Transport
Good morning. The first item of business is a debate on motion S1M-2945, in the name of David Mundell, on transport, and two amendments to that motion. Members who wish take part in the debate should press their request-to-speak buttons now.
I just met the Minister for Enterprise, Transport and Lifelong Learning in the foyer of the Parliament, wearing what looked like a jogging suit. I know now what the reference to pedestrians in the Executive's amendment is all about.
It is another Thursday morning—the 9.30 graveyard slot. I hope that today we will have a meaningful transport debate. Unlike last week's ministerial announcement of the so-called transport delivery plan—now called a report—I hope that today's debate will be of substance and will set out Scotland's transport needs and identify how we will meet them, not just for the benefit of the travelling public, but for the economy.
There can be no doubt of the significance of transport infrastructure. In that term, I include public transport. The infrastructure is important to the development of Scotland's economy and to lifting the growth rate above its continuing below-trend performance.
There is no doubt that business in Scotland is crying out for improvements. The Confederation of British Industry Scotland, Business a.m. and numerous other organisations have produced their own transport plans. The Scottish Executive described the CBI's plan as a
"timely contribution to the debate … in Scotland."
No wonder there is universal disappointment among the business community, road-user organisations and the travelling public following the launch of the Executive's transport delivery report. As Business a.m. said:
"Wendy Alexander's claim that her transport delivery report sets out an ‘impressive range and number of transport improvements' across Scotland is either astonishingly naive or is designed for Labour flag-waving. Of the 10 projects announced, some are old news, others are dependent on studies before they can go ahead, and none has committed funding."
Which projects would the member like to remove, and does he accept that the concessionary fares scheme, Traveline Scotland and others are fully funded?
Pardon me for being sceptical, but it is interesting that the much-vaunted travel scheme was announced 19 months before it is to come into operation. It will be fully operational only one month before the Scottish Parliament elections.
It is not as if the Scottish Executive did not have sufficient time to prepare detailed proposals. The transport delivery plan was due in September 2000, but has been constantly delayed. It was originally intended to be the Scottish version of John Prescott's 10-year strategic plan for transport in England and Wales. However, as The Sunday Times pointed out, since then there has been significant divergence between England and Wales and Scotland in the priority afforded to transport.
Will the member take an intervention?
I will not at the moment, but I will come back to Mr Muldoon.
Indeed, if The Sunday Times's story "Scots transport cash lags behind England" is to be believed, the minister's civil servants calculate the shortfall between what is being spent south of the border and what is being spent north of the border at £85 million over the next three years. That one-time favourite transport guru of new Labour, David Begg, agrees. In a recent paper, he accused the Executive of
"failing to deliver the levels of investment and improvement that are being implemented south of the border",
which will lead to a significant negative divergence of approach. According to the article in The Sunday Times, Miss Alexander rejected the idea of a strategic plan not, as I suggested last week, because she prefers 15-second soundbites to 15-year plans, but because she believes that planning is
"dangerous because it makes the unwarranted assumption that money will be available … to finance those promises."
What a danger; that the electorate should believe that the Labour party and its Liberal Democrat partners would back up promises to improve Scotland's transport system with hard cash. To avoid that clear danger, the minister took the decisive step of ensuring that there are no concrete plans in the report and that there is no money.
There are more questions than answers from last week's report. For example, it would be useful if the minister could give a copper-bottomed guarantee that the Scottish Executive, in conjunction with the Strategic Rail Authority, will complete the process of re-letting the ScotRail franchise by April 2004, but there is no evidence that it can.
What is the Executive's commitment to Borders rail? Is it patronising tokenism or will there be hard cash? Perhaps we will hear the answer today.
I am sure that the park-and-ride facility at Croy station is a good idea. No doubt there will also be benefits from the works at the Auchenkilns roundabout, although those benefits will be no substitute for an extension to the M80.
Will the member give way?
I will come back to Cathie Craigie.
Can it really be the case that when the minister announced her major strategy for the future of transport in Scotland, all that it contained were commitments to build a car park and a roundabout? No wonder it was met with such derision. That is why we need to begin the process again, but this time with funds and time scales clearly identified.
The member raised two points about matters in my constituency—the Auchenkilns roundabout and the Croy park-and-ride scheme—but it is obvious that he and his party know nothing about issues in the area. Traffic management at the Auchenkilns roundabout is exactly what the people of Cumbernauld and Kilsyth are looking for. It is exactly what will ease the congestion on that road. On Croy station—
We do not want a speech. You have made your point.
If Cathie Craigie had listened, she would know that I said that I welcomed the Croy station improvements. I have spent hours in queuing traffic at Auchenkilns roundabout, so I know what the problems are there and the solution is completion of the M80.
I will refer back to the transport delivery plan. I do not accept Miss Alexander's assertion in another Sunday newspaper that the transport problems of rural Scotland have been sorted out. That is an outrageous assertion that is based on the giving out of a few minibuses instead of acknowledging the deplorable state of most rural non-trunk roads, which those minibuses must drive on. Nor has rural public transport been improved.
The need to improve the A75 and A77 in the Stranraer area is as great as ever. Failure to do so will have a knock-on impact on ferry investment and will create in Wigtownshire a rural economic catastrophe of unparalleled severity. That is why the Conservative party would carry out the necessary works out of public funds. That does not apply just to the A75 and A77; we believe that Scotland's motorway network must be completed. The time for studies is over. Scotland's travelling taxpayers are entitled to see their hard-earned tax pounds spent on completion of the M8, the M74 northern extension, upgrading of the A80, the A8000 and the Aberdeen western relief road. There are many other worthy projects in Scotland.
Will the member take an intervention on that point?
Not at the moment.
