Parliamentary questions

Michael Matheson

1,154 questions tabled in the Scottish Parliament, most recent first.

10 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how it monitors the application of the provisions of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages as these relate to Scots.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The UK government has signed Part II of the Council of Europe Charter for Regional and Minority Languages in respect of Scots. Part II consists of the main principles and objectives that are applicable to all parties and all regional and minority languages. T…

10 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive what the timetable is for developing and implementing a national languages strategy.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The national languages strategywill be developed within the life of this parliament. The timetable for implementingit will depend on the strategy itself.

10 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-13616 by Peter Peacock on 31 January 2005, in which specific policies the principles of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, as these relate to Scots, have been given general expression.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The principles of the Charter, as they relate to Scots, find expression in Scottish Executive policies in education and the arts.

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive what its long-term strategy is to ensure the viability of Scottish Opera.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The future viability of Scottish Opera is dependant upon the implementation of its own business plan. The Executive and the Scottish Arts Council are supporting the company in its implementation of the plan, as well as closely monitoring progress being made t…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of primary school children was physically active in each of the last three years.

Answer · Peter Peacock: Based on the National Physical Activity Strategy definition of physical activity (see answer given to question S2W-14341 on 22 February 2005), all physicallyable primary school children should have been physically active in each of the last three years. <…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how many qualified physical education teachers will be in post in primary schools in each of the next three years.

Answer · Peter Peacock: Precise projections are not available. However we would expect numbers to increase in this period, as we move towards meeting the recommendations arising from the PE Review. Both through increases in secondary initial teacher education courses in PE, and thro…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how many qualified physical education teachers have been in post in primary schools in each of the last three years.

Answer · Peter Peacock: The available information from the 2003 Teacher Census shows there are 92 full-time equivalent (FTE) primary teachers with physical education as their main subject taught and 9 with it as their other subject.The previous teacher census was in 1998. The…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how many students completed physical education teaching courses in each of the last five years.

Answer · Jim Wallace: The table below shows the numbers of graduates from physical education teacher training courses for the years 1998-99 to 2002-03 (the most recent year for which data are available at present).Teacher Training Graduates in Secondary Level Physical Educa…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive what its definition is of "physically active".

Answer · Peter Peacock: In their 2003 strategy for physical activity, the Physical Activity Task Force defined physical activity as “a broad term to describe movement of the body that uses energy”, which can refer to any activity involving movement including walking, housework, manu…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive what its plans are for the future of the school cultural co-ordinators programme.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: Phase II (2004-06) of the pilot Cultural Co-ordinators programme is in train. Monitoring and evaluation of the scheme continues under the management of the Scottish Arts Council. The future of the programme beyond 2006 will be determined in the light of evide…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how it will monitor the success of the school cultural co-ordinators programme.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: Phase I (2002-2004) of the pilot Cultural Co-ordinators programme was evaluated by an external consultant and a resultant report published in June 2004. A copy of this evaluation is available from the Scottish Arts Council, which administers and monitors the …

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how many school cultural co-ordinators have been employed in each of the last three years, broken down by local authority.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The table details the number of people employed as cultural co-ordinators in the last three years and the number of posts which each local authority applied for. The table also indicates which local authorities have been awarded Phase II funding to date. …

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how much financial assistance has been awarded to the Scottish Library and Information Council in (a) 2003-04 and (b) 2004-05.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: Scottish Executive grants to the Scottish Library and Information Council are shown in the following table:<table border=1 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3> <thead> <tr> <td> </td> <td> 2003-04 </td> <td> <p align…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has had any discussions with the Ambassador Theatre Group in connection with the Theatre Royal, Glasgow.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: There have been no discussions between the Executive and the Ambassador Theatre Group in connection with the Theatre Royal, Glasgow.

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how it is helping schools to promote the teaching of music.

