British Sign Language (BSL) video relay service tender: FOI release

Information requested

Any minutes, emails, or other correspondence between Scottish Government officials and Ministers regarding the decision not to re-tender the BSL video relay service, Contact Scotland BSL.

Response

As outlined in your request, you are seeking information on the "decision not to re-tender the BSL video relay service, Contact Scotland BSL". We are interpreting this request based on the specific form of words used, which asks for information on "the decision not to re-tender" this service and have searched documents and emails up on this specific question until 8 January 2024 when this request was received.

In response to your question, I wanted to outline the approach that Scottish Government is taking on this contract.

The Scottish Government’s position is to tender for a new free service, and we communicated this publicly to Parliament on 19 December.

The full answer provided by the First Minister on this date is exempt for the purposes of this FOI under section 25 (1) of FOISA (information otherwise accessible) as it is available via the following link: Meeting of the Parliament: 19/12/2024 | Scottish Parliament Website The Deputy First Minister also reaffirmed this commitment in Parliament on 15 January 2025 and her response can be found here: Portfolio Questions | Scottish Parliament TV

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.