That does not mean taking money from rail and public transport, which have a vital role. That vital role is why we support the development of rail links to Edinburgh and Glasgow airports. As the Evening Times stated in relation to Glasgow airport:
"The lack of decent public transport links … not only helps to contribute to massive congestion on the M8 but is also one of the main factors cited as stifling the growth of the west of Scotland economy."
I want to make sure that we get this on the record. Will the member confirm that all that he suggests should be paid for by the Executive out of public funds? Does the Conservative party support those projects being paid for out of taxpayers' money?
Mr Rumbles will hear about that. We have previously made it clear that we would commit to transport £100 million per year from the budget of the rest of Miss Alexander's department. I restate that. As the smoke and mirrors are stripped away from the Executive's budget, significantly greater resources might become available. What, for example, will happen post 2004 to the £100 million a year that the Executive currently has in an estates budget that is being ploughed into the Holyrood project?
Given that the Conservatives are never going to be in power, or even in coalition, in this Parliament, can the member tell me what is the point of all this?
I call Bristow Muldoon.
You called Bristow Muldoon.
I am terribly sorry, I thought there was a point of order. On you go.
I do not know how to take that, Presiding Officer.
We in Scotland cannot have a transport system that we can be proud of if we do not rid the country of the scourge of Labour's plague of potholes, which have become all too common on our country roads and in our towns. The Executive must engage in a strategic dialogue with local government on the steps that are needed to return our non-trunk roads to a reasonable state of repair. Scottish Conservatives are committed to setting up an inspectorate that would carry out an independent audit of the state of non-trunk roads that would provide a basis for dialogue. Road users want to end buck passing between the Scottish Executive and councils. It is time to deliver a mutually funded plan for action.
The Scottish Executive has failed to deliver the transport infrastructure that business needs and the travelling public deserve. It has presided over transport chaos, the most lamentable recent example being its sitting on the fence on the rail strikes. Only when the public were at the end of their tether and business had lost millions did the Executive even begin to give any sort of signal to its friends in the rail unions that strikes were totally unacceptable and that the travelling public should be put first. In so doing, the Scottish Executive failed the Scottish people, just as Stephen Byers has failed rail users throughout the UK.
Mr Byers has one priority. That priority is not travellers, but himself and saving his neck. The latest thing he has had to do to achieve that is to pay £300 million to Railtrack's shareholders, which he and many Labour MSPs vowed would never be done. It would have been far better to have used that money to continue to support Railtrack to invest in improving our railways, but just as in Scotland—as the Executive's amendment today proves—Labour has no interest in transport, only in spin. The Conservatives do have an interest in transport. Our commitments to business and to the travelling public are clear and unequivocal.
I move,
That the Parliament notes the importance of transport to the economy in delivering growth and investment to Scotland; further notes that the Scottish Executive's stewardship of transport issues has been characterised by chaos and muddle, evidenced by strikes, increased congestion, poor maintenance of local roads and unreliable public transport; regrets that the long-awaited transport delivery plan launched by the Minister for Enterprise, Transport and Lifelong Learning on 21 March 2002 contains no concrete plans for funding and delivering desperately needed improvements to Scotland's transport infrastructure and services and, in particular, gives no details of new trunk road improvements beyond 2004-05, and calls upon the Executive to make a clear commitment to investing in transport for the benefit of the economy and the travelling public.
I am grateful to the Tory party for raising such an important topic again, and for providing us with another opportunity to highlight the Executive's priorities in delivering a modern transport system for Scotland as a whole. The reason why the debate has revolved, and will continue to revolve, around the policies of the Labour-Liberal Democrat coalition is not simply that we are in power. It is because we have gone beyond complaining about the problems and have brought forward solutions while the Opposition has not. We have outlined priorities and laid out what needs to be done to overcome the legacy of 18 years of neglect and decline under Tory rule.
That was five years ago.
Have the last five years vanished?
Indeed it was five years ago, but it has taken some time to get to where we are. In looking forward, we will not do what the Tories have just promised to do, and cut university funding by £100 million a year.
I do not think that we said that. Ms Wendy Alexander's budget covers far more, as Lewis Macdonald knows, than university funding. Does he think that the £3 million that Scottish Enterprise spent on public relations activity was money well spent, and that it would not be better spent on public transport?
If I stand corrected by Mr Mundell, I must acknowledge that rather than cutting £100 million from university education, clearly his proposal is to cut £100 million from business support. That announcement will not be welcomed by the business community, but perhaps it will be more welcome to universities than was his first proposal.
We will meet the challenges that face Scotland's economy and transport system in the next 20 years by setting priorities and moving forward to meet them. A generation ago, as Wendy Alexander said in the Parliament last week, the great challenge was to provide the strategic roads to link our major cities and to connect Scotland with the south. Today, the greatest challenge—and the one thing in the Tory motion with which I agree—is to tackle congestion in and between our major metropolitan areas.
We will not meet that challenge simply by girning about the problems. We will meet it by recognising that the price of urban congestion is too great for our economy and our environment to pay, and by identifying the most effective ways in which that economic and environmental burden can be removed. We will seek to modernise and improve our public transport system, not talk it down. We will seek to complete the missing links in our strategic transport networks, not just say that every single project is a priority and then avoid the tough choices that need to be made.
We want a bigger, better and safer railway network. That is probably the common view in the chamber, but the Executive will focus its efforts on what is achievable and what will deliver and make a difference. We are working to deliver by April 2004 the directions and guidance that are required for a 15-year franchise for ScotRail's services. We have restructured the existing franchise so that all existing services can be built into the baseline for its replacement, whether they are part of the present agreement or not. That is real progress. We want to see real competition for the next franchise, so that Scottish travellers get the best possible deal out of whoever delivers the services from April 2004.
On the ScotRail franchise, the minister might like to advise the current holders of the franchise that today is not a public holiday, and that it is highly inappropriate for ScotRail to charge travellers premium rates for travelling within Scotland, just because the company happens to be owned south of the border.
