Winter Resilience and Roads Maintenance Review
Our next item of business is winter resilience and the roads maintenance review. Our evidence session with the Minister for Housing and Transport will cover the Scottish Government’s winter resilience strategy and the outcomes of its national roads maintenance review.
I welcome the Minister for Housing and Transport, Keith Brown MSP, and the Scottish Government officials who are with him. Frances Duffy is director of rail and Roy Brannen is director of trunk roads and bus operations at the Scottish Government.
Minister, we know that you set up the winter weather review group and that it met three times over the summer. What were its key findings and how will they be implemented?
As you say, convener, the group met three times over the summer and it discussed issues across the piece. It discussed all the different modes of transport and some non-transport items. The findings can be categorised as initiatives for further joint working. We did not wait until the group reached conclusions on all issues, of course. Waiting for conclusions did not prevent action from being taken. A lot is still to be implemented but, as we are now in the winter period, we have already implemented substantial things.
There has been substantial capital investment in relation to roads, which has been informed by the group’s deliberations. There is a substantial number of new gritters, but existing plant will also be used in a more imaginative way. We have worked with farmers—members may recall that that issue came up last year. Some of the existing plant—for example, plant that is used to trim hedges during the summer months at least—has been adapted for the winter period, and we have substantially changed the communication strategy to make it much more effective than it was last year. There will be much greater use of social networks, for example, and an internet radio station has been established that will transmit transport information to transport users, including road users such as those who transport freight on our roads.
Members will be aware of the new provisions for roads that were implemented during the first part of this year and have been further developed. Additional salt-storage facilities have been placed at strategic locations by roads on which we know there can be difficulties with adhesion—on inclines, for example, for HGVs. We have improved the ability to open central reservations on roads in order to effect the removal of vehicles when there is an issue so that gritters can get in to clear the road.
The group looked at a number of issues to do with rail, such as the freezing of points. Network Rail has invested substantially to deal with that issue by heating points. Other measures, such as the establishment of a winter train that will take plant and personnel to different parts of the network to ensure that it is clear for use, have been developed as a result of discussions in the group.
A huge range of actions has been discussed. Some have simply been carried on from last year and some still have to be implemented, but many already have been implemented.
I want to follow up on the convener’s initial question about the winter weather review group’s report. What has been done to improve interagency communication in periods of severe weather? Obviously, that was an issue last winter.
It will be easiest to look at all the different modes of travel.
I will start with roads. The trunk road operating companies have been talking to each other. They were not obliged to do that previously. They have collaborated in the past, but they have been formally brought together. Around three weeks ago, there was a joint presentation for me from the trunk road operating companies; I think that a similar presentation was offered to members last week. The trunk road operating companies have been talking to each other about what they can do, and that has been done in conjunction with local authorities. Obviously, local authorities were involved in the review, and they are now involved in more collaborative working. I think that it is generally appreciated that some of the challenges that we faced last year can best be met by the collaboration of people who have perhaps not collaborated before. All the roads stakeholders have been involved in that process.
I turn to rail. Last week, I saw what is perhaps the culmination of the collaboration between ScotRail and Network Rail. I went to their joint control room in Glasgow to see how effectively they are working together. ScotRail and its services are on one side of the office and on the other is Network Rail. They are separated by just a small strip—there is a very good reason for that division. ScotRail’s duty manager sits right across from Network Rail’s duty manager. The organisations occupy a joint control room when there is severe weather. There is strong collaboration.
Across the piece, we have taken forward last year’s multi-agency response team—MART—initiative, which members will remember. When there was severe weather, a senior police officer, representatives of the trunk road operating companies, ScotRail and Network Rail, and—often, but not always—I would be in the same room. Members will remember December last year. When a decision was taken to close a road, especially a strategic road, there would be an impact on the roads around it. If a trunk road was closed, there would be an impact on local roads and on railways, as people obviously move to another mode if they cannot get to where they want to go by road. That was not co-ordinated. The point of the MART being co-located is that everybody knows about the decisions at the same time. That has informed what we have done since then, so organisations such as ScotRail, Network Rail and the Society of Chief Officers of Transportation in Scotland—SCOTS—which represents all the local authority directors of roads or equivalent posts. We also involve the Met Office and passenger transport organisations as well as the police and the trunk road operating companies. There is substantial joint working, but what is more important than any particular measure that we have taken is the change in culture that has happened. People now realise that they have to work together.