Answer · Peter Peacock: It is the responsibility of theindividual education authorities and head teachers to make decisions on how bestto promote the teaching of music. The Scottish Executive does, however, provide adviceon the provision of music tuition in the classroom, primarily …

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive what its strategy is to promote the work of Scottish painters internationally.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The Scottish Executive aims to ensure that Scottish artistic talent receives both national and international recognition. Our policy in this area is delivered principally by the Scottish Arts Council (SAC).The SAC’s Visual Arts Department has supported…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how much funding has been awarded to Historic Scotland in each of the last three years and how much will be awarded in each of the next three years.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The funding for Historic Scotland is as follows:<table border=1 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3> <thead> <tr> <td> </td> <td> 2002-03 (£000) Actual </td> <td> <p align=…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has any plans to increase the level of free access to Historic Scotland properties.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: Historic Scotland plans to continue the significant progress achieved in recent years in enabling free access to its properties. There are in excess of 250 sites throughout Scotland to which the general public have free access all year round.Progress h…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how many schoolchildren have visited Historic Scotland properties through free school visits in each of the last three years.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: Total numbers participating in Historic Scotland’s free educational visits scheme over the last three years are as follows:<table border=1 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3> <tr> <td> Year </td> <td> Number of Children </td> </tr> <tr> <td…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has any plans to extend Social Inclusion Partnerships' arts projects in each of the next three years and, if so, which organisations have applied for this support.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The Scottish Arts Council’sArts and Social Inclusion Scheme ended in 2003. The council’s new LocalAuthority Partnership Fund will target areas of disadvantage with new artists-in-residenceprojects. Decisions on which areas will benefit from the new scheme are…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how many people have taken part in Social Inclusion Partnerships' arts projects in each of the last three years.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The Executive’s culturalagency, the Scottish Arts Council, does not hold data of this description. the answer to S2W-14304 answered 1 March 2005, refers to the number of SocialInclusion Partnership arts projects which participated in the Scottish ArtsCouncil’…

9 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive which Social Inclusion Partnerships' arts projects are supported under the Scottish Art Council's social inclusion scheme, broken down by local authority area.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: A breakdown of SIP arts projectsacross local authority areas supported by the Scottish Arts Council’s Arts and SocialInclusion Scheme is listed below.Scottish Arts Council SocialInclusion Scheme Grants<table class=MsoNormalTable border=1 cellspacin…

8 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of children over 14 in social inclusion partnership areas took part in sport at least once per week in each of the last three years.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: Data collection for these participationlevels are not specifically for children over 14 but for all children andadults over 14 to help measure the related target in Sport 21 2003-2007. This commencedin April 2003 when Sport 21 took effect. Therefore, t…

8 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of children aged 13 to 17 take part in sport outside the school curriculum and how this is measured.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The rolling average for 1999-2002(up to December 2002) was 78% and for 2000-2003 (up to December 2003) was 71.3%.Whilst this shows a decrease, we expect this to change once infrastructure developmentssuch as Active Schools are bedded in. Active Schools should…

8 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how many primary schools have provided at least two hours of high-quality physical education by a qualified teacher in each of the last three years and how many schools expect to provide such education in each of the next three years.

Answer · Peter Peacock: This information is not held centrally. In my response to the PE Review Group report of June 2004, I outlined a 10 point action plan for taking forward the group’s recommendation. This work includes the gathering of baseline data, against which we will monito…

8 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how many Scottish people won world and international medals in each of the last three years, which medals were won and for what disciplines.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The table sets out thenumber of Scottish people who have won medals at senior level in the Olympic,Paralympic and Commonwealth Games and in World and European competitions ineach of the last three years. Given that some Scots will have won medals inmore than …

8 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of people aged 45 to 64 took part in sport at least twice a week in each of the last three years and how this was measured.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: The rolling average for 1999-2002(up to December 2002) was 42% and for 2000-2003 (up to December 2003) was also 42%.That for 2004 will not be available until summer 2005, and will be reported to theSport 21 National Implementation Forum in October 2005. There…

8 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of people aged 17 to 24 took part in sport at least twice a week in each of the last three years and how this was measured.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: Data collected as part of theomnibus household survey, the Scottish Opinion Survey, are used by sportscotlandto produce their annual reports on sports participation in Scotland. Becausethe sub-sample sizes for many individual sports are relatively smal…

8 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how it measures the implementation of Sport 21 targets established by sportscotland and what progress is being made in achieving these targets.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: I should first make clear thatthese targets were not established by sportscotland. Sport 21 2003-2007:The National Strategy for Sport - Shaping Scotland’s Future, is the strategy for Scottish sport by Scottish sport.Its 11 targets …

8 Feb 2005 · Written Question

To ask the Scottish Executive how many people were members of sports clubs in each of the last three years.

Answer · Patricia Ferguson: Information is not held in the format requested. However, recent figures from the Scottish Opinion Survey suggest that 957,000 Scots were members of sports clubs.