Members will find that the process of issuing directions and guidance and letting the next franchise will take into account the record of the present holder of the franchise, as it will take into account the plans of the present franchise holder and any other competitors that come forward.
Will the minister give way?
I will come back to Mr MacAskill shortly.
The Strategic Rail Authority's strategic rail plan, which was issued recently, contains a set of priorities for upgrading Scotland's railway infrastructure, which are also among the priorities for Scotland that were announced by Wendy Alexander last week. Redeveloping Waverley station is one of those. Provision of more platforms for local and strategic services will increase the capacity of the rail network on mainline routes to London, Glasgow and Aberdeen, and of commuter services into Edinburgh. In partnership with the SRA, work on that could be under way as early as 2004. On developing rail links to our largest airports, we will consider the options on the basis of proper examination later this year, and decide on progressing routes for development.
Is it still the Government's intention to get more and more freight on to the rails, given that that has massive implications for signalling requirements? What steps is the minister taking to ensure that signalling resources, expertise, manpower and hardware will be made available?
We have increased our target for transferring freight from road to rail and water from 18 million lorry miles a year, which we achieved this month, to 23 million lorry miles a year, which is our target for a year hence. We are in discussions with the SRA, Railtrack and others that are involved in the industry on how to obtain those signalling resources.
Delivering top-priority public transport projects is part of our proposals.
We also want a capital city with a public transport system that is fit for purpose. Edinburgh trams will symbolise that vision. Partnership is the key to fixing congestion in Aberdeen, which is also a key national priority.
In the course of the past 12 months, we have extended our strategic road traffic model and strategic rail planning to the north-east from the central belt. That means not more studies, but judging transport issues in Aberdeen on the same basis as those in Glasgow and Edinburgh, and fully acknowledging that Europe's energy capital is part of urban Scotland.
What does the Executive expect the end date to be with regard to plans for the transport system in Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire? Is it a year in the future?
We expect the strategic traffic modelling that I have described to produce concrete results during the course of this year. We are investing, as we did again last week, in the development of a modern north-east transport system for the region, and in developing a Borders rail link.
We will follow up the short-term measures that we announced last week to tackle the major issues on the corridors between Glasgow and Edinburgh. We will deliver our commitments to providing a national travel timetable through Traveline and concessionary fares for elderly and disabled people on local off-peak bus services.
We will continue to set our priorities, which we will use to achieve the transport system that we want. We will also continue to fund the rural transport projects that we have supported with substantial funding in the past three years, and to provide record levels of support to lifeline air and ferry services.
Will the minister give way?
I am over my time and I wish to conclude.
The transport delivery report and our list of priorities set out a clear route map for action, which will help us to achieve a transport system that will deliver sustainable economic growth in the next 20 years. We welcome support from all those who share that ambition.
I move amendment S1M-2945.2, to leave out from "further notes" to end and insert:
"welcomes the publication of Scotland's Transport: Delivering Improvements which sets out the Scottish Executive's transport vision for Scotland; endorses this Executive-led vision of an efficient, safe transport system which meets the needs of all in society: individuals and businesses, car and public transport users, cyclists and pedestrians, whilst protecting our environment and promoting sustainable development; commends the integrated package of measures that the Executive is pursuing: tackling congestion, ensuring greater access to a modernised and improved public transport system, promoting alternative modes of transport to the private car, and targeted motorway and trunk roads improvements, and further commends the specific articulation in this transport delivery report of the Executive's top priorities for delivery."
Mr Mundell talked about a "plague of potholes". The phrase
"A plague o' both your houses!"
springs to SNP members' minds.
I have some sympathy for Mr Mundell's critique, which echoed many sentiments that he and I, and members from around the chamber, have expressed in previous debates. He was right to say that the transport delivery plan provides more questions than answers. We must consider where we are at present and how we got here. We have not simply arrived from cyberspace. We are here because of a period of logical progression. As the minister said, during that time we had 19 years of Tory rule. Because of those 19 hard Tory years, the people of Scotland turfed the Tories out at the 1997 election.
Will the member give way?
Not at the moment.
The fact is that the Tories constructed the M74, for which we give them credit. However, they cannot dine out on the construction of one major bit of infrastructure in a generation. That is inadequate.
Many of the points that have been made about potholes arose because the Tories underfunded local authorities. The Tories started starving local authorities of cash and I am sad that the Lib-Lab Executive has continued to do that. When the Tories initiated that underfunding, the cracks began to appear. They might resemble crevasses in many areas now, and they began with the Tories.
Mr MacAskill asked how we got here. I got here from Ayr by driving up the A77 dual carriageway, which the Tories modified, up the M77, which the Tories provided, and on to the ring road around Glasgow, which the Tories provided. I got here on roads that the Tories provided.
The member probably did that because he did not wish to use the railway. A former Tory Prime Minister used to say that she did not believe in railways, and she went out of her way to humiliate them. Mr Gallie did not take the train because to travel through Glasgow—our major city—he would have had to change trains and stations. The Tories had power for a generation, yet they could not connect Ayr to Edinburgh with a direct train. The Tories failed to do that, so we need no empty lectures from them.
The motion refers to fault, error and malaise, but all that started with the Tories. Did not the terms "chaos" and "muddle" apply in the 1980s and 1990s? Did not we have strikes? Yes, we did. I have some sympathy for ScotRail, because when the public monopoly was handed over to a private monopoly, the difficulties that the public monopoly had were simply transferred. The blame for that cannot be laid solely at the Executive's door. I blame the Executive for failing to take action and for washing its hands of the matter, but the solutions that the likes of Mr Canavan suggest would probably not be required if we still had British Rail, because collective bargaining would take place nationally. The Tories caused the problems by fragmenting and privatising the rail network. As I said, the Tories started underfunding of local road maintenance.
