Former First Minister Bute House guests lists: FOI release

Information requested

A list of every visitor/guest to Bute House since Humza Yousaf became First Minister and the number of times each guest has visited.

Response

I enclose most of the information you requested. I have taken your request for visitors and guests to not include contractors attending to carry out maintenance.

The enclosed information is of those guests and visitors to Bute House who were signed in by the front of house team.

Guests attending functions in Bute House are not signed in this way, and their details are published proactively on the Scottish Government website (within each of the engagements, travel and gifts publications). Under section 25(1) of FOISA, we do not have to give you information which is already reasonably accessible to you.

Some senior political or diplomatic visitors will not be required to sign in, but their details are available in the First Minister's engagements on the Scottish Government website with photographic records on the Scottish Government's Flickr stream

You will wish to note that Bute House was closed between April 2023 and September 2023 for essential repair work, during which time there were no visitors or guests.

Exemptions under sections 38(1)(b) and 39(1) of FOISA apply to some of the information you have requested because it relates to personal data. As a result of this, some names have been anonymised to instead cite the role in which the individual attended (e.g. television interviews will include a camera operator, but the journalist and media outlet are named).

About FOI

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

FOI 202400409833 - Information Released - Annex

File type

4 page PDF

File size

111.8 kB