Iain Gray

9 Feb 2017 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what the target intake for Professional Graduate Diploma in Education (PGDE) (a) primary and (b) secondary teaching students for each university was for 2016-17, also broken down by subject; what the intake was, and what the target is for 2017-18.

Answer · John Swinney: The target intakes for Professional Graduate Diploma in Education (PGDE) in (a) primary and (b) secondary teaching students for each university, including secondary subject intake targets in 2016-17, which are set at a national level, are available at the fol…

9 Feb 2017 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government how many people have been recruited by each teacher recruitment campaign it has introduced since 2007.

Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government has delivered one teacher recruitment campaign, with a focus on the STEM subjects, since 2007. The #inspiringteachers campaign launched in 2015 resulted in an increase of 190 students entering PGDE Secondary teacher education courses a…

9 Feb 2017 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what subjects the Teaching Makes People campaign is targeting; how many recruits the campaign aims to attract, and how it will measure its effectiveness.

Answer · John Swinney: The Teaching Makes People campaign is targeting STEM subjects in general, and specifically Chemistry, Computing, Maths and Physics. The campaign has supporting objectives of helping change perceptions of teaching and career intentions among current STEM under…

9 Feb 2017 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government how much the Teaching Makes People campaign will cost, broken down by type of publicity and activity.

Answer · John Swinney: The Teaching Makes People campaign has a budget of £390,000 for the 2016-17 year, allocated as follows: £35,000: research, insight-gathering and audience testing £90,000: creative development and production £105,000: media buying £45,000: website design, …

9 Feb 2017 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government who the members are of the Teacher Workforce Planning Working Group; how often the working group meets, whether it will publish minutes of each of the group's meetings since January 2015, and what the running costs of the group are.

Answer · John Swinney: The membership of the Teacher Workforce Planning (TWP) Advisory Group is as follows: Members Organisation Rowena Arshad Universities Scotland Michael Boyle Association of Directors of Education in Scotland (ADES) Kathy Cameron Convention of Scottish …

9 Feb 2017 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what action it takes to ensure that there is a stable teacher workforce, and how it monitors the effectiveness of this.

Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government is taking a number of actions to ensure there is a stable teacher workforce. We have: committed £88 million this year so every school has access to the right number of teachers; launched a new teacher recruitment campaign on 8 Februa…

10 Jan 2017 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to concerns expressed by the Royal Society of Edinburgh regarding an “absence of a clear rationale” for the school governance review.

14 Dec 2016 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government how it will compensate for the reported 60,000 tonnes of additional emissions that could be caused by it introducing a 50% reduction in air passenger duty.

8 Dec 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government which local authority areas will be covered by the remit of the proposed South Scotland Enterprise Agency.

Answer · Fergus Ewing: Phase One of the Enterprise and Skills Review announced that we will create a new vehicle to meet the enterprise and skills needs of the South of Scotland. As part of the current Phase Two implementation, we will engage with stakeholders to explore how best t…

23 Nov 2016 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the recent BBC Scotland investigation into maternity hospitals.

Answer · Shona Robison: The safety of expectant mothers and their babies is of paramount importance and will remain so and we are working to ensure that Scotland is as safe a place as possible for mothers to give birth. To achieve this, Healthcare Improvement Scotland has led in the…

15 Nov 2016 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to disband the board of the Scottish Funding Council.

1 Nov 2016 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government what support it will offer the new National Marine Centre being developed at North Berwick.

18 Oct 2016 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government what additional support from the Council Tax Reduction scheme it will provide from April 2017 for families in the Musselburgh Jobcentre area who have migrated to universal credit.

26 Sep 2016 · Portfolio Question

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the new East Lothian Community Hospital project.

26 Sep 2016 · First Minister's Question

To ask the First Minister what the Scottish Government's response is to calls by those working with abuse survivors for an urgent investigation into the direction of the National Strategy for Survivors of Childhood Abuse.

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government when it will announce details of the updated package of support for eligible postgraduate students for academic year 2017-18.

Answer · Shirley-Anne Somerville: The Scottish Government is currently considering the support available to postgraduate students in Scotland and will ensure any changes are announced in time to allow students and institutions to make necessary preparations for academic year 2017-18.

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government how much it will provide in the next five years to fund the higher education bursary available to students with an income of up to £19,000, and how much of this money is additional under the new threshold.

Answer · Shirley-Anne Somerville: The higher education bursary budget is demand-led and entitlement based. The amount made available each year will vary based on student applications. The increase in the threshold for eligibility for the maximum bursary of £1875 from 2016-17 was achieved wit…

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government how much it will provide in (a) real and (b) cash terms over the next five years to make educational maintenance allowance an entitlement.