It is gross hypocrisy for the Tories, who privatised the railways and deregulated the buses, to say that public transport is unreliable. Not only did the Tories deregulate the buses back in the 1980s, but Mr McLetchie now wants to privatise Lothian Buses—the jewel in the crown of Edinburgh in the 21st century. The Tories initiated the problem and want to worsen the situation. The people of the Lothians will reject them again next year, because their suggestion to privatise Lothian Buses is anathema.
The Tories did not restrict themselves to privatising the railways and deregulating the buses—they even sold off the British Airports Authority. Glasgow airport now withers on the vine not simply because of the Executive's failure to construct a rail link, but because of its management's failure to deliver and make that airport prosper. We have no control over that, because the Tories sold BAA.
The Tories say that they want to resolve the situation by taking money from Scottish Enterprise's budget. I sympathise with that position. Scottish Enterprise has suggested that it would pay for the M74 north extension if nobody else would, so it is clear that there is slack in its budget. However, that alone will not address matters.
How much slack does the budget have? How much would Mr MacAskill cut and for what purpose?
That is a matter for Scottish Enterprise. The minister would have to speak to Robert Crawford about that. Scottish Enterprise has said on record that if the M74 extension could not be funded any other way, it would scrape to the bottom of the barrel and use all its money at local enterprise company and national level to build the extension, because it considers the extension important. If Scottish Enterprise has said that it can manage that, it is about time the Executive found out where it can get that money.
Will the member give way?
Not at the moment.
In the Executive's amendment, Mr Macdonald talks about public transport. The ScotRail franchise is to pay for everything that has been pledged for rail, but the franchise does not exist in isolation. We will eventually pay for it. We can approach SNCF, Virgin Trains or National Express, but they will all want to know how much they will be given before they will say what they can do.
We cannot say that we will construct the Borders rail link and the airport links, improve the service and make the trains run on time unless we say in time for the tendering process in 2004 what budget will be available. It is incumbent on the Executive to say what funding will be available for the ScotRail franchise. Until it does that, we will have only a wish list, because SNCF, Virgin Trains and National Express will say only, "We can provide what you want, but that depends on how much you pay us."
The proposals for Waverley station are fine. Everyone welcomes the developments, but Waverley station is a property bank.
The Executive and the previous Tory Administration failed and let down Scotland. We are paying the price for a generation of underfunding and the failure to have a strategy. The key problem with the transport delivery plan is that it contains no long-term planning and establishes no structure. We need immediate action to fix the potholes in key congestion areas, allied with a long-term strategic plan for building up our national infrastructure. So far, the problems have been caused by the Tories and continued by the Executive, which has no solution. As I said, we should say not "plague of potholes", but
"A plague o' both your houses!"
I move amendment S1M-2945.1, to leave out from "unreliable" to end and insert:
"trunk roads and unreliable public transport; recognises that this is a result of decades of under-investment and misguided privatisation; regrets that the Labour and Liberal Democrat Executive has failed to reverse these damaging Tory policies, and further regrets that the Scottish Executive's latest transport strategy publication, Scotland's Transport: Delivering Improvements, provides no programme, no costings and no timescale, and therefore offers little hope for, or commitment to, improvements in Scotland's transport infrastructure."
The Conservatives have lodged a brave motion. It says that
"the Scottish Executive's stewardship of transport issues has been characterised by chaos and muddle, evidenced by strikes, increased congestion, poor maintenance of local roads and unreliable public transport".
When did all that start? To do all that in two short years is very clever. [Members: "Five years."] The motion refers to the Scottish Executive. Could the cause have something to do with the brutal undermining of local authorities, which created a backlog of road maintenance that stretched 40-year road treatment programmes to 200 years, as an almost tearful local government officer once informed me? Could it have something to do with bus deregulation or the botched privatisation of the railways?
The motion rather unfairly sneers at the transport delivery plan. For a start, it is a transport delivery report, and it reports many good things. Members should read it. It sets out projects that are beginning to be tackled, including the redevelopment of Waverley station, dealing with congestion in Aberdeen—projects that are dear to my own self-interest—rail links to Edinburgh and Glasgow airports, a light rail system in Edinburgh and the Borders rail link. All those projects were Liberal Democrat manifesto pledges. The report also lays out completion of the missing links on the A8 and A80. Progress is beginning to be made on all of those projects.
Nora Radcliffe said that the projects she listed were Liberal Democrat manifesto commitments. Will she say what funding the Liberal Democrats have pledged to put in and where the money will come from?
The projects were in our manifesto and progress is beginning to happen. As the member knows, the money is collected from various sources.
Scotland presents an interesting selection of transport problems. They range from our remote areas and islands that have population levels that cannot sustain unsubsidised modern transport links, to densely populated areas that have overloaded public transport systems. We have highly productive food, forestry, paper, fish and textile industries at one end of the country, but their main markets are at the other end of the country, in Europe and beyond. We have a rural population that is dependent on the car and an urban population that is choking on its own exhaust fumes. Thirty per cent of households have no access to a car.
Does the member accept that the last time her party was in power there were very few cars and therefore no transport problems? Will she tell me whether her party is following the same policies today as it did at that time?
I remind the member that the National Health Service was among our policies.
Scotland has the advantage of being a small country in which it is easier to take an holistic approach. Would not it be sensible to rationalise how our airports do business so that they complement each other and do not compete for the same type of business? Modern mapping systems and computer capability enable us to look at the goods and bodies on any particular route and to calculate the reason why that route is used. Those systems and that capability can calculate whether the route is used for a local or a through journey, for business or leisure and by a native or a tourist. Those systems and that capability make it possible to make intelligent transport provision, using every appropriate mode of transport, including pavements, cycleways, roads, rail, air, sea and even canals.
