{"id":491562,"date":"2026-03-23T22:28:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T22:28:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/491562\/"},"modified":"2026-03-23T22:28:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T22:28:09","slug":"stephen-kerr-accused-of-using-ai-to-generate-1400-holyrood-questions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/491562\/","title":{"rendered":"Stephen Kerr accused of using AI to generate 1400 Holyrood questions"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Stephen Kerr, Central Scotland MSP, submitted 1477 questions to ministers over the last year before the Scottish Parliament went into recess ahead of the election.\n<\/p>\n

\n Written questions are used by MSPs to obtain information on a variety of issues, but representatives are asked to exercise caution with the amount.\n<\/p>\n

\n The average cost of answering a written question is \u00a3138.07, with each taking an average of three hours and 40 minutes to process.\n<\/p>\n

\n READ MORE: Holyrood candidates urged to back Scottish LGBT+ conversion therapy ban<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\n Between July 1, 2021 and December 31, 2024, Kerr lodged 839 questions, but managed to almost double the amount lodged with Scottish Government<\/a> officials between January 1, 2025 and March 2026.\n<\/p>\n

\n Overall, Kerr lodged 2340 written questions during the last Holyrood<\/a> term.\n<\/p>\n

\n It comes after Kerr\u2019s colleague Douglas Lumsden was forced to deny he had used AI for \u00a3185,000 of \u201cfrivolous\u201d Holyrood questions<\/a> in February last year.\n<\/p>\n

\n The MSP for North East Scotland submitted 987 questions in January 2025 alone<\/a>, more than half of the total asked by all 129 MSPs that month.\n<\/p>\n

\n \"DouglasDouglas Lumsden was forced to deny using AI (Image: PA)\n<\/p>\n

\n Kerr did not deny using AI, instead disputing that he asked \u201cdaft\u201d questions, as the SNP<\/a> had suggested he had asked about potato peelers in one instance.\n<\/p>\n

\n Between March 2025 and March 2026, Kerr submitted on average six questions each working day.\n<\/p>\n

\n This cost around \u00a3203,929 for officials to answer the 1477 queries over the past year.\n<\/p>\n

\n SNP MSP Kevin Stewart said: \u201cThe Tories<\/a> are always the first to complain about how taxpayers\u2019 money is spent \u2013 do they really think that asking about potato peelers is the best use of \u00a3200,000 worth of public money?\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cEyebrows will certainly be raised at how it was possible for Stephen Kerr \u2013 in a single year \u2013 to ask double the number of questions he managed in the previous four years combined \u2013 if he is using AI, he should come clean now.\n<\/p>\n

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\n \u201cBetween them, Stephen Kerr and Douglas Lumsden have cost the public purse around \u00a3400,000 through this nonsense \u2013 they should be explaining to their constituents why they think this is acceptable.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cWhat is clear is that the public have had enough of Tory MSPs debasing the Scottish Parliament \u2013 and on May 7, people can vote SNP to protect Scotland\u2019s parliament and to be rid of these time wasters.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n The SNP said they have requested that the parliamentary authorities review the written question system to enable MSPs to hold the Scottish Government to account while protecting taxpayers against bad-faith actors.\n<\/p>\n

\n In response to the SNP\u2019s accusations, Kerr said: \u201cFor the past five years I have tirelessly held this useless SNP Government to account.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cWhether it be exposing Michael Matheson\u2019s \u00a311,000 iPad bill, raising the issue of school violence or speaking up for whistleblowers.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cI will never apologise for doing my job of holding this rotten SNP Government and their inept ministers to account.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cI don\u2019t ask daft questions \u2013 the items referred to were mentioned in the answer provided to a legitimate query on the scandalous rise in Scottish Government spending on lavish receptions and entertainment.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stephen Kerr, Central Scotland MSP, submitted 1477 questions to ministers over the last year before the Scottish Parliament…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":491563,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[554,733,4308,86,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-491562","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificialintelligence","11":"tag-technology","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491562","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=491562"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491562\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/491563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=491562"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=491562"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=491562"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}