- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 09 March 2005
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Current Status:
Answered by Patricia Ferguson on 22 March 2005
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it considers that increases in the premiums for insurance cover for businesses which provide outdoor education are a barrier to the provision of outdoor education experiences for young people; whether it will commission research into this field, and, in particular, whether it will issue a questionnaire to businesses providing outdoor education to obtain information on the costs of such cover and further details of their outdoor education activities in order to assess the extent to which this is an issue.
Answer
We share the general concern over increases in the cost of liability insurance premiums. The level of premium costs is of course an issue for the insurance market as a whole. We keep in touch with the work of the Insurance Cover Working Group, established by the UK Government, to act as a forum for on-going dialogue with the insurance industry and other interests. We are aware that some commercial providers of outdoor activities have concerns about the impact of increased insurance premiums. However, we have no plans to commission research or conduct a survey of outdoor education businesses. Our contacts with outdoor education interests do not suggest that the cost of insurance cover impacts on the ability of local authorities to locate and access enough suitable providers of outdoor education activities.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 10 March 2005
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Current Status:
Answered by Nicol Stephen on 22 March 2005
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will set out the methodology to be applied for Freight Facilities Grants where the operation is cross-boundary.
Answer
The standard procedure for handling cross-border Freight Facilities Grant (FFG) applications is for the assessment process to be undertaken by the administering authority in the country in which the capital expenditure will take place and for any award of grant to be funded by that authority. The environmental benefits generated by saving lorry miles in England and Wales can be taken into account by the Executive.
If a cross-border rail FFG project involves capital expenditure in Scotland, as well as England or Wales, the expenditure in Scotland would be funded by the Scottish Executive, any expenditure in England by, at present, the Strategic Rail Authority (depending on resource availability) and any expenditure in Wales by the Welsh Assembly Government.
If a cross-border water FFG project involves capital expenditure in Scotland, as well as England or Wales, the expenditure in Scotland would normally be funded by the Scottish Executive, any expenditure in England would be funded by the Department for Transport (DfT) and any expenditure in Wales would be funded by the Welsh Assembly Government. However, the DfT can contribute to the funding of water FFG projects in Scotland and have done so in the past.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 10 March 2005
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Current Status:
Answered by Lewis Macdonald on 22 March 2005
To ask the Scottish Executive whether raptor study groups, funded by Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) to monitor nests, are obliged to disclose nest sites to SNH.
Answer
This is an operational matter for Scottish Natural Heritage.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 28 February 2005
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Current Status:
Answered by Nicol Stephen on 22 March 2005
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has the competence to establish a rail passengers' committee to represent the interests of passengers; if so, whether it will establish such a committee, and whether it will confer on it legal powers identical in substance to those of the current rail passengers' committee which is scheduled to be discontinued by the Railways Bill.
Answer
The Scottish ministers have the competence to establish a rail passengers’ committee in Scotland.
Passenger representation will continue to have an important role in Scotland. We are considering the best arrangements for achieving that.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 11 January 2005
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Current Status:
Answered by Nicol Stephen on 22 March 2005
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will not make a ministerial statement or lodge a motion for debate on the future of the Clyde and Hebrides ferry services and, in particular, the issue of tendering and whether tendering is necessary, until such time as there has been a reasonable opportunity for those ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ who wish to hold a meeting with the European Commission officials to do so and whether the Minister for Transport will discuss the timing of any such statement or debate with ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ from opposition parties.
Answer
During the parliamentary debate on ferry services on 8 December 2004, the Parliament expressed concerns regarding the tendering process. I agreed to discuss these concerns with the European Commission and raised this issue with the European Transport Commissioner, M Barrot, when I met him in Brussels on 9 December. Following that meeting I wrote to M Barrot asking whether there was any way, within the terms of European law to allow the Clyde and Hebrides services to continue to be delivered on a subsidised basis without the need to tender. Further discussions are taking place between the Executive and the European Commission and I will report back to Parliament on this issue as soon as possible.
