Parliamentary questions
Stephen Kerr
2,595 questions tabled in the Scottish Parliament, most recent first.
24 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what information it has on how many businesses in Scotland have relocated (a) to the rest of the UK and (b) overseas since 2021.
Answer · Richard Lochhead: The information requested is not held centrally. However, data are available on the number of businesses operating in Scotland that are rest of the UK owned and Abroad owned. These estimates, sourced from the Businesses in Scotland 2024 publication, are shown…
24 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what information it has on how many people are currently registered to vote in Scottish Parliament elections, and how many of those registered are foreign nationals.
Answer · Jamie Hepburn: At 1 December 2023:the total number of people registered to vote in Scottish Parliamentary and local government elections was 4,241,800;just under 189,500 qualifying foreign nationals resident in Scotland were registered to vote in Scottish Parliamentary and …
24 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the potential impact on the average cost of childcare provision of increasing childcare staff-to-child ratios.
Answer · Natalie Don-Innes: Adult to child staff ratios are set by the Care Inspectorate as the regulatory body for the Early Learning and Childcare (ELC) sector and as experts in assessing high quality, safe and nurturing ELC provision.The Care Inspectorate has no plans to update the c…
24 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the potential impact of any United States tariffs on the Scotch whisky industry.
Answer · Richard Lochhead: There can be no doubt that the tariffs that have been imposed by the United States will cause damage to the global, UK and Scottish economies. The USA is the most valuable export market by far for Scotch Whisky, worth £971m in 2024 (18% of total Scotch …
24 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how many antisocial behaviour orders were issued in 2024, and how many of these orders resulted in imprisonment.
Answer · Angela Constance: Antisocial Behaviour Orders (ASBOs) may be issued by either criminal or civil courts in Scotland. ASBOs do not carry a custodial sentence and a civil court cannot impose a custodial sentence. A criminal court may only impose a custodial sentence where a separ…
24 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how many schools have completed the LGBT Inclusive Education National Implementation and Evaluation Toolkit.
Answer · Jenny Gilruth: 24 education settings have received certification for their work using the LGBT Inclusive Education National Implementation and Evaluation Toolkit.The Toolkit is an optional additional support resource, on top of the national professional learning course. The…
24 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking to support the teaching of Latin in state schools.
Answer · Jenny Gilruth: Latin can be taught in both primary and secondary state schools as part of the Scottish Government’s 1+2 approach to language learning. It is also offered as a National Qualification from National 3 to Advanced Higher level.Education Scotland work close…
24 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the reasons for any disparities between local authorities in the proportion of children that they identify as having additional support needs.
Answer · Jenny Gilruth: Local authorities have the statutory responsibility for delivering education and for ensuring that those pupils identified with an additional support need, are fully supported to learn. Work is underway through the Additional Support for Learning Action Plan …
20 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what its procedures are for vetting and reviewing ministerial memoirs.
Answer · Kate Forbes: Paragraph 12.1 of the Scottish Ministerial Code (Scottish Ministerial Code: 2024 Edition - gov.scot) requires former Ministers intending to publish their memoirs to submit the draft manuscript in good time before publication to the Permanent Secretary and to …
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how many consultants specialising in endometriosis there are, broken down by NHS board.
Answer · Neil Gray: The information requested on how many consultants specialising in endometriosis there are, broken down by NHS board is not centrally held.
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how much each NHS board has spent on repairing and maintaining imaging equipment in the last five years, also broken down by how many pieces of equipment have been repaired and/or maintained.
Answer · Neil Gray: The Scottish Government does not collect information on maintenance costs for imaging equipment held by NHS Boards. As holding bodies, NHS Boards are responsible for the management of their infrastructure assets and for identifying maintenance requirements. M…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what the age profile is of MRI, X-ray and CT scanning equipment in use across NHS Scotland.
Answer · Neil Gray: The Scottish Government does not collect information on the age profile of scanning equipment held by NHS Boards. As holding bodies, NHS Boards are responsible for the management of their infrastructure assets and for identifying maintenance and replacement r…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish all communications, meeting notes and correspondence between ministers and (a) SSE and (b) Equinor regarding the Peterhead gas-fired power station project.
Answer · Alasdair Allan: To avoid accusations of bias or undue influence in planning and consenting decisions, Minsters cannot undertake any discussions with developers or objectors about the merits or otherwise of forthcoming, or live applications.Ministers may of course undertake m…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a breakdown of the travel expenses incurred by (a) ministers, (b) special advisers and (c) (i) senior and (ii) junior civil servants in each of the last five years.
Answer · Ivan McKee: a) The Scottish Government publishes details of Ministerial engagements, travel and gifts - gov.scot containing information about Ministerial engagements, overseas travel, car journeys, domestic travel and gifts received.b) The Scottish Government publishes d…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a breakdown of the reported £19.5 million spent on consultants for the A83 Rest and Be Thankful upgrade.
Answer · Fiona Hyslop: The Scottish Government is committed to delivering a long-term solution to the landslip risks at the A83 Rest and Be Thankful and in December we made further progress by publishing draft Orders for the long-term solution and also for future phases of the medi…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a breakdown of how much it has spent on business (a) analysts and (b) consultants in each year since 2017-18.