Co-location is not only about being able to speak to each other better; it is also about working in a different way on the ground. It is about central and local bodies coming together to work together to give a more effective response.
That is so. I recently met freight companies and courier firms, because they were also affected last year and they can provide information and intelligence, because they have a network around the country. I cannot itemise all the background work that has happened but, as you say, a lot of the effective stuff will come out of meetings that the organisations concerned have had to produce a more effective response.
Another example is what I saw when I went to the Calor Gas facility at Grangemouth recently. The company has done work on winter maintenance for its own yard to ensure that it gets supplies in and out. That has necessarily also involved ourselves and the trunk road operating company. You will know the site down at Grangemouth—a trunk road goes by and a local road, which the council has to look after, goes down to the facility. As you can imagine, the Calor Gas facility is very important because it will provide heating supplies to many people, including vulnerable people, throughout Scotland during the winter. There are 1,001 examples of such collaboration.
Such communication between organisations is very important, but equally important is the communication of decisions and the availability of information about emerging problems to the public. You said a little about some of the initiatives that have been taken forward on the internet. Can you tell us a little bit more about how the Government plans to get the information out? For example, what arrangements do you have in place with television and radio broadcasters?
You will have seen all the information on getting ready for winter. We worked on a winter resilience week with the Red Cross that mirrors an initiative in Canada. It can be very important, for the sake of your health, to know what is happening in Scotland in winter time, but in Canada in many cases it is a matter of life or death if you do not know the dangers of winter. We have taken that on board and had a week-long series of initiatives and public education processes, which involved literature being posted out, school educational toolkits and many other measures.
There is general public awareness of the winter. Over and above that, I mentioned the internet radio initiative. It is also true to say that, this year, if someone is going to go up the A9 and they want to know when the treatments on that road are taking place, they can now get access to that information, which was not previously available.
I would like to be able to get to the stage in the future whereby somebody could put into a global positioning system or whatever the information that they are going up the A9 and that they would like to know what the weather forecast is for that road. Obviously, that would be very interesting information for haulage companies. They would be able to put that information side by side with the information on the treatments that we will carry out on the road. We are working towards that, but now it is simply the case that people can go on to the internet and find out when we intend to treat the road.
Over and above that, many initiatives to communicate with the public are not ours to take; it is for ScotRail, which has done a huge amount of work on train services, and Network Rail to communicate the information.
Having seen the coverage in the papers throughout the country—including small local papers—there seems to be a huge amount of information out there and it signposts where people can go if they want further information.
I mentioned social networks, which we identified last year as giving us huge potential to get information out, especially when people want to see quickly whether a train service, for example, will be available.
On that particular point, ScotRail would readily admit that its website fell over at a crucial point because of the volume of traffic that was coming into it. Many organisations, not just ScotRail, have built in extra resilience to their websites so that they can cope with a much higher volume of traffic. Work has been going on across the piece in terms of communications.
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What about the mainstream broadcast media—television and radio—on which people rely hugely for transport information in particular. What arrangements are in place in that regard?
We are happy to host any media organisation that wants to use the Traffic Scotland information. Of course, the cameras are publicly available—anyone can log on and see what is happening on the roads in real time.
We met recently with the BBC to talk about how we can better help it. Media organisations put out appeals to ask people to get in touch with them if they are aware of an issue on the roads or rail. The issue there is that, although they often get information more quickly than we do, because they appeal to everyone across the country, they do not always have the chance to verify that information. Last year, I spent an interesting night in the Transport Scotland control room then drove to the Parliament for the winter resilience debate. I sailed right through the Calder roundabout at about 8 in the morning while listening to a report on the radio—I will not mention the broadcaster—that said that the junction was completely backed up and that there was no way through it.
