- Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 19 December 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Dorothy Bain on 15 January 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what percentage of criminal cases in each of last five years have resulted in a plea agreement prior to trial.
Answer
COPFS uses a live, operational database to manage the processing of reports submitted to Procurators Fiscal by the police and other reporting agencies throughout Scotland. It is designed to meet business needs in the processing of criminal cases, rather than for statistical analysis. This question as currently framed cannot be readily answered by COPFS.
- Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 20 December 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 15 January 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how real-time data is used to support emergency response and recovery during flood events.
Answer
SEPA, as Scotland’s hydrometric and flood warning authority, and a civil contingency category one responder, provides a range of real time data including Floodline flood alerts and warnings; rainfall data at over 250 locations and water level data at over 400 locations in Scotland. Through an on-going technology improvement programme, SEPA has increased the timeliness of rainfall and water level real time data.
SEPA continues to develop its data and explore how its use may be expanded including sharing data through Application Programming Interfaces for organisations to ingest into their own websites or systems; prioritising data by internet searches during major flood incidents; and exploring how to better integrate flood warning and water levels information and to simplify real time access to the information.
- Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 19 December 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Dorothy Bain on 15 January 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what proportion of cases handled by the Aberdeen office of the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) resulted in a conviction in each of the last five years.
Answer
In the last 5 years, almost 100,000 charges have been reported to the Aberdeen Office of COPFS.
COPFS uses a live, operational database to manage the processing of reports submitted to Procurators Fiscal by the police and other reporting agencies throughout Scotland. It is designed to meet business needs in the processing of criminal cases, rather than for statistical analysis. Any data sought in the requested period would encompass convictions for cases reported out with that period. As such, any figures would not accurately reflect numbers of convictions in respect of the cases reported in that period.
- Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 19 December 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Dorothy Bain on 15 January 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what percentage of cases handled by the Aberdeen office of the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) in the last year involved alleged offences under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971.
Answer
The following table shows percentage of cases reported to the Aberdeen Procurator Fiscal’s Office containing one or more charge under - Misuse of Drugs Act 1971.
Criminal cases reported to COPFS Aberdeen Procurator Fiscal office during the financial year 2023-24 |
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| 2023-24 | |
Percentage of cases reported which contained one or more charge under - Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 | 7% | |
- Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 20 December 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 15 January 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how it plans to improve flood risk communication and awareness through enhanced data visualisation tools.
Answer
SEPA is responsible for producing national flood risk maps and operating Scotland’s flood warning system. Both actions are important to communicate flood risk and rely heavily on the use of data and presenting it for greatest impact; both in terms of knowing which places are at risk of flooding and what is the immediate risk during unsettled weather. SEPA keep these processes under review through engagement with stakeholders and customers and are committed to continuous improvement. Recent improvements include work on the Scottish Flood Forecast to deliver a mobile-friendly overview of the flood risk for the next 3 days, an upgraded Floodline messaging system, and improved and more accessible real time water levels webpage.
Improving flood resilience through use of data is a key strand of work from the Flood Resilience Strategy.
- Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 20 December 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 15 January 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what resources are being allocated to SEPA’s flood forecasting and warning services.
Answer
The draft Scottish budget indicates a £52.6m grant in aid allocation to SEPA for 2025-26 and SEPA may determine how to allocate those resources, setting this out in an Annual Operating Plan each year.
The recent budget includes an additional £15m to support the improvement of flood resilience across Scotland.
- Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 09 January 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 15 January 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to inform the public about the change by SEPA to the 24-hour contact system, including how environmental incidents can be reported.
Answer
There is no change to how the public contact SEPA’s 24-7 service. The public are still able to use the same telephone number or online contact form to report incidents.
SEPA’s external website provides clear information on how to contact SEPA and report an incident .
- Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 09 January 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 15 January 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how much was spent on investigating the creation of a Scottish public energy company.
Answer
The Scottish Government have previously published in an FOI response that £519,842.13 inc VAT was spent on investigating the creation of a Scottish public energy company. This information is available in detail at .
- Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 19 December 2024
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Current Status:
Answered by Dorothy Bain on 15 January 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how many criminal prosecutions the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) has handled in each of the last 10 years.
Answer
The following table shows the number of criminal cases reported to COPFS with a first substantive marking for court proceedings.
Number of accused in criminal cases reported to COPFS with a |
First Substantive Marking for court proceedings | |
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Financial Year | Total | |
2014-15 | 126,349 | |
2015-16 | 117,588 | |
2016-17 | 112,388 | |
2017-18 | 102,745 | |
2018-19 | 97,016 | |
2019-20 | 104,356 | |
2020-21 | 89,553 | |
2021-22 | 82,232 | |
2022-23 | 85,364 | |
2023-24 | 94,588 | |
- Asked by: Douglas Lumsden, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 09 January 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 15 January 2025
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will require SEPA to publish regular performance reports on the effectiveness of its automated customer hub in handling any 24-hour support needs.
Answer
The Scottish Public Finance Manual (SPFM) is issued by the Scottish Ministers to provide guidance on the proper handling and reporting of public funds.
Under the terms of SPFM, the Scottish Government and SEPA operate a joint Framework agreement. Sections 25-26 and Sections 32-34 of that agreement details SEPA’s duties to develop Corporate and annual business plans, which include reporting on key performance targets.
This is readily accessible on the SEPA website here: .