Parliamentary questions
Jackie Baillie
9,397 questions tabled in the Scottish Parliament, most recent first.
2 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-24763 by John Swinney on 1 April 2015, for what reason it has not yet published the responses to its consultation on an interim constitution in Scotland.
Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government has been considering the consultation responses and intends to publish them in the near future.
2 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-24763 by John Swinney on 1 April 2015, when it analysed the responses to its consultation on an interim constitution for Scotland.
Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government has been considering the responses to the consultation The Scottish Independence Bill: A Consultation on an Interim Constitution for Scotland since the consultation closed.
2 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-24763 by John Swinney on 1 April 2015, how many responses it received to its consultation on an interim constitution for Scotland.
Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government received 110 responses to the consultation The Scottish Independence Bill: A Consultation on an Interim Constitution for Scotland.
2 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-24973 by John Swinney on 1 April 2015, what the closing date was for the consultation on an interim constitution for Scotland.
Answer · John Swinney: The closing date for responses to The Scottish Independence Bill: A Consultation on an Interim Constitution for Scotland was 20 October 2014.
2 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government which cabinet secretary sought agreement from the Cabinet for the policy of full fiscal autonomy and when the matter was discussed.
Answer · John Swinney: Cabinet regularly discusses the ambition for greater powers for Scotland.
2 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government when it adopted the policy of full fiscal autonomy.
Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government has published a range of proposals for how full fiscal responsibility within the UK could operate. These include: Fiscal Autonomy in Scotland: The case for change and options for reform (February 2009) http://www.gov.scot/Resource/D…
1 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how spending by innovation centres is managed and whether it plans to audit the spending.
Answer · Angela Constance: This is an operational matter for the Scottish Funding Council.
1 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it is on target to create 2,000 jobs by 2018 from its investment in innovation centres.
Answer · Angela Constance: Innovation centres will help to ensure that Scotland continues to be a pioneer in sciences, innovative technology, ideas and development. Their business plans indicate that they have the potential to create up to 5,000 jobs in their first five years. The inno…
1 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how many (a) direct and (b) indirect jobs the spending on innovation centres has created, broken down by centre.
Answer · Angela Constance: The current total number of staff directly employed by the eight Innovation Centres is 65. This number was broken down by centre in the answer to question S4W-25217 on 29 April 2015. This does not take account of in-kind staff contributions across industry a…
1 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what total number of staff is working for innovation centres, also broken down by centre.
Answer · Angela Constance: Currently, the total number of staff directly employed by the eight Innovation Centres is 65. The following table breaks this down by centre. The numbers in the table are based on current ‘core’ team structure and those directly employed by the Innovation Ce…
1 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what the total budget is for each innovation centre, including funding from academic institutions, private enterprise and other major sources.
Answer · Angela Constance: The total budget for each Innovation Centre is provided in the following table. It includes indicative funding from the Scottish Funding Council (SFC), academic institutions, private enterprise and other major sources. Innovation Centres (IC) SFC funding (£…
1 Apr 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what its budget is for innovation centres; what it has spent already and over what time period, broken down by centre, and whether it plans to make additional funding available for centres to apply for.
Answer · Angela Constance: The Scottish Government is investing in Innovation Centres through the Scottish Funding Council (SFC), which has committed £124 million of funding for the Innovation Centres programme over six years (2013-19) comprising £110 million of core funding and £14 mi…
19 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether there are issues that would cause difficulty with the implementation of the (a) Scottish Landfill Tax and (b) Land and Buildings Transaction Tax.
Answer · John Swinney: Implementation of the two new tax systems is an operational matter for Revenue Scotland. The Scottish Government is satisfied with the arrangements which Revenue Scotland has put in place for the implementation of the Land and Buildings Transaction Tax and Sc…
19 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether Revenue Scotland will be fully operational from 1 April 2015.
Answer · John Swinney: On 1 January 2015, Revenue Scotland was established as a non-ministerial department of the Scottish Administration. It started to collect devolved taxes on 1 April 2015 and is now fully operational.
19 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish the fiscal assumptions that underpin the assertions in both publications entitled Benefits of Improved Public Performance.
