Questions and answers

Question reference: S6O-03569

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 05 June 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 13 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on its commitment to increase the number of electric vehicle charging points, particularly in rural areas.

Question reference: S6O-03516

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 29 May 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 5 June 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to ensure that children and young people have opportunities to engage with fine arts and performing arts, such as music, drama and art.

Question reference: S6O-03373

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 24 April 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 2 May 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions the transport secretary has had with ministerial colleagues regarding the potential impact on Scotland’s aviation industry of any proposals to levy an air departure tax on short-haul flights in Scotland.

Question reference: S6W-26300

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 March 2024
Current Status: Answered by Gillian Martin on 3 April 2024

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S6W-26130 by Gillian Martin on 19 March 2024, as part of its work to explore other avenues with the onshore renewables industry to maximise benefits flowing into communities, whether it has specifically considered maintaining community benefit schemes and community shared ownership agreements as a condition of the sale or transfer of all onshore renewables projects.

The Onshore Wind Sector Deal includes an industry commitment to making community benefit agreements binding at the point of Financial Investment Decision, and to maintaining community benefits and shared ownership agreements as a condition of sale or transfer of a wind farm.

This is supported by a joint Scottish Government and industry commitment to establish a standard approach to the management of community benefits funds and to establish a national register of community benefits and community shared ownership, to ensure transparency and effective reporting.

Question reference: S6W-26049

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 11 March 2024
Current Status: Answered by Claire Baker (on behalf of the SPCB) on 25 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body (SPCB) how many meeting room bookings within the Scottish Parliament estate have been made in each of the last two years, broken down by those that were made by (a) ministers or ministerial staff, (b) SPCB staff, (c) non-ministerial MSPs or MSP staff and (d) anyone else.

There were 6983 meeting room bookings in 2022 and 8852 bookings in 2023.

For the purposes of this response these numbers have been adjusted to reflect bookings for meetings only. Bookings for activities such as MSP sponsored events, maintenance, broadcasting checks, set up times etc. were filtered out to leave the following totals:

5817 meetings in 2022 broken down as:

ministers or ministerial staff 312
SPCB staff, 4599
non-ministerial MSPs or MSP staff * 835
anyone else 71 (CPGs)

7505 meetings in 2023 broken down as:

ministers or ministerial staff 964
SPCB staff, 5343
non-ministerial MSPs or MSP staff * 1060
anyone else 138 (CPGs)

*It was not possible to identify non-ministerial MSPs as a separate group. Therefore, the category MSP/MSP staff includes Ministers acting in their capacity as an MSP and includes all Members who have been a Minister for all or part of each year.

Question reference: S6O-03266

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 20 March 2024
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 27 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to reports that the former chairman of Prestwick Airport resigned his post to lead a bid to purchase the airport.

Question reference: S6W-26135

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 14 March 2024
Current Status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 20 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on whether productive farmland is an ecosystem service provided by soils.

Question reference: S6W-26129

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 March 2024
Current Status: Answered by Gillian Martin on 20 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what consideration it has given to developing a more detailed national strategy and spatial plan for energy storage developments that identifies (a) peak energy demand times on the grid, (b) the locality of such demands on the grid and (c) the length of hold time required for the dispatchable power source.

Legislation and regulations relating to electricity networks are reserved to the UK Government, with National Grid Electricity System Operator (ESO) responsible for electricity system planning and electricity network planning across GB. As set out in the UK Transmission Acceleration Action Plan, the UK Government has committed to develop a Strategic Spatial Energy Plan, which will bridge the gap between government policy and infrastructure development plans across the whole energy system, land and sea, across Great Britain. The Scottish Government is broadly supportive of a more strategic approach to energy planning however, we are continuing to press the UK Government to ensure that the SSEP respects the devolved competencies of the Scottish Parliament.

Question reference: S6W-26130

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 March 2024
Current Status: Answered by Gillian Martin on 19 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what consideration it has given to replicating elements of the onshore wind sector deal, such as maintaining community benefit schemes and community shared ownership agreements as a condition of the sale or transfer, in other renewable technology sectors, such as battery energy storage systems.

Building on the success of our Good Practice Principles and our Community and Renewable Energy Scheme, the Onshore Wind Sector Deal represents a significant step forward in ensuring our journey to net zero benefits people across Scotland, and is part of a just transition. We are learning from these successes and will continue to work with industry to explore other avenues within our devolved powers to maximise the benefits flowing into communities.

We are also pressing the UK Government to explore mandating community benefits from onshore renewables as well as electricity transmission network infrastructure. It is critical that the UK Government continues to work with us as these proposals are developed to ensure they deliver the maximum benefits for the people of Scotland, and support our transition to a green economy in which no one is left behind.

Question reference: S6W-26133

Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 12 March 2024
Current Status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 18 March 2024

To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on whether the preservation of farmland for future food security is in the public interest.

Tell us your views

Seòmar agus comataidhean