They had cleared the road just for you. [Laughter.]
Is that what the three gritters in front of me were about?
That points to the fact that situations change quickly. We are trying to see whether we can get information out more quickly, but we also want to ensure that the information has integrity and is up to date. We have spoken to broadcasters about that. They are aware of the issue. They are an aid to us in that regard, because the more intelligence that we can get in, the better—I have mentioned the situation with courier and delivery companies already. We have discussed with broadcasters how we can help each other.
Transport Scotland has taken various steps to improve the response to severe winter weather on the trunk and local road networks. Given that part of the problem last winter was that salt is less effective when temperatures fall below zero, what research has been done into alternatives to salt for de-icing, and are there sufficient supplies of such alternatives to be deployed this winter?
A number of things are being done. As you know, Transport Scotland has the responsibility for the trunk roads, motorways and so on. However, local authorities have worked with Transport Scotland, as they have an obvious interest in that regard.
Despite some misconceptions, nobody ran out of salt last year—there was enough salt to go around. Some authorities ran low, but were able to access the strategic stock. We already have in stock well over 100 per cent of the amount of stock that we used in the whole of last year, and we have more coming in.
As you say, salt becomes less effective around -7°C. We have therefore investigated other treatments, such as Eco-Thaw and Safecoat. We trialled them last year in the north-east of Scotland. They operate below that temperature and can help to keep the road free from ice for a longer period. They can also help us to break up ice—I do not know whether you recall the scene last winter of a caravan of vehicles coming along the M8 trying to break up the ice. We have around 70,000 litres in stock at the moment. Those products are about seven times more expensive than salt, so they will be used only when the temperature gets that low. It is up to the trunk road operating companies to make the decision to use them.
Having investigated those products and satisfied ourselves that they do not damage the environment, we have said to local authorities that they might want to make use of them to break up ice on pavements and so on. We have made information about the products available to them and will consider any requests that they make. I hope that if more people use the products, the price will come down.
You touched on the problems of the motorway network to the west of Edinburgh. What advice from Transport Scotland’s performance audit group was given to operating companies on how to improve their winter maintenance procedures and what sort of response was there from those companies, in particular BEAR Scotland?
I will ask Roy Brannen to respond on the dialogue with the companies. The advice involved, for example, ensuring that we have more intelligence on the state of the road surface. The M8 appears to us as one continuous road, but its dips and so on and the different temperatures in different parts of it are significant issues, so it is important to have remote sensors. However, remote sensors are expensive and there were not many of them on the trunk road network. We have therefore ensured that most if not all patrol vehicles will have remote sensors, which means that they will be able to measure low temperatures in road dips and assess whether the road requires treatment. Some of the advice that we gave to trunk road operating companies was therefore about ensuring that they had intelligence about particular issues.
Roy Brannen (Scottish Government)
At the tail-end of last winter, we undertook a joint piece of work with the operating companies, and Halcrow, our performance audit group, to review the winter service that has been in place for the past decade. We looked at three areas in particular: decision making, treatment and communication. I have been in post since 1 April and, over the past six months, we have worked on strengthening all three legs of that stool, if you like, which makes up winter resilience.
On decision making, we have put in six new ice sensors across the network where there were gaps in the set-up, which takes the number of our ice-alert stations up to about 141. Twenty-six additional cameras have been deployed so far, with another seven going in on Friday, to let the winter duty officers see exactly what is going on in the network. As the minister said, we have put 50 mobile sensors on the front-line patrol vehicles so that the road surface temperature and air temperature can be relayed directly back to the operating companies’ winter control rooms and the duty officer in charge of managing the winter response can see at first hand exactly what is going on.
We have employed 23 new front-line patrol gritters, whose purpose is to back up the precautionary treatments that will already have been undertaken throughout the day. The normal process is that a forecast comes in around lunch time and the winter duty officer in the operating company control room starts to plan exactly what the precautionary treatment will be for that evening. He will then put that in place and the spreaders will go out and lay a treatment of salt across the network where it is deemed likely that ice will form.
