Beatrice Wishart

10 Jun 2020 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on Brexit negotiations.

3 Jun 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government when the 2019-20 child poverty report will be published.

Answer · Aileen Campbell: As I outlined in response to S5W-29680 on 8 June 2020; due to the unprecedented impact of Coronavirus we have made the difficult decision to delay preparation and publication of the 2019-20 Progress Report on Child Poverty, which was required by end June 2020…

2 Jun 2020 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government how it is supporting Shetland’s rural economy.

28 May 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the evidence given by Richard Lochhead to the Education and Skills Committee on 20 May 2020 regarding the take-up of student hardship funding following the COVID-19 outbreak (Official Report, c. 31), in light of the minister’s comment that “I hope that, by the end of this wee…

Answer · Richard Lochhead: As of 15 May, £837K of the additional £2.2M Higher Education Discretionary Funds issued to colleges and universities in April, had been spent. The information provided by institutions focused on the spend on the funds rather than the reasons students were re…

28 May 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what percentage of teachers have received mental health first aid training.

Answer · John Swinney: Since 2014, the Scottish Government and Education Scotland have supported local authority staff, including staff from school settings, to attend Mental Health First Aid Training. School staff could include teachers, teaching assistants and additional support …

28 May 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether the qualification pathways required to meet the national professional standard for school counsellors funded through its 2018-19 Programme for Government have been impacted by the COVID-19 outbreak, in particular for (a) the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (…

Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Funding Council does not normally monitor the delivery of qualifications in real time or get involved in the detail of the assessment process at institution or subject level. However, the Scottish Funding Council has been surveying institutions o…

28 May 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will meet its commitment to ensure that every secondary school has counselling services by September 2020.

Answer · John Swinney: It is expected that the commitment to ensure access to a counsellor in every secondary school from September 2020 will be met. The mental health and wellbeing support being put in place by local authorities, including providing access to counsellors, is a cru…

28 May 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government how many school nurses are currently in place, and how many new school nursing posts have been filled in each of the last three academic years.

Answer · Jeane Freeman: NHSScotland Workforce statistics, including school nurses, are published on a quarterly basis and can be found on the NHS Education for Scotland Nursing and Midwifery dashboard here: https://turasdata.nes.nhs.scot/workforce-official-statistics/nhsscotland-wo…

28 May 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will meet its commitment to ensure that, by the end of academic year 2019-20, every local authority will be offered training for teachers in mental health first aid.

Answer · John Swinney: The 2018-19 Programme for Government, included a commitment to enhancing support and professional learning materials for teachers on good mental health, including, ensuring that by the end of academic year 2019-20, every local authority will be offered traini…

28 May 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the commitment in its 2018-19 Programme for Government, how many additional counsellors will be in place in secondary schools by September 2020.

Answer · John Swinney: As stated in the Programme for Government 2018-19, we anticipated that the investment of over £60m in additional school counselling services across Scotland would create around 350 counsellors in school education. Local authority plans to implement the commit…

27 May 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the announcement by the First Minister on 21 May 2020 that £30 million in funding is to be used to provide laptops for disadvantaged children and young people, to enable them to study online, whether any of this funding will be used to provide broadband to families without a …

Answer · John Swinney: Scottish Government officials are working closely with local authorities to clearly establish which children and young people are suffering from digital exclusion, be that through lack of access to a suitable device, lack of access to the internet or both. T…

26 May 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what consideration it has given to permitting maritime activities such as recreational (a) boating, (b) fishing and (c) sailing to resume, given COVID-19 restrictions.

Answer · Joe FitzPatrick: The Scottish Government and sport scotland have been working with partners on how sporting activities can safely re-start as restrictions are eased. As on Friday 29 May 2020, we have now entered phase 1 which allows some outdoor activities to start. Activitie…

20 May 2020 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the work of the COVID-19 Education Recovery Group.

12 May 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-26932 by Paul Wheelhouse on 22 January 2020, whether it will provide an update regarding by what date section 14 of the Islands (Scotland) Act 2018 will come into force.

Answer · Paul Wheelhouse: Activity on Island Communities Impact Assessments (ICIAs) had, regrettably, to be put on hold to enable Scottish Government officials, across a number of portfolios of relevance, to focus on delivering the response to the COVID-19 pandemic, including specific…

17 Apr 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish the daily childcare setting attendance figures reported to it by local authorities, and how this compares to projected attendance, broken down by (a) key worker category and (b) number of vulnerable children.

Answer · John Swinney: On average, over the past week (from 20 April to 24 April), 6,060 children and young people (0.8%) were attending school hubs. Of this total an estimated 83% were children and young people of key workers and an estimated 17% were vulnerable children. We did …

17 Apr 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what it is doing to (a) monitor and (b) support the wellbeing of children who have been identified as vulnerable but are not attending childcare hubs.

