Questions and answers

Question reference: S6W-04078

Asked by: Oliver Mundell, MSP for Dumfriesshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 05 November 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 17 November 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether COVID-19 vaccine booster appointments are being offered to all members of a household on the same day and at the same time, where they are close in age and required to travel a considerable distance to a vaccination clinic, and, if not, what the reasons are for these considerations not being taken into account when appointments are being offered.

Vaccination appointments including boosters, are scheduled based on the cohorts defined by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) and from the files submitted by Health Boards. These are in priority order based on risk to the individual, rather than postcode alignment. For example, a married couple in the same house, one 68 years old and one 71 years old, would see them placed in different JCVI risk cohorts, therefore the 71 year old would be scheduled before the 68 year old, and their appointments may be days or weeks apart.

Individual cases can be considered by the Health Board if a priority, and support arranged.

Question reference: S6W-03083

Asked by: Oliver Mundell, MSP for Dumfriesshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 September 2021
Current Status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 12 November 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether people living in Scotland and travelling abroad are experiencing difficulty accessing French QR codes to prove COVID-19 vaccination status and, if so, what action it is taking to resolve any reported issues.

The Scottish Government have been working with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO), and the Border Force to ensure countries that require QR codes would accept ours. Scottish Government officials became aware on 8 September 2021 that French authorities were seeking additional verification to our QR codes only for their domestic certification purposes, and that information was issued the same day. The issue was therefore resolved on 9 September 2021.

French authorities have not experienced any further issues in accessing the QR codes of people living in Scotland.

Question reference: S6O-00399

Current Status: Withdrawn

Question reference: S6W-03460

Asked by: Oliver Mundell, MSP for Dumfriesshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 05 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 22 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has any agreements in place with any preferred installers or providers of interlinked fire alarms.

Question reference: S6W-03461

Asked by: Oliver Mundell, MSP for Dumfriesshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 05 October 2021
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 22 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what process is in place to allow firms to advertise their products and services as being Scottish Government-approved in (a) general and (b) relation to interlinked fire alarms.

Question reference: S6O-00283

Asked by: Oliver Mundell, MSP for Dumfriesshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 October 2021
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 27 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions the net zero secretary has had with ministerial colleagues regarding reports that wind farm developers are offering payments to local residents in return for signing non-disclosure agreements and not objecting to planning applications.

Question reference: S6W-03014

Asked by: Oliver Mundell, MSP for Dumfriesshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 16 September 2021
Current Status: Answered by Mairi McAllan on 4 October 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what consideration it has given to setting a target to increase Scotland’s hedgerow network as part of its Forestry Grant Scheme.

Hedgerows can support ecological connectivity by joining up nature rich areas across Scotland, contributing to wider nature networks and helping to address habitat fragmentation, which is one of the most significant drivers of biodiversity loss.

The Scottish Government recognises the value of hedges and their creation and supports the this through the Agri-Environment Climate Scheme which has committed £11.6 million since 2015.

Question reference: S6W-02879

Asked by: Oliver Mundell, MSP for Dumfriesshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 09 September 2021
Current Status: Answered by Graeme Dey on 24 September 2021

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-01926 by Graeme Dey on 23 August 2021, how many of the 58 potential new stations have been appraised in line with the Scottish Transport Appraisal Guidance (STAG).

The Scottish Transport Appraisal Guidance (STAG) provides a framework to identify and appraise transport interventions. The process is designed to provide investment decision-makers with the information they need in a clear, structured format. The second Strategic Transport Projects Review is following STAG as the basis for undertaking its appraisal, therefore all 58 station options are being appraised in line with STAG.

Question reference: S6W-02157

Asked by: Oliver Mundell, MSP for Dumfriesshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 26 August 2021
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 23 September 2021

To ask the Scottish Government for what reason funding that it provided to support organisations responsible for building social housing, which have incurred additional costs due to the COVID-19 pandemic, has reportedly not been received by some organisations, in light of reports that sub-contractors of Cunninghame Housing Association have not received such funding.

The Scottish Government published guidance in August 2020 setting out the circumstances under which additional grant support requests would be considered for projects contractually awarded prior to the March 2020 lockdown and which were as a direct result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Additional grant support through this route from the Affordable Housing Supply Programme is discretionary and is dependent on the circumstances of the individual organisation, development and the contractual arrangements.

An assessment of applications can only conclude when all the appropriate evidence has been supplied to support the request for additional funding. In the case of a request for support in Dumfries and Galloway, the Scottish Government recently received sufficient evidence to determine the claim and the Housing Association has now been informed of the outcome of that assessment .

Question reference: S6W-02476

Asked by: Oliver Mundell, MSP for Dumfriesshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 August 2021
Current Status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 21 September 2021

To ask the Scottish Government what analysis it has made of the primary school performance and attainment data that was published by The Times on 18 August 2021.

The performance and attainment data published by The Times was obtained from the Scottish Government and is publicly available via the School Information Dashboard Profile | Tableau Public . The Scottish Government does not produce school league tables and never will. The guidance published alongside the data makes it clear that statistical data alone is not a measure of how well a school is doing. All schools are unique. To properly understand how well a school is doing it is important to look at a range of different data sources, together with information about the individual school.

A wide range of school performance and attainment data is collected and analysed by the Scottish Government to inform the National Improvement Framework and Improvement Plan for education. The information gathered identifies where further improvements can be made which will, in turn, contribute to delivering our priorities to deliver equity and excellence in Scottish education.

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