Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change Committee

Meeting date: Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Official Report 373KB pdf

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Petition

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Rural Fuel Prices (PE1181)

The next item on the agenda is consideration of PE1181, in the name of Helena Coxshall, on rural fuel prices. Members have been provided with a paper relating to the petition, and we have today received correspondence between John Swinney, the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer. During our previous consideration of the petition, we agreed to urge the Government to write to the chancellor, and the correspondence is the result of that. The cabinet secretary has made the argument in favour of the petition, citing the example of the French Government being granted permission to apply a reduced rate of fuel duty. The chancellor’s reply acknowledges the problem but argues that the difference in fuel prices in remote and rural areas is

“the product of market forces”

rather than a result of the fuel duty regime. The chancellor then gives two reasons for taking the position that the fuel duty regime should not be used in the way that has been suggested by the petitioner and by members of the committee.

15:15

It seems to me that we have a fairly limited number of choices about what to do. The petition simply calls on the Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to make representations to the United Kingdom Government about the issues. We can do relatively little now that the terms of the petition have been complied with.

We have also had a note from the Scottish Government saying that it would welcome suggestions from island communities on ways in which transportation costs could be mitigated and on whether it could help to facilitate those. We can certainly highlight that to the petitioner, and it might be worth having a short discussion about any other things that committee members might want us to do on the petition. However, it seems to me that the fundamental terms of the petition have been complied with at this point.

I am not sure that I entirely agree with you that the terms of the petition have been complied with. The minister wrote in November 2008 and then again in March 2010, but no action was taken in between. The minister has not sought a meeting with the chancellor to discuss the issue and press the case. That disappoints me because we have all said in different arenas that the issue is important. I am keen to keep the petition open, especially given that we might soon have a new chancellor to talk to about the issue. We should keep the petition open.

On the basis of our previous discussions and in light of the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s reply, I think that there is still room for discussion. One suggestion of a non-market nature that I mentioned was that we could have some kind of bulk buying process. Since our previous discussion, I have raised that suggestion with Highland Council, which said that the regulations would be complex. However, it seems to me that any petrol station already has to go through complex regulations to store and sell petrol. Because of the severity of the market disadvantages for people who live in the remote Highlands and on the islands, I wonder whether we should ask the Government to consider how such a bulk buying approach might be adopted. People out there are looking for something innovative but, at present, the Chancellor of the Exchequer is just saying, “Sorry. One size fits all.” We know that that does not wear well with people in the areas that I represent.

Whoever the chancellor is in London, and given the recent budget discussions there, it seems that there are no differences between the parties that vote on these matters in London, and that the issues are between people who come from Scotland, particularly the more remote parts, and those in large areas in the centre. We have only to look at the figures on people who vote on the issue when suggestions are made on mitigation of the problem to see that there is no difference.

We have to look at a different route to find some way to address the question of people being disadvantaged. The suggestion that I mentioned is one way, and there might be other ways, but I wish that we could ask the Government to tell us whether councils could buy in bulk, and how the fuel could be distributed thereafter.

The public petitions process is certainly important for putting issues on the Parliament’s agenda. The issue is clearly on the Parliament’s and the Government’s agenda.

I agree with Charlie Gordon and I feel bad that the petition has gone round and round. It is bad for the Parliament when petitions go round the committees but get nowhere.

Hauliers from my constituency tell me that, when they travel north to deliver goods, whether goods for the farming community or petrochemicals, the cost of doing so ends up being paid by the people in the islands and rural communities. There are issues about what travels north and what system could be put in place to support those communities, which carry the cost of things being delivered. Some lateral thinking makes sense. The petition has flagged up the issue, but it is not appropriate for it to go round and round while that lateral thinking takes place. The issue has been flagged up and the invitation has gone to the Government and local authorities to consider a way forward. That is probably the best that we can do. Otherwise, we are saying that we can do something that we cannot, and that is not fair.

Yes.

