have committed over £500,000 in funding to the Scottish Huntington’s Association (SHA) towards the development of the national care framework for Huntington’s Disease (HD) and in funding towards the organisation’s specialist support services and initiatives to raise awareness of the condition.

I was pleased to meet with the SHA on 10 November 2021 to discuss motion S6M-00923, the progress on the Framework for HD and to understand the provision of specialist services in Scotland. We will continue to work with NHS, third sector partners and people affected by Huntington’s Disease to drive up standards of care.

Question reference: S6W-07334

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 16 March 2022
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 25 March 2022

To ask the Scottish Government which NHS board areas have a Huntington’s Disease Clinical Lead, and, in each of these cases, regarding Huntington’s Disease Management clinics, how (a) long each lasts and (b) regularly they take place.

The information for parliamentary questions S6W-07334, S6W-07336 and S6W-07337 on 25 March 2022 is not held centrally. Please visit the National Care Framework for Huntington’s Disease website to obtain further information on the services and support available to people with Huntington’s Disease through NHS Scotland, by health board area.

The Scottish Huntington’s Association also maintains a list of HD Clinical Leads by health board on its website: HD Clinical Leads • Scottish Huntington's Association (hdscotland.org) .

Presymptomatic genetic testing is available for those with a family history of Huntington disease and tests whether the person has inherited the faulty gene associated with the condition. This is delivered by our genetic laboratory services and data on the number of people tested is not held by the Scottish Government.

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-07336

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Friday, 18 March 2022
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 25 March 2022

To ask the Scottish Government (a) how many people and (b) what proportion of the population (i) have received a (A) positive (1) predictive and (2) diagnostic and (B) negative (1) predictive and (2) diagnostic test for Huntington’s disease, and (ii) are at risk of inheriting Huntington’s disease but have not been tested, broken down by NHS board area.

Question reference: S6O-00937

Asked by: Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western, Scottish Liberal Democrats
Date lodged: Wednesday, 23 March 2022
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 30 March 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on what plans it has to tackle homelessness.