Shared transport is more efficient transport; that is the case on environmental and financial grounds. The public will change from using their cars and move on to buses and trains not only if major investment in infrastructure and rolling stock is put in place, but if more passenger-centred thinking is applied. Potential passengers will not use a bus if they do not know its timetable or route. They will not spend time and trouble seeking out that vital information. We must put the information under their noses.
The potential passenger's journey does not begin or end at the bus stop, station or airport. We have to think about the facilities, connecting services or information that the person will need. Provision of such services need not be expensive, but it will pay dividends.
Although transport is about moving people and goods around, we tend to forget the value of planning for removing the necessity for transport. All new developments should be planned to put people's homes near their jobs, to build walk and cycleways through residential and business areas and to ensure that pupils have safe walking routes to schools.
On Monday, I travelled to Oban for the Transport and the Environment Committee's meeting. As I did so, the remains of an old railway line—two short viaducts and a retaining wall—caught my eye. The structure had survived from Victorian times because it was beautifully engineered and built to last. If the Victorians could build a rail network to last, surely to goodness we can do at least as well. The Victorians believed that they could do it, so they did it. We need some of that confidence and self-belief today.
We can and will create a safe and affordable transport network throughout Scotland and with connections beyond. It should be a network that is as fit for our time as the Victorian network was for its time.
We move to the open debate. I ask for speeches of about the standard four-minute duration.
When the minister announced the transport delivery plan—with the customary fanfare of trumpets—it was significant that she decided to do so in a statement rather than a parliamentary debate. The reason for that was simple. When one examined the statement, one saw that it did not say a lot. The report's 10 highlighted priorities depend entirely on the completion of more studies, more consultations and more plans. There is a total lack of action.
Given the time that is available to me, I will deal not with the transport problems that affect Scotland, but with those that affect Glasgow. That is not because I am being parochial or territorial; it is because the problems in Glasgow highlight the difficulties that apply to Scotland.
Glasgow is a city in which it is easy to get around. It does not have too many problems in that respect. As a result of some pretty enlightened thinking in the 1960s and 1970s, Glasgow, with its expressway and its motorway network, is easy to get through. However, getting there is highly problematical.
A journey from Stirling to Glasgow is fine until one arrives at the nightmare that is Auchenkilns. A journey from Edinburgh is fine—once one gets out of Edinburgh—until one arrives at Newhouse, where the situation is one of wall-to-wall metal all the way into the city. We agree that missing transport links have to be completed, but when will that be done and what action will be taken in the meantime to improve a situation that is well nigh intolerable?
When will something be done about the rail link to Glasgow airport? Even by the earliest estimation, it will take something like seven years for the project planning and planning process to be undertaken. Until that component is in place, the vital link between Glasgow and its airport will not be achieved. Is it not ironic that it is possible to take a train from Glasgow or Edinburgh to Manchester airport but impossible to take a train from Glasgow city centre to Glasgow airport? That highlights the difficulties that we face. Not only would a rail link to Glasgow airport be invaluable to commerce and the local economy in the city of Glasgow, but it would achieve what the Executive seems anxious to achieve—a reduction in the congestion on the M8 around and about Paisley.
The railway network is in a total and absolute shambles and is likely to become worse as a result of Mr Byers's plans and his ill-considered taking of Railtrack into administration. I have referred before in the chamber to Michael Palin's programme "Great Railway Journeys of the World". However, in the minds of many people, what should be a simple train journey from Glasgow to Edinburgh is a nightmare. It need not be thus. With a bit of thought and pre-planning, many of the difficulties that are experienced could be avoided. Although, as a Glaswegian, I tend to regard the view from the 5.30 pm train from Edinburgh to Glasgow as one of the best that the city of Edinburgh has to offer, there has to be better communication between the two cities. If there is not, there could be a damaging effect on industry and commerce.
Does the member accept that the current state of the railways has little to do with Mr Byers, who has been in office only since last summer, and everything to do with the Treasury under the Tories? At that time, the Treasury turned down practically every investment scheme that was proposed for the railways.
I would have more sympathy for Mr Morgan's viewpoint if he and his SNP colleagues realised one basic fact, which is that the Conservative Government has not been in office for five years. Anything that was wrong should have been rectified by now. It is now up to the Labour Government to act, but it has manifestly failed to do so.
We should examine the SNP's record on transport. It is interesting to note that Mr MacAskill was highly critical of my colleague Mr Gallie for highlighting the fact that he was able to drive on Conservative-funded roads from Ayr to Edinburgh. If Mr MacAskill's colleagues had had their way, Mr Gallie would not have been able to do that—the SNP vigorously opposed the M77 link. That shows the negative aspect of the SNP's approach to transport.
The debate is serious. It is a good thing that it has already engendered some heat. Transport in Scotland is in a vulnerable state and early action is necessary.
Before touching on the main subject of the debate, I want to respond to some of the points that have been made. Mr McGrigor intervened to make a point about the length of time since the last Liberal Government. I look forward to that same length of time elapsing until the next Conservative Government. Indeed, if the Tories continue as they are, that will be easily achieved. I must also comment on Mr Aitken's brave reference to missing links. The Conservatives could give evolutionists a great deal of useful material on that topic, but perhaps not in the way that he intends.
The Tories' choice of subject is interesting. I wonder why they choose to secure debates on subjects in which they have a record of abject failure instead of debating topics in which they had some success when in government. When I thought back over the Tories' 18 years in power—not 19 years, as Mr MacAskill claimed—I came up with some successes that perhaps they should be mentioning instead. For example, making the wearing of seat-belts compulsory and banning alcohol in Scottish football grounds were excellent initiatives. However, it would get boring if we had to talk about those issues every week.
I am pleased that the Tories have decided to debate transport today, because it is one of the areas in which they have the worst record of failure. They are responsible for many of the problems that they have highlighted. Bill Aitken described the railway network as
"a total and absolute shambles".