Answer · John Swinney: The assumptions underpinning the modelling scenarios are outlined on page 1 of the report published on 9 March 2015 and are quoted below: “The first scenario reflects the situation under the Smith Commission powers where the majority of additional tax revenu…
19 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government on what date it will publish a revised oil and gas bulletin.
Answer · Fergus Ewing: The Budget 2015 represented an admission by the chancellor that his policy for the North Sea has been wrong and that the poor stewardship by successive UK governments has had a detrimental impact on our oil and gas sector. The measures announced by the chance…
19 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what Barnett consequentials arise from the 2015 UK Budget announcements and how these will be allocated.
Answer · John Swinney: Barnett consequentials arising from the UK Budget announcement amounted to £31.5 million, £29.9 million of resource DEL and £1.6 million of capital DEL. The consequentials arising from health expenditure in the rest of the UK will be passed on in full to heal…
18 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-24666 by Derek Mackay on 10 March 2015, when it will agree the final account and outturn costs with contractors involved in the A898 Erskine Bridge Vehicle Barrier Replacement project.
Answer · Derek Mackay: The final account and out-turn costs will be agreed by the end of November 2015.
18 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S4W-24763 by John Swinney on 17 March 2015, on what date it will publish the responses to its consultation on an interim constitution for Scotland.
Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government has not yet announced a specific date on which responses to The Scottish Independence Bill: A Consultation on an Interim Constitution for Scotland will be published.
16 Mar 2015 · Portfolio Question
To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to tackle low pay.
16 Mar 2015 · First Minister's Question
To ask the First Minister, in light of the new analysis by Professor Brian Ashcroft regarding fiscal autonomy, whether the two Scottish Government reports entitled Benefits of Improved Economic Performance are based on the continuation of the Barnett formula.
12 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how much of the £35 million discretionary housing payments budget allocated to local authorities in 2014-15 has been spent, broken down by local authority.
Answer · Margaret Burgess: Details of expenditure on discretionary housing payments by local authority in Scotland are published on the Scottish Government website at: http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Social-Welfare/dhp
12 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what estimate it has made of the reduction in discretionary housing payments from the UK Government to local authorities for 2015-16.
Answer · Margaret Burgess: The UK Government has reduced funding to Scottish local authorities for discretionary housing payments (DHPs) by £1.9 million, from £15.2 million in 2014-15 to £13.3 million in 2015-16. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) provides DHP funding based o…
12 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government for what reason there is a reduction of £8.972 million in the discretionary housing payments budget for 2015-16.
Answer · Margaret Burgess: The budget for funding local authorities for discretionary housing payments (DHPs) in both 2014-15 and 2015-16 is £35 million. The Scottish Government has provided local authorities with £26,028,194 for DHPs from 1 April 2015 and has retained £8,971,806 to be…
12 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will detail the £150 million underspend in 2014-15, broken down by portfolio.
Answer · John Swinney: As in previous years, I will provide details of the expected Departmental Expenditure Limit outturn by portfolio alongside my provisional outturn statement in June 2015.
11 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what its estimate is of how much will be required to capitalise the Scottish business development bank and what the set-up costs will be.
Answer · John Swinney: We are looking at different options of how best to deliver a Scottish development bank, working jointly with enterprise agencies and public and private sector stakeholders. This work includes agreement on the best scope, scale and structure. Once this work is…
9 Mar 2015 · Portfolio Question
To ask the Scottish Government what work it is undertaking with educational institutions to tackle occupational segregation.
5 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government when it will publish the responses to its consultation on an interim constitution for Scotland.
Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government intends to publish the consultation responses to the Scottish Independence Bill: A Consultation on an Interim Constitution for Scotland in the near future.
4 Mar 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government how it will capitalise the proposed Scottish business development bank.
Answer · John Swinney: We are looking at a range of sources and are speaking to a wide range of partners and stakeholders in exploring options for establishing a Scottish Business Development Bank. This includes an option appraisal of whether the best structure should be public, pr…
26 Feb 2015 · Written Question
To ask the Scottish Government what the cost was per day of the lane occupation charges agreed with contractors to discourage late completion of the A898 Erskine Bridge Vehicle Barrier Replacement project.
Answer · Derek Mackay: The works for the A898 Erskine Bridge Barrier Replacement contract were substantially complete in May 2014 and finished, after the Commonwealth Games, in early September 2014. The contract for these works is within the defects correction period, thus is curre…