First Minister’s Question Time – in the Scottish Parliament at on 4 December 2025.
Patrick Harvie
Green
I know that the First Minister is aware of the scale of the housing crisis in Glasgow, which has been exacerbated by the United Kingdom Government’s changes to asylum policy—changes that are harming the lives of asylum seekers and are also harmful to the budgets available for public services. Will the First Minister tell us what urgent action the Scottish Government has taken, since his officials started meeting the local authority, registered social landlords and others to discuss the situation, to ensure that those parties have the resources that they need to deal with this crisis, which is not of their making?
John Swinney
Scottish National Party
The first thing that we have done is to press the Home Office to address those issues—the Home Office is the root cause of the issues and difficulties that Mr Harvie has raised in the Parliament today—and we are working collaboratively with Glasgow City Council in that respect.
Other steps that we have taken include increasing investment in housing and, in particular, ensuring that void accommodation is brought back into use. In our partnership with Glasgow City Council, we have seen much progress being made, and I commend it for the work that it is doing, including with registered social landlords, as part of that process.
As a consequence of the support that we make available to the council, particularly in relation to homelessness, we are working as effectively as we can to tackle the significant issues that Mr Harvie has raised.
Question Time is an opportunity for MPs and Members of the House of Lords to ask Government Ministers questions. These questions are asked in the Chamber itself and are known as Oral Questions. Members may also put down Written Questions. In the House of Commons, Question Time takes place for an hour on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays after Prayers. The different Government Departments answer questions according to a rota and the questions asked must relate to the responsibilities of the Government Department concerned. In the House of Lords up to four questions may be asked of the Government at the beginning of each day's business. They are known as 'starred questions' because they are marked with a star on the Order Paper. Questions may also be asked at the end of each day's business and these may include a short debate. They are known as 'unstarred questions' and are less frequent. Questions in both Houses must be written down in advance and put on the agenda and both Houses have methods for selecting the questions that will be asked. Further information can be obtained from factsheet P1 at the UK Parliament site.
Ministers make up the Government and almost all are members of the House of Lords or the House of Commons. There are three main types of Minister. Departmental Ministers are in charge of Government Departments. The Government is divided into different Departments which have responsibilities for different areas. For example the Treasury is in charge of Government spending. Departmental Ministers in the Cabinet are generally called 'Secretary of State' but some have special titles such as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Ministers of State and Junior Ministers assist the ministers in charge of the department. They normally have responsibility for a particular area within the department and are sometimes given a title that reflects this - for example Minister of Transport.
