Ben Wallace: Yes.
Ben Wallace: To ask the Scottish Executive what guidelines were issued to health boards before Christmas in relation to epidemics or winter emergencies.
Ben Wallace: If the Executive's staff policies are working so well, why, in January 1999, according to the Unison survey, was staff morale lower than it had ever been? That reflected the fact that staff morale is lower under this Government than it was under the Tories. In December of last year the Royal College of Nursing conducted a similar survey and found that after a year of Labour policy the...
Ben Wallace: Will Malcolm Chisholm give way?
Ben Wallace: Just over 1,000 days ago—not seven months ago—the Labour Government came to power. It does not get two starts to this race, I am afraid. In opposition, Labour used the words "crisis", "verge of collapse" and "sick". It then declared that waiting lists were the be-all and end-all of health measurement and that staff were better off in Labour's hands. A thousand days later, we are all...
Ben Wallace: It was reported that Jack Straw said that any family of asylum seekers who waited more than six months would be paid in cash rather than vouchers, and the minister spoke about the 600 families that will come to Scotland. As the backlog is 23 months, is it the case that no family coming into Scotland will be paid by voucher?
Ben Wallace: Will the member give way?
Ben Wallace: I visited HCI; the management of HCI would completely disagree and say that it is absolutely nothing to do with Labour policy that it is now moving forward, employing more people than Kvaerner shipyards just down the road from it, and is in fact an investment that was made by our Government and the specialist equipment that was there. On the point of Scotland and the "madcap" economic...
Ben Wallace: To ask the Scottish Executive whether organisations such as Care and Repair will be eligible to apply for European funding under the new structural funds plan.
Ben Wallace: From what the minister has said today and from what we have read in the strategy document, we can see that tourism has been placed at the heart of Scotland's economy. I am well aware of the minister's stringent efforts to listen to the industry's many representatives and to consult the Enterprise and Lifelong Learning Committee in the consultation process. We have heard many speeches from SNP...
Ben Wallace: The SNP's commitment to the euro is questionable. We will see what happens when we have that debate. At the moment, the euro is extremely weak. One of the reasons why Ireland is cutting so much of its spending on tourism is that the weaker currency is putting pressure on inflation rates and public spending. While the euro remains weak, I recommend that we stay out of it, otherwise we may have...
Ben Wallace: We have only 129 members, so I would be happy for the Liberal Democrat Deputy Minister for Parliament to go. I wonder whether my Labour colleagues would agree. Although I fight for the union, Scotland has separate needs and a different competitive advantage from those of the rose gardens of England. The Executive's strategy is one-sided, in that it puts a lot of responsibility on an already...
Ben Wallace: To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has plans to exempt Scottish students on specialist courses in England which are unavailable at Scottish institutions from paying tuition fees.
Ben Wallace: To ask the Scottish Executive whether all funds from the last European Structural Funds round have been allocated.
Ben Wallace: To ask the Scottish Executive whether it intends to review current provisions for dental care in Scotland.
Ben Wallace: To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S1W-2420 by Mr Jack McConnell on 7 December 1999, when it expects to have available a more comprehensive assessment of the costs of answering parliamentary questions and whether this will include a detailed breakdown of the £100 average cost of answering a parliamentary question.
Ben Wallace: Will Mr Rumbles give way?
Ben Wallace: To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S1W-4167 by Mr Jack McConnell on 16 February 2000, what legal status and terms of articles of association organisations must have and what activities, broken down by the general subject areas covered by Objective 2 and Objective 3, they must be involved in to be eligible to apply directly for European Structural Funds support.
Ben Wallace: To ask the Scottish Executive to provide a breakdown of the (a) Objective 1; (b) Objective 2 and (c) Objective 5b Scottish structural fund payments received from Her Majesty’s Treasury in each year from 1996 to 1999.
Ben Wallace: To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will review the current structure of the delivery of dental treatment.