However, as Mr MacAskill correctly pointed out, the network is in such a state because of the Tories' lack of investment in the railways when they were publicly owned and because of the Tories' botched programme of privatisation.
Will Mr Muldoon be writing to his colleague Mr Byers to urge him to renationalise the railways completely?
Mr Byers has taken a progressive step by placing Railtrack into administration and turning it into a not-for-profit company. That will result—[Interruption.] The Tories should listen to this point. That step will ensure that taxpayers' money will be spent on improving the railway service instead of being poured down the drain making shareholders rich as the Tories would prefer.
What will the £300 million that Mr Byers has set aside for Railtrack shareholders be spent on? Why were Mr Byers and indeed Mr Muldoon's colleagues only a few weeks ago saying that not a penny would ever be paid to shareholders?
Mr Mundell should tell us instead how many more billions of pounds of taxpayers' money the Tories would waste on an enterprise that failed in every respect. Railtrack failed to invest, to manage safety and to operate as a financially successful company.
The Tories are absolutely obsessed with roads. However, they have absolutely no concept of public transport, which is hardly surprising, as they never use it. Mr Gallie demonstrated that when he described his journey from Ayr.
Will the member give way?
No, I have taken enough interventions. The member should sit down.
I have a simple point of information.
Sit down.
If the Tories had any experience of using public services, they might believe in them.
From the way in which the Tories describe the Executive's forward transport programme, one would think that they did not want the minister to plan for the future. Do they think that major investment in infrastructure happens by accident and that we do not have to plan it out years in advance? Perhaps that is why there was so little planning when they were in power.
The Tories also seem to suggest that, so far under the Executive, nothing has happened in transport in Scotland. However, there has already been major investment in a number of areas. For example, £8 million has been invested in the Fife circle line and £13 million has been made available for new trains for Strathclyde Passenger Transport. Moreover, the Executive has committed an additional £320 million to a number of motorway and trunk road projects. In my area, £4 million has been invested in a brand-new express bus service from Livingston to Edinburgh. As for the Strategic Rail Authority plans, a range of different projects over the next three years are already under way with timetables attached, including investment in capacity on the Bathgate to Edinburgh line.
In their dogmatic approach to transport and their failure to recognise their responsibility for the problems that the Executive is now grappling with, the Scottish Tories have clearly shown that they are committed to staying on the road to nowhere.
Before I ask the minister specific questions about the railways, I must tell Bill Aitken that the Tories have a lot to answer for. Rail projects are not delivered quickly; they have a long gestation period, and we are still suffering from the lack of investment throughout the Tory years.
Will the member give way?
Not at the moment.
I know that the minister is not directly responsible for the west coast main line, but is the Executive happy with the capacity forecasts on the line, particularly in relation to freight? The rail lobby is already complaining that there is not enough capacity south of the border. When Richard Branson introduces his faster tilting Pendolino trains, the situation will only get worse, because there will be even less room for freight. The Post Office has already indicated that it is taking off some of its trains because the journey times are not decent enough. The matter is important for the Scottish economy.
I am glad about the remodelling of Waverley station, but one of the main constraints is the line capacity out to Dalmeny and Falkirk. Before ScotRail introduced its emergency timetable, one delay in the morning would make every train late. As I have not been able to find the part of the programme that addresses that problem, I wonder whether the minister will explain where it is hidden.
All parties need to find some imaginative solutions to the fact that many of our previous solutions have become problems. For example, the Edinburgh city bypass was originally built to take traffic around Edinburgh. However, instead of simply being a bypass, the road has become a destination, because many offices, supermarkets and cinemas have been built beside it. Clearly such development cannot be undone; indeed, one could argue that it has brought great economic benefit to the city. However, in future, when new bypasses are built elsewhere, we must stipulate the planning constraints on development near them to ensure that bypasses remain bypasses and do not become new points of congestion.
I know that members would be disappointed if I did not have a small rant about the A75 and the A77, so that is what I intend to do so for the remaining minute and a half of my speech. This is not just a local matter in Dumfries and Galloway; the roads are strategically important to the whole of Scotland. If we compare the northern corridor from Stranraer to Ireland with corridors further south, we find that the northern corridor is far more important for freight than, say, the central corridor from Holyhead. The proportion of freight on the northern corridor—and then on the A75 and the A77—has implications for the type of road that is needed. Although the total number of vehicle movements might not be as great as those on more southerly corridors, the fact that most are lorry movements means that we need a better solution to the problem.
The A55 through north Wales to Holyhead has brought significant economic benefits to that part of the world.
That is a Tory road.
Well, it might be, but it is a Tory road that was not built in Scotland. That is part of the problem.
A Cardiff Business School survey highlighted the huge economic benefits that the A55 has brought to north Wales and that was before the recent dualling of another 18 miles of road in the island of Anglesey. One constituency alone has received 18 miles of dual carriageway at the end of the route from London to Holyhead and then on to Ireland, which is about 17 miles more than the entire length of dual carriageway in the south-west of Scotland. Although £730 million was spent on the A55 at 1996 prices, it is planned that only £30 million will be spent on the A75 and that is for the period up to 2008. If we do not have a more level playing field between the A55 and the A75, there will be severe consequences for the economy of the whole of the south-west of Scotland and—because the roads are of strategic importance—for the whole of Scotland.
I am delighted to support David Mundell's motion. Unlike Bill Aitken, who said that he did not wish to be parochial, I fully intend to be parochial and will raise two issues that affect the region that I represent.
I am sure that many members, especially those who commute into Parliament daily, will be familiar with the problem of rail services in Fife. I should declare an interest at this point, because a member of my staff who commutes on that route is constantly late because of the railway. At least, that is what she tells me.