The winter patrols will go out on the motorway network, the A9 and the A90 up to Aberdeen when the temperature falls to 3°C and continues to fall. They will be out from 2 in the morning right through the morning peak for traffic until 10 am. They will patrol the network on the basis of a one-hour patrol and one hour on standby, so that they will be able to reach any part of the network within 30 minutes. If they get a call or see something on the mobile sensor and the winter duty officer says that they need to dispatch a batch of salt to a particular location, they will, because they are fully loaded six-cube gritters—in fact, some are nine-cube gritters—be able to deploy within 30 minutes to that location, under the direction of the police or the winter duty officer.
The motorway network and the principal A-class roads will be covered by those 23 additional spreaders. When there are severe snow events, that will mean a 14 per cent increase in our total plough fleet to deal with snow when it gets to depths of 30mm and more.
As the minister said, we have introduced a number of communication initiatives. The principal one, which went live last week, is Traffic Scotland internet radio. The service is being provided by Trafficlink, which is a broadcast provider that is co-located in the Traffic Scotland control room and that currently broadcasts to 95 per cent of all commercial radio stations in Scotland. The same provider provides us with a bespoke carousel service of two to three minutes that will run all day through the morning peak and the evening peak, then through the night with pre-recorded updates on planned road works. It is a dip-in, dip-out service; there is no music, but there are infomercials on how people should prepare their car and what else they need to do to seek information. It will provide up-to-date information on live incidents and it is available as an application on any smartphone and is available via the internet to any personal computer.
Given the pressures in the budget, what is the impact of financial constraints on funding for winter roads maintenance at a national and local level? What is being done to ensure that footways and cycle paths are kept cleared? What practical action is being taken to ensure that bus services can keep running during severe winter weather?
The first question was about budgets. There is no question but that budget constraints play a big part in our planning and in our work. That has always been true, but it is probably more true just now. We have a £1.3 billion cut to absorb and, crucially for roads maintenance, much of which is capital spending, we have a 36 per cent cut in our capital budget over the next four years. Those constraints will have an impact.
We knew last year that we would have those constraints. We improved the budgets for both winter maintenance and roads maintenance, but we also focused on how to do what we do better. In that, we have emphasised two things in particular.
The first is collaboration. A trunk road operating company could be carrying out work on a trunk road adjacent to a local road, or a lighting project could be going on next to a trunk road, and that work would be done much more cheaply if the local authority and trunk road operating company worked together. We have asked for increased collaboration, and that is what the roads maintenance review has been mainly about.
We have also taken views from around the world on how different countries deal with roads and winter maintenance. That has allowed us to consider different equipment and practices. An awful lot of work has been done on how we can get more from the money that we have available, because we realise the constraints that we are under.
I am trying to think what your second question was, Gordon.
How do we keep the footways and cycle paths clear?
By and large, they are the responsibility of local authorities. We will continue to have the same obligations for the footpaths that are adjacent to trunk roads, with Transport Scotland and the trunk road operating companies having to clear footpaths within a certain time.
Over and above that, we are running an initiative, especially in the north-east and south-west, whereby we provide to householders a pack including grit, a shovel and some other equipment. That does not mean that we are opting out of what we did before; it just means that, if it will take a certain time to clear a particular path or driveway, the householders will have the option of using the equipment to help out. That does not affect our obligation to do the work.
The different areas where the initiative has started are Boddam, St Fergus, Crimond and Cromdale in the north-east, Carlops in the south-east, New Cumnock in the south-west, and from Golspie through to Benderloch in the north-west. It has been fairly well received. A question was asked in the media about whether we are opting out of our obligations to look after the footpaths and so on. We are not—we have the same regime as before. The initiative gives people another option, and it has been well received by community councils and communities.
That is what we are doing, but by far the biggest work will fall to local authorities, as they have responsibility for far more footpaths and cycle paths than we do. Transport Scotland is responsible for about 6 per cent of the road network in Scotland, and the rest is the responsibility of local authorities.
Did that cover all the points that you asked about, Gordon?
I think so.