Answer · John Swinney: I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-03071 on 29 September 2016. 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/parliamentarybusin…

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government how much it provided in (a) real and (b) cash terms to increase the proportion of looked-after children moving on from school into (i) education, (ii) training and (iii) employment in each year since 2007.

Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government does not provide ring-fenced funding for looked after children moving from school into education, training and employment. However, a wide range of provisions to support all young people’s post-16 transitions, including for looked afte…

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government how much it will provide in (a) real and (b) cash terms in each of the next five years to increase the proportion of looked-after children moving on from school into (i) education, (ii) training and (iii) employment.

Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government will set out its spending plans for all areas including for looked after children in its 2017-18 Draft Budget. This will be in week commencing 12 December, after the UK Government’s Autumn Statement. Proposals for 2018-19 and 2019-20 …

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government how many looked-after children went into (a) education, (b) training and (c) employment in each year since 2007.

Answer · John Swinney: This data has only been available since 2009-10 - it is published in the annual Education Outcomes for Looked After Children official statistics release. It should be noted that figures are published based upon two surveys of post-school destinations - at pe…

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government who will lead the review into learning for 16- to 24-year-olds; what the review's terms of reference will be; when the review will be published, and what level of funding will be provided for the review.

Answer · Shirley-Anne Somerville: The Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Education will lead a review of the 15-24 learner journey, a commitment set out in the Education Delivery Plan and reaffirmed in our Programme for Government. The review will build on the solid foundations…

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what level of funding for promotional and marketing materials will be provided for the First Minister's Reading Challenge in each year of the current parliamentary session in (a) real and (b) cash terms.

Answer · John Swinney: There is no dedicated budget for Scottish Government promotion and marketing of the First Minister's Reading Challenge. As mentioned in response to S5W-02390 on 22 September 2016, some of the £344,144 funding allocated to enable the Scottish Book Trust to dev…

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what level of funding will be provided to the review by HM Inspectors of Education into "the demands placed on schools by each local authority" as stated in the Programme for Government.

Answer · John Swinney: Education Scotland used existing resources to allow the review to be planned and carried out by the end of August 2016, and the report published by mid-September 2015 as specified in the Delivery Plan.

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what level of funding was provided to the Scottish Qualifications Authority in each year in (a) real and (b) cash terms since 2007.

Answer · John Swinney: The information requested is in the following table: Real terms £000 Cash terms £000 2007-08 £17.646m £15.559m 2008-09 £15.153m £13.724m 2009-10 £16.173m £14.850m 2010-11 £18.587m £17.378m 2011-12 £21.187m £20.084m 2012-13 £18.805m £18…

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what level of funding will be provided to the Scottish Qualifications Authority in each year of the current parliamentary session in (a) real and (b) cash terms.

Answer · John Swinney: The Scottish Government has allocated £12,794,000 of grant in aid to the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) for 2016-17. The SQA’s financial position will continue to be monitored throughout the year and appropriate action will be taken to ensure it has …

21 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government how many qualified teachers there (a) are in each local authority area and (b) were in Scotland in each year since 2007.

Answer · John Swinney: The following information is published and available in table 6.1 the teacher census supplementary tables: http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics/Browse/School-Education/teachcenssuppdata/teachcensus2015

14 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government to which schools the Read, Write, Count campaign will be extended from April 2017.

Answer · John Swinney: The Read, Write, Count campaign will be extended to P4-P7 in areas of high deprivation from April 2017. No decision has yet been taken on which schools this will include.

14 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what level of funding has been provided each year to the (a) Play, Talk, Read and (b) Read, Write, Count campaigns in (i) real and (ii) cash terms.

Answer · John Swinney: The following table provides the level of funding provided each year to the (a) Play, Talk, Read and (b) Read, Write, Count campaigns in (i) read and (ii) cash terms. Real terms figures are in 2015-16 prices and are calculated using the HM Treasury GDP deflat…

14 Sep 2016 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Government what level of funding will be provided to the (a) Play, Talk, Read and (b) Read, Write, Count campaigns in (i) real and (ii) cash terms in each year of the current parliamentary session.

Answer · John Swinney: £700,000 has been allocated to the Play, Talk, Read campaign in the current financial year in cash terms (£689,655.17 in real terms). £1.5 million has been allocated to Read, Write, Count in the current financial year in cash terms (£1,477,832.51 in real term…