We accept the need to get more traffic off the roads and more people on to the railway. However, there is a real problem with the state of rail infrastructure and the lack of capacity on the tracks. Despite all the spin that we hear from the Executive and today's self-congratulatory amendment, in the real world commuters face a dismal experience. They know what the situation is on the ground. As on the health service, all that we get from the Executive is fine talk; the reality does not match the rhetoric. We need proper management of the railways so that confidence can be restored to the sector.
The railways need the private sector to invest, but the private sector will not do so with all the dithering that we have seen from Stephen Byers and the Department of Transport, Local Government and the Regions. Six months ago, Stephen Byers was saying that not a penny of taxpayers' money would go to Railtrack's shareholders. This week, in another dramatic U-turn by the Labour Government, £300 million is to be spent on compensation. How can anybody have any confidence in the Government's approach when Byers's priority is saving his own neck rather than sorting out the problems on the railways?
Murdo Fraser talks about capacity problems that cause difficulties, especially in the east of Scotland. Can he tell us when a Tory Government or the privatised Railtrack was going to get around to investing in Edinburgh Waverley? Does he not recognise that the Strategic Rail Authority—which was established by Labour—put that on the political agenda?
Plans to reassess the capacity of Waverley have been in place for years. The fact is that the private sector will not invest in Railtrack and the railways because of what has happened with Byers. The Government has completely lost the confidence of the private sector.
I shall move on to talk about roads. Mr Muldoon talked the most nonsense that I have heard in the chamber for a long time when he talked about our record. Under the Conservative Government in the years between 1992 and 1997, the average spend on trunk roads and motorway construction in Scotland was £150 million a year. In 2002-03, the spend on trunk roads and motorways will be £43 million. The improvements that were delivered under the Conservative Government can be seen: the dualling of the A90 from Perth to Aberdeen; the dualling of the A9 from Stirling to Perth; improvements on the A9 north of Perth; and the Dornoch and Kessock bridges. Bristow Muldoon would not have to look too far to see where those road improvements were made. We have a good record to be proud of.
Does the member accept that the failure to provide rail facilities across the Dornoch bridge was short-sighted of the Conservative Administration?
As I understand it, a proper assessment was undertaken at the time and incorporating rail on the Dornoch bridge was deemed not to be a viable project.
I welcome the fact that work will shortly start at the Inchture junction on the A90. I also welcome the work that is being done at the Forfar and Glamis junctions to deal with accident blackspots. However, work also needs to be done on the A9. South of Perth, a considerable number of junctions are in need of upgrading. The problem is that there has been an exponential growth in traffic on the A9 since it was dualled. Because of the growth in communities such as Greenloaning, Blackford and Auchterarder, the junctions that serve those communities have become substandard. I recently spent a day in that area, meeting local councillors and community councillors who all had the same message: the accident rate is unacceptable. If there is to be further housing development in the area, there must be improvements. In the long term, we must also consider dualling the entire stretch of the A9 north of Perth to Inverness. That would have to be done over several years. The Conservative Government made good progress on that, but investment has dried up under the Labour-Liberal coalition.
Good roads are required not just to make the lives of locals easier. Poor and congested roads inhibit economic growth, especially tourism, which is the life-blood of local communities. If the Executive is serious about promoting enterprise in Scotland, it should listen to local people and business organisations and loosen the purse strings so that we can build the roads that we need to get Scotland moving again.
I congratulate the Scottish Conservatives on today's motion, which surely wins the award for showing the biggest brass neck since the election in May 1999. The motion shows the brass neck of a party that pontificates about the importance of transport to the economy but that presided over a sustained period of underinvestment in our transport infrastructure and was responsible for some of the most volatile economic conditions in the UK in recent history. It shows the brass neck of a party that criticises our public transport services but, when it was in power, spent less than 12 per cent of the transport budget on public transport, compared with the 53 per cent of the transport budget that the Labour-led Executive is spending on public transport. It shows the brass neck of a party that dares to comment on rail problems after selling off our national rail infrastructure for a bargain-basement price to a company that demonstrated that it could not do the job.
I am beginning to have serious doubts about the health of Conservative members. They seem to have a form of dementia that causes them to forget the distant past and remember only recent events. In debate after debate, the Tories seem to have completely forgotten what happened under previous Tory Governments.
Ms Whitefield is well qualified to lecture on amnesia, because that is what she is suffering from. She seems to think that time stopped in May 1997, when Labour took control of transport in Scotland. From that time, the Government has delivered nothing. Labour has been in power for five years and that is where the buck stops.
Since we came to power, things have started to move. We have started to invest in public transport and we are not setting public transport against roads. The issue is not just about investing in roads, which is something that previous Tory Governments failed to understand.
Let me provide the Conservatives with some therapeutic assistance to help them to remember what happened. In a debate on rail privatisation in 1996, John Watts, the then Minister for Railways and Roads, said:
"Rail user groups are increasingly coming to recognise the benefits that privatisation has brought. A shift in public attitudes is under way. The future of the railway in the UK is secure. The case for privatisation is so overwhelming that in 10 years the radicalism of today's policies will look like nothing more than common sense. By putting the railways into the private sector, we are powering them into the 21st century."—[Official Report, House of Commons, 15 November 1996; Vol 285, c 607.]
David Mundell said that Railtrack failed because of Labour's interventions. However, less than a year after the Tory minister made that statement—in May 1997 when Labour came to power—Railtrack was already £700 million behind in its investment in rail and its maintenance programme. We all know that the Tories' vision of nirvana for the railways was oversold. The truth is that they botched the privatisation and the Labour Government and the Labour-led Executive have been left to pick up the pieces.