What has Network Rail done to ensure that rail infrastructure—especially points and signalling systems—are better able to withstand winter weather than during the past two winters? We understand that ScotRail trains have been equipped with more winter resistance measures. Could you outline what those measures are?
I have mentioned the winter train, which is one aspect of Network Rail’s improvement to services. Around the country, more points that can fail in severe weather, especially strategic points, are now heated. That will help to keep them working. Network Rail also has the use of a helicopter, which through thermal imaging and other means can help it to identify problems on the network much more quickly. It also uses that to identify incidents of cable theft, which is a problem for it, too.
Network Rail has done a lot of work to make sure that it is more resilient this year. Along with ScotRail, it will be able to use the key routes strategy, under which the companies concentrate on keeping key routes open when very severe weather takes hold for a period of time. That is never popular because it always involves not running some services, but they did it last year, so ensuring that strategic services continued to run. I have said to the companies that I am keen that that strategy is used only as a last resort.
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Will it entail some lines closing?
Yes, or services not being run. For example, a main line that has heavy and fast passenger traffic will be kept open, but it might be at the expense of a local line. If points are in danger of freezing, they need to be kept open to maintain the line. That will happen only in very extreme weather.
Apart from the communications initiatives that ScotRail and Network Rail have undertaken, ScotRail will refine some of the innovations that it brought in last year, such as housing rolling stock in polytunnels, putting skirts or kilts around the trains to stop ice accumulating underneath the carriages, and using hot lances to get rid of any ice. It is interesting that other countries, including some parts of the United States of America, have adopted what ScotRail did last year because it proved to be so effective.
Those are probably the main changes that I can think of. You mentioned signalling. Network Rail has identified improvements to infrastructure and undertaken significant maintenance and track improvement works to help to reduce the potential impact of severe winter weather. We have had a more laser-like focus on that since last year. It should be part of Network Rail’s normal business, but it has focused on doing more of that this year.
You might have seen the Office of Rail Regulation’s intervention on levels of service. ScotRail has traditionally given a much higher level of service than train operating companies in the rest of the UK have. However, its service level has dipped of late, so we have worked with it and the Office of Rail Regulation to get on top of that and make sure that it maintains its previous high standards.
We are very focused. A lot of improvements have been made and a lot of new thinking has been done. ScotRail has invested about £2.2 million and Network Rail has made substantial investment in the winter train and the helicopter, and so on.
We heard from Mr Brannen that, until the recent refresh, the winter resilience programme had been the same for the past 10 years or so. In our budget discussions, we have talked about being a bit more preventative and anticipating future issues in, for example, the design of systems and rolling stock. Have any of the lessons of the past two winters been taken on board in those longer-term plans?
Yes, they have, although there will be a difference between road and rail in this respect. The roads maintenance review, which I mentioned earlier, was not just about different working practices in other countries but about different design possibilities and the materials that are used to make repairs or when laying roads in the first place. It will be a little more difficult with rail. We have to consider the franchise timetable, as the award of the franchise is the point at which we might see substantial new investment in rolling stock, for example. It is not that the rail improvements have been ad hoc, but the companies have had to be more innovative in what they do under the current franchise.
Having had a winter resilience programme in place for the past 10 years does not suggest complacency. It is simply a fact that the past two winters were quite unlike the previous eight. Although we have drawn many lessons from the past two years, there is always a balance to be struck between investing in expensive capital equipment that may not be used—and being criticised for that—and not having that equipment if we need it during the winter.
It is also true to say that much of the thinking has been informed not just by last winter. Since last winter, which people rightly focus on, we have had a volcanic ash cloud, the highest winds in May for many years and very severe rain in August, which was equivalent to a month’s rain falling in two days, all of which presented problems. We also had the remnants of hurricane Katia. Each of those presented challenges to the transport system and has informed what we are doing just now.
I do not know whether that is enough, or whether there are other things that you want to hear about road and rail specifically.
You have certainly had an eventful period in office. You mentioned rain; I understand that there have been a number of studies on flooding and drainage on the rail network. What has been done to implement the results of those studies? Is significant work needed there?