I appreciate members’ concerns on this issue and propose to hold appropriate consultations with all ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ with an interest.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 07 March 2005
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Current Status:
Answered by Lewis Macdonald on 21 March 2005
To ask the Scottish Executive what action it has taken to promote the use of deer whistles to prevent accidents and whether it will invite the Deer Commission for Scotland to study the findings of the project funded through the Californian Office of Traffic Safety in the County of Modoc, California, which showed that, in a period of about two years when 1,648 air actuated and electronic deer whistles were distributed free to drivers, there was a 99.6% level of confidence that deer whistles were responsible for the reduction in the number of collisions with deer involving vehicles fitted with these whistles.
Answer
The Deer Commission for Scotland will consider all viable options in their on-going research, consideration and priority site action on deer related road accidents.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 07 March 2005
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Current Status:
Answered by Lewis Macdonald on 16 March 2005
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has considered the costs of any measures to be introduced in relation to bathing water; what estimate it has made of the total costs which may be required to introduce such measures, and whether it will provide a breakdown of these costs.
Answer
In order to meet the microbiologicalwater quality requirements of the Bathing Water Directive, the Executive is evaluatinga number of measures designed to reduce the impact of diffuse pollution on susceptiblebathing waters. These projects include farm management programmes, such as in theRiver Nairn catchment, and the creation of biogas plants. As these projects areon-going, we are not yet in a position to give total costs. Scottish Water has investedover £1.6 billion improving treatment infrastructure since 2000, part of which isaimed towards improving bathing water quality.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 07 March 2005
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Current Status:
Answered by Lewis Macdonald on 16 March 2005
To ask the Scottish Executive who would be responsible for independent monitoring of whether more than 200 people use a beach for bathing; how much this would cost; what purpose this expenditure would serve, and whether such expenditure would be justified.
Answer
Under forthcoming bathing water identification proposals, to be run on the Executive’s behalf by Clean Coast Scotland, owners or operators of bathing water sites wishing to be identified under the Bathing Water Directive will be required to provide data indicating peak daily usage of 150 people or above. This will ensure that future sites are identified in line with the directive’s requirement to protect large numbers of bathers. Data should be such that it can be independently validated. Costs of data collection are to be borne by the applicant, and will vary depending on the size of site and survey method employed. Clean Coast Scotland will be responsible for introducing application criteria, but, it is likely that both manual counts and photographic evidence will be acceptable.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 07 March 2005
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Current Status:
Answered by Rhona Brankin on 15 March 2005
To ask the Scottish Executive when it will publish the follow-up report to the Scottish Needs Assessment Programme Report on Huntington's Disease, Acquired Brain Injury and Early Onset Dementia.
Answer
The Scottish Needs Assessment Programme (SNAP) issued its report on Huntington’s Disease, Acquired Brain Injury and Early Onset Dementia in February 2000 in order to assess progress in implementation. The Scottish Executive Health Department then commissioned a review to report on what changes had been made. The aims of the review were:
To affirm the Executive’s commitment to meeting the needs of people with these conditions.
To raise awareness of these conditions at a strategic level.
To examine what progress had been made since the SNAP report.
To summarise key issues.
Following receipt of the Review Report the Chief Medical Officer wrote, in July 2003, to chief executives of NHS boards and NHS trusts, Directors of Public Health and of Social Work and a number of other bodies including the Scottish Head Injury Forum and Alzheimer Scotland drawing attention to the key areas still to be addressed in promoting best practice. A full copy of the review Report has been made available to any respondents who requested it. It is therefore already in the public domain and a copy has been placed in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre.
- Asked by: Fergus Ewing, MSP for Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber, Scottish National Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 17 February 2005
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Current Status:
Answered by Lewis Macdonald on 15 March 2005
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has issued, or will issue, any statutory guidance to National Park Authorities in respect of the workings and application of section 8 of the National Parks (Scotland) Act 2000.
Answer
Statutory guidance relating toSection 8 of the National Parks (Scotland) Act 2000
- as set out at schedule1 to the act – was issued to the National Park Authorities in the relevant DesignationOrders and Elections Orders.  Both parkauthorities also have an Ethical Standards Code of Conduct in place for their boardmembers, as required of bodies listed under Schedule 3 to the Ethical Standardsin Public Life etc. (Scotland) Act 2000. There are no plans at present to issue anyfurther guidance under the terms of schedule 1 to the 2000 act to the two establishedNational Park Authorities.