Answer · John Swinney: From the outset of the COVID-19 lockdown, Government has worked closely with partners in local authorities, health boards, the 3rd sector and with other stakeholders, to monitor and ensure support to vulnerable children who are not attending the hubs. This ha…

17 Apr 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what information it is gathering on the provision of care for (a) vulnerable children and (b) children of key workers.

Answer · John Swinney: From the outset of the COVID-19 lockdown, the Scottish Government has been gathering data on a daily basis from local authorities on the number of vulnerable children and children of keyworkers attending ELC provision and education hubs. There is also daily c…

17 Apr 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government how many children have been identified as vulnerable in each local authority area, and what percentage on average have been attending childcare hubs each week.

Answer · John Swinney: This information is not held centrally. The data that has been provided by local authority indicates that overall around 1% of the relevant school and early year’s population have been attending local authority hubs since schools were asked to close.

10 Mar 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-26427 by Paul Wheelhouse on 28 November 2019, whether it has now established with David MacBrayne the reason that the company felt able to make the claim.

Answer · Paul Wheelhouse: The reason why David MacBrayne Limited decided to challenge the outcome of the tender process for the Northern Isles Ferry Services is a matter for the company, not Ministers. Scottish Ministers are confident that the procurement process for the Northern Isl…

4 Mar 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-27236 by Maree Todd on 2 March 2020, for what reason the affirmative Scottish Statutory Instrument will be brought forward in Spring 2021, and for what reason this cannot be brought forward before the beginning of the next academic year.

Answer · Maree Todd: Preparatory work is still underway with our local government colleagues to assess the resource implications and agree an implementation approach. Once an approach is agreed, I will update Parliament. I am sure Parliament will appreciate that our collective r…

4 Mar 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5T-02059 by Maree Todd on 3 March 2020 (Official Report, c. 4), whether it will publish local progress reports on the expansion of early learning and childcare.

Answer · Maree Todd: I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-25748 on 6 November 2019. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusines…

4 Mar 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5T-02059 by Maree Todd on 3 March 2020 (Official Report, c. 4), what its position is on the National Day Nurseries Association's statement that local progress reports on early learning and childcare will “help demonstrate what is and isn’t working”.

Answer · Maree Todd: This statement was made by the National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA) in relation to the results of their 2019 workforce survey on local authority approaches to recruitment. As a result of this issue being raised by the NDNA, we have taken action to improv…

4 Mar 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5T-02059 by Maree Todd on 3 March 2020 (Official Report, c. 4), what discussions it has had with the National Day Nurseries Association regarding local progress reports on early learning and childcare.

Answer · Maree Todd: We have not had any specific discussions pertaining to the local progress reports produced by local authorities with the National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA). However, the NDNA is a standing member of the ELC Partnership Forum where national expansion pr…

4 Mar 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5T-02059 by Maree Todd on 3 March 2020 (Official Report, c. 4), for what reason it did not address the publication of local progress reports on the expansion of early learning and childcare.

Answer · Maree Todd: I refer the member to the answer to questions S5W-25748 and S5W-25754, on 6 November 2019. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parl…

4 Mar 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5T-02059 by Maree Todd on 3 March 2020 (Official Report, c. 4), whether every parent of an eligible child will have a choice over where they access their child’s funded early learning and childcare entitlement in August 2020.

Answer · Maree Todd: From August 2020 Funding Follows the Child means that parents and carers will be able to choose to access their child’s early learning and childcare (ELC) entitlement from a local offer of ELC providers who all meet the National Standard – as long as the prov…

3 Mar 2020 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government what recent discussions it has had with the UK Government regarding its EU negotiations on aquaculture.

2 Mar 2020 · Topical Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether all aspects of the expansion of funded early learning and childcare will be available to all families in August 2020.

26 Feb 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with early learning and childcare stakeholders regarding the number of early learning and childcare staff employed on temporary contracts.

Answer · Maree Todd: The Scottish Government is in regular dialogue with stakeholders across the Early Learning and Childcare (ELC) sector about a range of topics relating to workforce planning, including terms and conditions of staff. It is the responsibility providers of ELC s…

26 Feb 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has any plans to introduce a maximum class size in early learning and childcare settings to help ensure a quality service.

Answer · Maree Todd: The Scottish Government has no plans to introduce a maximum class size in early learning and childcare (ELC) or to introduce a cap either on how many children can be registered with an ELC setting or how many children can be accommodated at the same time with…

26 Feb 2020 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-25750 by Maree Todd on 9 October 2019, what percentage of the 435 equity and excellence leads is currently in post, and when the remainder will be recruited.

Answer · Maree Todd: The most recent national data on the number of equity and excellence leads in post can be found in the early learning and childcare census. Findings were published on 10 December 2019 in Summary statistics for schools in Scotland . This found that during ce…