I will let Frances Duffy come in on the detail of that. Not just in winter, but when there is potential for flooding, the Government’s resilience room—the Scottish equivalent of COBRA in the UK—comes into effect. The Minister for Environment and Climate Change is involved in that and there is a whole system of flood alerts in different stages that we all tap into, so we get up-to-date information about the likelihood of flooding occurring.
Frances Duffy (Scottish Government)
We are aware that key parts of the rail network are susceptible to flooding. It is something that David Simpson, route managing director for Network Rail, is looking closely at because, obviously, flooding impacts on the performance of the rail network. As the minister was saying earlier, we and the Office of Rail Regulation are pressing Network Rail for better performance on that. There has been considerable investment in new pumps at certain key locations on the network. As part of the Edinburgh to Glasgow improvements programme, we are looking at the implications of flooding around Winchburgh if we put more capacity through there.
One of our expectations for the railway in control period 5 will be greater resilience, and that will direct expenditure. As part of its performance activities, Network Rail is looking at different standards, designs and ways of operating across the UK in order to improve things. In Scotland, there has been some investment in flood prevention, through different pumps, but we are also seeing new instances of flooding. We had some very heavy rainwater ingress in Queen Street station, which seems to have been caused by redevelopment work further along the track. We need better communication between the rail network and the local authorities and better planning in order to understand what is happening in locations that might impact on the rail network.
This might not be relevant to what you have been discussing, but has there been discussion with public and private sector employers to assist them in applying consistent policies when employees cannot get to work because of weather-related problems? I am thinking about what happens when there is advice given to travel only when essential. To a manager of a company or organisation dealing with that, it can often mean that somebody appears who did not hear the message and says, “Well, I got in,” and the next person says, “Well, I heard the message on the radio and I didnae come in.” There can be ambiguity about whether that person gets paid or not, and it becomes a bit messy.
Yes, we have given that some thought. There are constraints that operate in that area and there is only so far that the Government and the police authorities can go. We see it as our responsibility to make the advice that we give clearer, although it can only be advice. We cannot tell people, “Stay in your homes and do not go to work.” We cannot do that kind of thing, but a lot of work has been done to make the advice that we give clearer. That work has been done in conjunction with the Met Office so that what we are saying is consistent. We want employers and employees to realise that, if we are saying to avoid travel, that is pretty clear advice. It will be down to individual employees to decide whether to avoid travel and down to individual employers to decide how to react if employees do not come to work because of disruption. We have had other discussions, most recently with housing associations and local authorities, about what they might want to consider. For example, Stirling and Clackmannanshire share education and social work services. If someone can get to a school in Stirling, even though they work in one in Clackmannanshire, why should they not go to the nearest one, if possible?
A different culture operates in other countries, which seem to have more of an understanding between employers and employees about when they should turn up for work. There is an interesting example in Washington, where there is a federal initiative to tell people exactly that. An announcement is sent out at 4 o’clock in the morning—you may happen to be looking at your mobile phone at that time—about whether the federal Government will, essentially, close for the day. We do not propose to do that here, but elsewhere they are looking inventively at how they can give people the right advice. People are also able to stay in their workplace overnight if the travel conditions are too severe. We will continue to review the question, but in most instances the individual employee and the company concerned will make such decisions.
Will any guidance be provided?
Our role is to give advice. If we can provide as much information as possible to an individual before they make a journey and, obviously, if the employer has the same access to that information, they can both see the options. I remember in 1979 walking from Wester Hailes to Newington in Edinburgh through some very heavy snow to get to work and, when I turned up, my employer, far from showering me with gratitude, said, “Why are you late?” An employer has access to the same information about the weather conditions and knows where their employees live, and we have simply said that people should act reasonably in those circumstances.
That issue is probably even more crucial for drivers for freight companies and so on. On the continent, especially in France, employers have an understanding of the road conditions and drivers will take a decision to park up on a road that they feel to be dangerous. In other countries, employers seem to understand why drivers would do that while keeping an eye on potential abuses.
