The Scottish Parliament has made changes to the scheduling of Portfolio Questions, starting in March.

What are Portfolio Questions?

Portfolio Questions are departmental questions to the relevant CabSec or Minister, asked and answered in the parliament chamber, traditionally after lunch on a Wednesday.  Across a 40 minute slot, 20 questions would normally be scheduled.  For a big portfolio like Health, all 20 questions would be allocated.  For smaller portfolios, they would be twinned with each portfolio getting 10 questions each.

For example, on Wednesday 27 February, the two sets of 10 questions were as follows:

So, what’s changed?

From the w/c 4th March, an extra session of Portfolio Questions will be scheduled on a Thursday after lunch.  The number of questions selected will also reduce from 10 to 8 (or 20 to 16) in the hope that all questioners can be fitted into the time.  The Presiding Officer has also indicated today that he will be grouping similarly-worded questions, to be more efficient within the time allocation.

*sigh*, another thing to remember.  How do I know what’s coming up when?

We’ve prepared a handy rota with dates and deadlines, based on official information provided by the Parliament.  As with all parliamentary dates, these are subject to change, but they can be checked/updated on request.

Portfolio Questions March-June 2019

Get in touch if you need any more information on how questioners are selected and how to keep track of discussions if you’re not able to listen in to every session.  Our monitoring and training services are designed to support you every step of the way.