Answer · Shona Robison: Business Analysts operate across both our directly employed and contingent workforce. Within our directly employed workforce, they operate across two of our Professional groups (Professions); the Digital Profession and the Operational Delivery Profession. A d…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the recently announced council tax increases, what support it can provide to households, and what assessment it has made of the impact of these increases on low-income families.
Answer · Shona Robison: Throughout engagement with COSLA, councils and opposition parties ahead of the 2025-26 Scottish Budget, there was a clear consensus that councils should have full flexibility for decisions on Council Tax rates. The Scottish Budget delivered that ask in full, …
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how much it has spent on consultancy and external reviews regarding the viability of Ferguson Marine as a state-owned shipbuilder.
Answer · Kate Forbes: The Scottish Government has created a webpage on www.gov.scot dedicated to documents relating to Ferguson Marine (https://www.gov.scot/collections/ferguson-marine-documents/). This webpage contains links to consultancy documents produced when Ferguson Marine …
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how many ministerial interventions have been made in the management and operations of Ferguson Marine since its nationalisation.
Answer · Kate Forbes: The Framework Agreement that exists between the Scottish Government and Ferguson Marine sets out the relationship between the business and Scottish ministers, including matters requiring Scottish Government approval such as the appointment of the Chair, the B…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government to what extent universities rely on international students to help their financial stability, and what impact this has on admissions policies.
Answer · Graeme Dey: The Scottish Government welcomes the valuable contribution that international students make to our society, culture, and economy. Our commitment to Scotland's universities is demonstrated through our long-term commitment to Scotland’s universities, inve…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish a breakdown of total university funding per student, including teaching grants and other financial support, in each of the last 10 years.
Answer · Graeme Dey: As part of the annual budget process the funding for the Scottish Funding Council (SFC), is announced. The 2025-26 Budget includes over £1.1bn of investment in teaching and research in Scotland’s universities.It is the role of the SFC to allocate …
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government for what reason it chose to develop a bespoke NHS Scotland app and did not adopt the NHS England model, which has been operating for several years.
Answer · Neil Gray: Unlike the NHS App in England, which is currently just for the NHS, our planned service is for both health and social care. The development is also linked into wider digital developments for Scottish public services overall, particularly in relation to a comm…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what the deadline is for the NHS Scotland app to be fully operational across all NHS boards, and what contingencies are in place should there be delays.
Answer · Neil Gray: The online app for health and social care, which is part of our ‘digital front door’ programme, will initially be available to a small cohort of people in Lanarkshire from December 2025. Whilst work continues on preparing for that initial release,…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what the cost to date has been for the development of the NHS Scotland app, including the cost of any contracts awarded, and whether there has been any budgetary overspend compared with initial projections.
Answer · Neil Gray: Delivery of the health and social care app for Scotland is being taken forward by NHS Education Scotland (NES) as part of the wider Digital Front Door programme. The majority of costs to date have been on mobilising the team required and developing the Outlin…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what engagement it had with businesses, including in the renewable heating sector, before making the decision to not proceed with the proposed Heat in Buildings Bill.
Answer · Alasdair Allan: As I have set out in my statement to Parliament earlier today, we intend to introduce a Heat in Buildings Bill in Year 5 of this Parliamentary session. In this statement I set out government’s rationale for the format of the Bill. We will continue to en…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how many local authorities have (a) reduced or (b) eliminated modern language teaching in (i) primary and (ii) secondary schools in the last five years.
Answer · Jenny Gilruth: The Scottish Government does not publish local authority level data for the items requested.Scottish Government does, however, publish related data on language learning and teaching at a national level. The table below provides a summary of data from the bien…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how it will ensure that reducing methane and nitrous oxide emissions in agriculture does not lead to increased food imports from countries with poorer environmental standards.
Answer · Jim Fairlie: We firmly believe there is no contradiction between high quality food production and producing it in a way that delivers for the climate and nature and it is important that we do not offshore our emissions as we work towards net zero.We are supporting our far…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what consultation it has had with (a) farmers and (b) agricultural bodies regarding the practicalities of meeting agricultural net zero targets.
Answer · Jim Fairlie: We are committed to co-developing and co-designing our agricultural policies with industry and rural partners.The Whole Farm Plan was co-developed with industry and will help farmers and crofters measure their businesses’ impact and find ways to become …
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the feasibility of its net-zero targets for agriculture, in light of concerns raised in Scotland on Sunday on 16 March 2025 that current policies could put farms "at risk".
Answer · Jim Fairlie: The Scottish Government is fully committed to delivering net zero by 2045. Our pathway to net zero must recognise that agriculture and food production relies on natural processes and will always cause some degree of emissions. We have no policy to reduce live…
17 Mar 2025 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how much NHS Scotland has spent on (a) legal fees, (b) settlements and (c) tribunals related to disputes in the last five years.
Answer · Neil Gray: The Scottish Government does not hold this information centrally. This would need to be requested from the NHS Boards directly. It is for NHS Boards to ensure best use of available resources to support service delivery whilst prioritising patient safety and c…