We do not provide guidance other than the advice that we give about the travel conditions. The decision is left to employers and employees.
Thank you. Obviously, we have had some unusual weather events already this year, including now, when it is particularly mild for November. I wonder whether the Met Office has given you any indication whether it will be a severe winter. Perhaps when we close this evidence session we should ask Alex Hill from the Met Office, who is sitting behind you. I thank you all very much for the evidence you have given us today—[Interruption.] I am sorry, I thought that we had finished. We must move on to the roads maintenance review.
Given that the “National Roads Maintenance Review” highlighted the strategic framework for change, can you explain what that framework is and how it will be delivered by roads authorities?
May I first say something that I forgot to mention earlier? If the committee is interested, I am assured by Transport Scotland—I am sure the same would be true of ScotRail and Network Rail—that we would be happy to host the committee on a visit to the control room or even one of the trunk road operating companies’ headquarters if you want to see some of the issues in dealing with winter demand. That is a standing invitation for any point during the winter if you want to come and see that work at first hand.
The roads maintenance review was based on trying to tackle the constraints of budget and resources at a time when Audit Scotland had identified a substantial backlog in the amount of work to be carried out. That work has been taken forward in two summits with all the stakeholders, including the Society of Chief Officers of Transportation in Scotland, which comprises officers in local authorities with responsibility for the roads network; the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities; the councils themselves; and the trunk road operating companies. At the first summit, we had substantial exhibitions from different companies involved in innovation in roads. After the second summit, which took place last week, I feel that we have an awful lot of common ground, especially with the councils, which are the relevant roads authorities for their areas.
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Those summits have produced about 30 options, many of which can be implemented very quickly. Indeed, I have spoken to the president of COSLA, who addressed last week’s summit, and the organisation will consider those options at a leaders meeting on 18 November. If, as I hope, COSLA approves that particular paper—in fact, I wrote to COSLA the day after the summit, encouraging it to do so—we will be able to take certain early and longer-term actions. We will come back to the issue over the winter and hope that, in the spring, we will be able to move to the next stage with some of the other options.
It is also probably worth mentioning the work of the Scottish road works commissioner, who examines how utilities and others use the road network when, for example, they close a road to carry out works. Our very full discussion with the commissioner will lead to further developments in his remit, but he has certainly been examining the issue of overpossession, in which a utility might close a road for a week but take 10 days to carry out the works. In other parts of the country, overpossession can lead to severe penalties and we will be looking at that issue.
Moreover, the register of proposed works, which is held by local authorities, lists who will be using a particular road, and we are thinking about how we might refine that to limit the number of times a road has to be dug up and ensure that it is reinstated to the required standard. By and large, such reinstatement happens, but my view is that, even if a road is reinstated as required, when it has been dug up 30 or 40 times it cannot be reinstated to its original condition. We are looking at how we can address that issue with the utilities. It is certainly clear that a lot of options are coming out of the roads review.
Although the report makes seven recommendations, it points out that implementing them will only slow rather than halt or reverse deterioration in the road network. Can you comment on that?
There is no question but that budgets play a large part in this matter—and we are increasing the budget in this respect. However, I am responsible for about 6 per cent of the road network, although I point out that those roads require more investment because they tend to be faster roads such as motorways and trunk roads. Given the large part played by budgets and resources, we have emphasised that improvements can be made through better design and better collaboration between roads authorities and by taking the best of current international practice. However, like everyone else, we have to carry out our work within a constrained budget; after all, a £1.3 billion cut is going to be felt in every area of government.
When the steering group looked at the research in this area, it suggested nine options for immediate delivery. What do you intend to do about those options and what do you propose to do about the further recommendations on additional research?
I mentioned one or two of those options in relation to the nine different actions that have been highlighted. Indeed, going back to our previous discussion on winter maintenance, I note that one of the options is to factor lessons learned from the winter maintenance review into roads maintenance. The point might be obvious, but we have to deal with the many different organisations with responsibility in this area.
There are many other recommendations that I am happy to outline, but they are still subject to agreement with COSLA, which is by far the biggest stakeholder with the proportion of the roads network that it covers.
