{"id":1209,"date":"2019-03-01T10:17:26","date_gmt":"2019-03-01T10:17:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.news.direct\/?p=1209"},"modified":"2019-03-01T10:17:26","modified_gmt":"2019-03-01T10:17:26","slug":"scottish-parliament-makes-changes-to-ministerial-questions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.direct\/scottish-parliament-makes-changes-to-ministerial-questions\/","title":{"rendered":"Scottish Parliament makes changes to Ministerial questions"},"content":{"rendered":"
The Scottish Parliament has made changes to the scheduling of Portfolio Questions, starting in March.<\/p>\n
What are Portfolio Questions?<\/strong><\/p>\n Portfolio Questions are departmental questions to the relevant CabSec or Minister, asked and answered in the parliament chamber, traditionally after lunch on a Wednesday.\u00a0 Across a 40 minute slot, 20 questions would normally be scheduled.\u00a0 For a big portfolio like Health, all 20 questions would be allocated.\u00a0 For smaller portfolios, they would be twinned with each portfolio getting 10 questions each.<\/p>\n For example, on Wednesday 27 February, the two sets of 10 questions were as follows:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n So, what’s changed?<\/strong><\/p>\n From the w\/c 4th March, an extra session of Portfolio Questions will be scheduled on a Thursday after lunch.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 The Presiding Officer has also indicated today that he will be grouping similarly-worded questions, to be more efficient within the time allocation.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n *sigh*, another thing to remember.\u00a0 How do I know what’s coming up when?<\/strong><\/p>\n We’ve prepared a handy rota with dates and deadlines, based on official information provided by the Parliament.\u00a0 As with all parliamentary dates, these are subject to change, but they can be checked\/updated on request.<\/p>\n