We seem to be split two ways on whether to keep the petition open. The text of the petition is simply a call for us to urge the Scottish Government to speak to the UK Government about the matter. That has happened.

The issue is too important at the moment. It is high in people’s minds. It is passing strange that we should close the petition when there are clearly some solutions that we want to work through and when we want to urge the Scottish Government to keep up its dialogue with the UK Government. We must keep the petition open.

15:30

Correct—the petition is specifically worded and its requirement has been met.

Should it not also stay on our agenda?

Absolutely. I would say that the petition has achieved its objective in getting the issue on to the agenda across the political perspective.

I have been passed a note by the clerk, but I am sorry—I cannot read it. [Interruption.] I again suggest that we write to the petitioner in the terms that are set out in the proposal in the paper and that we write to the Scottish Government to urge it to continue to pursue the alternative options that Rob Gibson and others have outlined, and to keep us informed of progress on that. I propose that we close the petition and recognise that the issue remains high on the agenda not just of this committee, but of the whole Parliament and the Scottish Government. Is that agreed?

Not by me. I am sorry, but I want to keep the petition open.

I agree that we should keep the petition open to ensure that the issue stays on our agenda. I do not think that it is satisfactory to say that it will be kept on the Parliament’s agenda when we do not know what that work plan will be, or to say that it is somewhere in the public consciousness. I think that we need to ensure that it is part of our work plan, and that is best done by keeping the petition open.

For completeness, I point out that the letter of 19 March 2010 from John Swinney to Alistair Darling says:

“Over the course of the last two years, I have written to you on a number of occasions”,

so it would be fair to say that the Scottish Government has pursued the issue. However, there is a difference in position between the two Governments. The Scottish Government takes one view and the UK Government takes another. A future chancellor, whether they are of the same political persuasion or a different one, might well take a different view, but that seems to be the situation as it stands.

As far as I can see, there has been no attempt to bridge the gap between the two Governments, and that should have been done.

I again point to the Scottish Government’s response, which says that it would welcome suggestions from island communities on ways in which transportation costs could be mitigated and on whether the Scottish Government can help to facilitate that. That is a specific reference to the sort of arrangements that Rob Gibson describes. The issue is certainly on the Scottish Government’s radar.

It is on the public’s agenda, too—members of the public are talking about the issue. I do not deny that.

Sorry, convener. Were you making the recommendations that are set out in paragraph 12 of our paper?

It did not sound like you were doing that, but if that is what you were doing, I support the approach.

How can the committee, on the basis of the discussion that we have had, write to the Government to say that we are happy for it to continue with its approach, while sending the petition to another committee, as you seemed to imply that we might do? You suggested that the petition could be closed but that the issue could be kept going through the Government reporting to the Economy, Energy and Tourism Committee—

It is on our agenda.

The issue does not go away. It is one that we must continue to look at, but I think that we have met the petitioner’s expectation. I feel that it would just not be fair if we were to hang on to the petition for another six months or if we were to pass it on to the Economy, Energy and Tourism Committee. We would be passing the ball around and people would watch and think, “What on earth is the Parliament doing?”

That is my position, too.

Are there any other comments?

We seem to be split 50:50, which I guess means that the decision about what to do comes down to a casting vote. I do not think that the casting vote was necessarily designed to deal with decisions on whether to close petitions, but I am aware that the committee has already signed up to an extremely busy programme, which takes up its time not just this year but to the end of the parliamentary session. We will write to the Scottish Government to ask it to keep us informed of its progress on the alternative options. When it gets back to us, we can decide whether extra value would be added by having further committee consideration of that progress. I close the petition.

I also close the meeting, because we have reached the end of our agenda.

Meeting closed at 15:33.

From a strictly formal point of view, your interpretation is correct, convener. This is the third time that the petition has come to the committee. The strict wording of the petition asked us to

“urge the Scottish Government to make representations to the UK Government”.