Roy Brannen may want to comment on some of the initiatives.
I chaired the review during the summer months on behalf of the steering group, which consists of the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives, COSLA, SCOTS and the Scottish road works commissioner. The nine recommendations emerged from 100 options that were filtered through officers from all those organisations. We felt that the recommendations could start to change the culture of how we as professionals manage the asset that is Scotland’s road network.
One recommendation was to set up a national roads research working group. A winter managers’ forum took place up in Perth and Transport Scotland and SCOTS led on bringing us and local authorities together to consider winter initiatives. In Ayrshire, one of the councils put forward an initiative that uses alternative products on footways and will undertake a trial of that. Until now, such a piece of work would not have been shared with other partners.
The national working group will ensure that everyone benefits from that type of research, which seems simple, and that is certainly where we want to go. We will use the best resources that we have, and organisations such as Transport Scotland and any of the local authorities can engage in that work and share best practice across the piece.
We also want to examine standards—UK standards in particular—for maintaining our roads safely. With local authorities, we will examine those standards closely and lobby the UK Government and other national roads authorities to ensure that they are fit for purpose. It has been some time since we last reviewed some of the standards, such as the intervention levels for dealing with surface depreciations and those relating to road geometry and wider aspects of road design.
We feel that we can start to work on a number of things now, including building on the best practice that has come out of the discussions. One really positive thing that has emerged is that the group will remain in place for a considerable period of time and will not finish at the end of the spring. Officers are committed to ensuring that we continue to drive forward the work on asset management and the review of how we undertake our business going forward.
As the minister mentioned at the outset, all that comes against the background of a declining budget for roads across the country. The Audit Scotland report indicated that we have something like a £3 billion-plus backlog of repairs and maintenance in the roads infrastructure. How will we cope with that? You are looking at improvements in operating and trying to get better value from the work that you are doing, but the backlog seems to be growing.
That is a good point. The figure that Audit Scotland mentioned was £2.25 billion, which is a concern for all roads authorities, but I must focus on what Transport Scotland controls. Consideration comes down to the fact that with budget constraints as severe as they are—and they are more severe than at any time that I can remember during my time in local authorities, at the Parliament or in Government—we need to get more for the money that we have.
From memory—although I could be wrong on this—I do not think that the Audit Scotland report gave a very good indication of how the situation developed. It gave some figures, but not for how the backlog has grown over time. I know from my time in local authorities the cliché that the roads maintenance budget is one area that you can look to if you have a tough budget settlement, as it is an area of discretionary spend. It may well be the case that the same attitude prevailed centrally. Not that long ago, in the previous session of Parliament, there was a move by one of the committees to cut the winter maintenance budget by £15 million.
We recognise the constraints. The backlog has existed for some time. We would like more capital expenditure, not least because it can allow us to make major improvements to roads, and some contracts have future maintenance costs factored in. If we had additional capital, we could do an awful lot more, and that has the benefit of employing a lot of people, who then pay tax rather than receive benefits, because such work is labour intensive. Also, now is the very time when we can get fantastic deals for our money. Earlier, the cabinet secretary mentioned the new Forth road crossing, for which there are huge potential savings because of the point in the economic cycle at which the contract was let. Many companies and individuals are hungry for such work, and we would love to give it to them, but we must live within our budget, as must local authorities.
Given that situation, although we are increasing budgets, if we are to make progress, we must seek efficiencies, joint working and collaboration and the use of best practice and new design solutions. If we receive consequentials money, we can use that. If we had borrowing powers, we could do more. I used to be a member of Clackmannanshire Council, which is a small council but which has more borrowing powers than the Scottish Government has. The council has no trunk roads or motorways in its boundaries so it has to look after all its roads, but it can borrow money and we cannot. Those are the sort of constraints that we must live with. We need to be inventive in responding to the challenge.
As we have no more questions, I thank the minister and his team. I suspend the meeting briefly to allow the witnesses to leave.
12:11
Meeting suspended.
12:13
On resuming—