Questions and answers

Question reference: S4O-04318

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 06 May 2015
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 13 May 2015

To ask the Scottish Government when the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning last met Education Scotland and what was discussed.

Question reference: S4O-04212

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 25 March 2015
Current Status: Answered by Shona Robison on 2 April 2015

To ask the Scottish Government when the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Sport last met NHS Lanarkshire and what was discussed.

Question reference: S4W-24864

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 12 March 2015
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 26 March 2015

To ask the Scottish Government, other than exam results and qualification attainment, what national indicators or measures it will use to monitor progress on closing the attainment and achievement gap for pupils.

As clearly set out in our Programme for Government, we are committed to ensuring that educational outcomes for all learners are improving and that inequity is eradicated. A range of educational performance data, including school-leaver destinations, exam results, literacy and numeracy survey reports and international Program for International Student Assessment figures currently provide information about attainment in Scotland.

I have announced in recent weeks extensive measures we are putting in place including the Attainment Scotland Fund, Read, Write, Count and local support. Working with key partners, we are developing a national improvement framework which will build on the existing data to help us make further progress on narrowing the attainment gap for pupils.

Question reference: S4W-24977

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 18 March 2015
Current Status: Answered by Derek Mackay on 25 March 2015

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will give public transport authorities the power to compel public transport operators to participate in multi-operator ticketing schemes.

Sections 28-32 of the Transport (Scotland) Act 2001 enable local transport authorities to specify what ticketing arrangements should be available for their areas and to seek to make these available on a voluntary basis.

If they cannot achieve satisfactory arrangements voluntarily, then local transport authorities can, following consultation, impose a duty on operators to implement a ticketing scheme, which can then be enforced by the Traffic Commissioner.

Question reference: S4W-24863

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 12 March 2015
Current Status: Answered by Angela Constance on 25 March 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how the Scottish Attainment Fund will improve the attainment of pupils with additional support needs irrespective of whether they live in the most deprived local authority areas.

The Attainment Scotland Fund is targeted at local authorities with the biggest concentration of primary school pupils living in households in our most deprived areas. It will focus on literacy, numeracy and health and wellbeing in the primary sector to support children and young people in these communities to achieve their potential.

Our approach to raising attainment is for all children and young people including those with additional support needs, and has a firm foundation in all our key policies and programmes, the pillars of which are Curriculum for Excellence, Teaching Scotland’s Future, Getting it right for every child, the Early Years Framework and Developing Scotland’s Young Workforce. There are a range of activities already underway and planned, which are supporting authorities and schools across Scotland to raise attainment and reduce the attainment gap.

In addition, education authorities and other agencies have duties under the Additional Support for Learning Act 2004 (as amended) to identify, provide for and review the additional support needs of their pupils. An additional support need can arise for any reason and be of short or long term duration.

Scottish Ministers are required to report to Parliament annually on the implementation of the Act. The February 2014 report indicated that there has been increase of 2% in attendance for pupils with additional support needs, a pattern of better qualifications and higher grades for pupils with additional support needs since 2009-10, and that 82.3% of school leavers with additional support needs were in a positive destination, a rise of almost 8% on 2009-10.

Question reference: S4O-04173

Current Status: Withdrawn

Question reference: S4O-04137

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 11 March 2015
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 18 March 2015

To ask the Scottish Government how many non-teaching staff there are in schools and how this compares with 2013-14.

Question reference: S4O-03984

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 January 2015
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 4 February 2015

To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to establish a future jobs fund for Scotland.

Question reference: S4O-03958

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 21 January 2015
Current Status: Answered by Fiona McLeod on 28 January 2015

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to implement the recommendations of Jackie Brock's report on safeguarding vulnerable children.

In November 2014 when the Brock report was published the then Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning acted decisively accepting its recommendations in full. The report is one strand of a wider improvement programme to ensure Scotland’s approach to safeguarding children and young people is as robust as possible. We are already taking forward key recommendations in the report. For example, the first cross-sector National Strategic Leadership Summit on Child Wellbeing will take place in February 2015.

Question reference: S4F-02558

Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Monday, 26 January 2015
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 29 January 2015

To ask the First Minister what the Scottish Government’s response is to reports that science lessons in schools are being underfunded by £8 million per year.

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