The Scottish Government has done that. It is not good for the Parliament’s reputation for us to have petitions that do the rounds repeatedly. However, that is not to downplay the significance of the issue. Leaving aside the fact that there is a United Kingdom election campaign on and that we will debate the wider issue in the Parliament this Thursday, courtesy of the Liberal Democrats, I have considerable sympathy with the view that we need to find a way within a devolved Scottish context, and perhaps other contexts, to address the problem. The high petrol and diesel prices are impacting adversely on communities, particularly island communities.

The recommendation in the paper gives us an opportunity to explore practical suggestions. We have just heard such a suggestion from Rob Gibson, with which I do not have a particular problem. Formally, the strict terms of the petition have been complied with. Are we going to say that the petition should come back to the committee for a fourth time? That is not a good way for the Parliament to operate. However, I do not run away from the issue. I am open to other suggestions alongside the one in the paper.

I am disappointed by the reliance on market forces in the response from the chancellor. We surely should have learned in the past couple of years that that might not be the way forward in certain circumstances. The issue that we are discussing is one such case. The two Governments have different policy agendas to follow on the issue. We could go round the houses demanding meetings, but the Governments would make exactly the same points. A better way forward is to take up the Scottish Government’s offer to consider innovative ways of dealing with the issue. That might not technically be what the petition asks for, but we all know that the petitioner is calling for action on fuel prices. The Scottish Government is offering a way to do that.

Rather than have a stand-off between the two Governments, we are being offered a third way, whereby we can come to a solution that addresses the outcome that I think the petitioner wants. We need to take that up. I do not know how the petitioner will feel about that, but I think that she will appreciate that an alternative solution is being considered and that the matter is being kept on the agenda. If that means that we must keep the petition open, we should be open to doing so.

I agree that we should encourage the Scottish Government, the petitioner and, potentially, the Economy, Energy and Tourism Committee, which might have more interest in the energy aspect, to consider the options that the Scottish Government and Rob Gibson have talked about. The question is simply whether the petition continues to appear on our agenda, given that there is little that this committee can do about it in practice, even though the Government can start to take forward some ideas.

We could consider the petition again and have the same discussion in six months’ time, we could leave it as a legacy issue for our successor committee in the next session of the Parliament, or we could close the petition. None of those options would prevent the Government from taking forward creative options, including bulk buying, if that proves possible, nor would it prevent the Parliament as a whole from expressing its view in Thursday’s debate or subsequently. On that basis, does the committee agree to write to the petitioner and to close the petition?

Members: No.

We do not seem to have agreement in the committee on what to do. Is there another proposal?

Like Rob Gibson, I did not agree with much of what the convener said, but I agree with the recommendations on the petition. I am not for kicking it for a shy to another committee. This is a transport matter, and the fact is that, for the foreseeable future, the motor car will be the main means of transport in many parts of rural Scotland. There are other transport-related issues, not least to do with the movement of goods. The recommendations in the paper are fine and accommodate the practical suggestion that Rob Gibson made.

Okay. Rob Gibson seemed to be asking that we also write to the Scottish Government, to ask it actively to pursue the issue and to keep the committee informed. Is that sufficient?

I am asking that we do that. However, the real issue is whether we close the petition, as members suggested. Germane suggestions have emerged from the debate on the petition and I am sure that the petitioner would be happy for discussions to be kept in that context. If the Government comes back and says that there is nothing that it can do, we can close the petition then. I would rather keep it open at the moment. I support Alison McInnes’s proposal that we do so.

There is a difference between closing consideration of the issue and closing the petition.

That seems to me to be the case, but that is not to say that the issue goes away—it will certainly remain on the Parliament’s and the Government’s agenda, as we have heard. We can write to the Government to urge it to continue to pursue it.

The issue may well stay on our agenda if the Government informs us of progress, but the petition asks us to urge the Scottish Government to speak to the UK Government and that has been done.

The fact that the issue will undoubtedly be carried on with in the Scottish Parliament and in other forums, not least the Scottish Government, does not mean that the petition will have been unsuccessful if it is closed. It will mean that the petition has moved the issue on to a different arena.

I think that we should close it.