The Executive is committed to tackling congestion in an integrated way, by improving key sections of our trunk road network and investing substantially in and improving our public transport system. Unlike the Tories, the Executive is not content to take sides in a false dichotomy between the car and public transport. I welcome the strategic approach to the transport delivery report. It is right to prioritise initiatives that will alleviate congestion, such as the development of rail links to our airports, action on the findings of the multimodal studies—which I believe will prove the need for an Airdrie-Bathgate railway line—and the delivery of free off-peak travel for elderly people.
Under Labour, we will at last see an improvement in the section of the A8 between Baillieston and Newhouse—something that the Tories long promised but never delivered. No one is claiming that turning around 20 years of underinvestment in our transport system will be easy, but the Scottish Executive is finally beginning to make its mark. I am confident that, given time, even the scars that have been left by failed Tory Governments can be healed.
David Mundell is always good value in the chamber, but I think that I must have slipped into a parallel universe when I hear senior Tory spokespeople such as David Mundell quoting David Begg. David Begg was wrong on several things that he said about transportation in Edinburgh and some of my constituents would be interested to hear that he has now been adopted as the Conservative party's transport guru.
I will be parochial this morning. Given that the majority of people in Scotland live within 50 miles of Edinburgh, failing to get the strategic view of the Edinburgh transport system right will have a knock-on impact on the rest of Scotland's economy. Over the years, the people of Edinburgh have been frustrated not only by 18 years of Tory Government but by the grand schemes of City of Edinburgh Council and previous councils. David Mundell was dismissive about the Croy park and ride. All I can say is that, after decades of grand schemes in this city, we still do not have a park and ride. Sometimes, a successful transport policy is not about dreaming up grand schemes but about delivering small, medium and large schemes. That is what the Executive is trying to do in developing the proposals that the minister outlined last week. It aims to develop a mix of small, medium and large proposals, in the short term, the medium term and the long term.
That is the way forward. We must have a strategy for where we are going. What people want from a transport system, in Edinburgh and elsewhere, is capacity and choice. This city is absolutely booming, but it is a victim of its own success in transport terms. We have economic and population growth unlike any other part of the country, but in the past we have not had investment. I welcome the fact that in recent months investment has been announced and that the Executive has made a commitment to improve transport in my constituency, with investment in the west Edinburgh bus system, the north and central Edinburgh tramway and now the west Edinburgh light rail tramway. The Executive's priorities include airport links, the redevelopment and increased capacity of Waverley station, which will have an impact for the whole of central Scotland and beyond, and the Borders rail line.
Does Margaret Smith believe that the tramway outlined in the transport delivery plan is best paid for by congestion charging? If we read between the lines, it is quite clear from the answer that the minister gave after making her statement that the tramway in Edinburgh would be paid for by congestion charging. Does Margaret Smith support congestion charging?
If Kenny MacAskill is prepared to wait, he will hear me come on to that point.
It is critical that, as well as meeting the capacity needs of the city and Scotland's transport needs in general, we must give the people of Edinburgh and Scotland choice. Obviously, some of that choice can come only with investment. We have to consider a whole range of ways in which we can invest in Scotland's transport infrastructure to make that happen. I would rather that my constituents were given the opportunity to make legitimate choices about what public transport they use and other transport issues than allow the current situation to continue, where they have no choice but to sit in traffic jams. There are 15,000 people working at Edinburgh Park. They cannot get in and out to their work in the morning because of congestion.
Unless people see investment on the ground, they will view congestion charging as nothing other than a tax. It has to be seen as something that will actually make a major difference to people's lives. That will happen only if people feel that that money is being properly invested on the ground, giving them opportunities for choice before they are asked to pay congestion charges. That is important in considering how to take forward the consultation with people and what we intend to do with such schemes.
We had 18 years of the Conservatives. Murdo Fraser talked about their commitment to transport. We had no dualling of the A8000, which is a missing link in Edinburgh's road system. We had no airport link, no integrated public transport system for Edinburgh and no Borders railway. None of those things was delivered in 18 years. What kind of commitment to Scottish transport is that?
The announcements that the Executive has made, in relation to Edinburgh and in relation to the whole of Scotland, show that it is serious about planning in the short term, the medium term and the long term for Scotland's transport needs. I support that, but it is essential to back it up with proper investment to deliver the schemes on the ground to give people the real choice to decide whether to use their cars on roads that are safe or whether to use public transport. We must give them the choice and that needs investment—from the Executive, from the private sector and from local authorities. I also urge the minister to keep a serious watching brief on what is happening with the A8000 and the new Forth bridge authority that is being set up. We need that missing link. It is ridiculous that the Conservatives took 18 years and still did not deliver that link. We must deliver it.
We live in strange and disturbing times. I have listened to David Mundell calling for more public investment and focusing on public transport, and I have read the document from the Executive, which does not want to spend any public money whatever. That merely confirms the view that we on the SNP benches have already formed that the new Labour party is the new Tory party.
I would like to say a little bit about something that has not been covered much in the debate—the effect on business of the current infrastructure in Scotland. Like many other members, I will be parochial.
The Executive's document says that it will be
"fixing Aberdeen's congestion before it leads to further deterioration in journey time reliability."
The reality is that many people in the north-east of Scotland—and when I use that phrase I mean the country beyond Aberdeen—are absolutely constrained by the congestion in Aberdeen. Businesses in my constituency are actively considering relocation because they cannot reliably go through Aberdeen.
That is since he was elected.
They have been considering relocation even since Mr Davidson became a regional member for the area.
Businesses are paying huge sums of money because of congestion and unreliability. It costs £50,000 a year for a small company to be in Peterhead instead of Aberdeen. It is time that the Executive stopped talking about grand plans and started putting up some grands of money to solve the problems.
I thought that I heard the minister say that he is looking for 23 million lorry miles in his new plan. I would very much welcome that, because his document mentions 21 million. He might care to confirm that. I would very much support that. I see that there are existing facilities for getting freight off the roads and on to railways, enabling groceries to go from Bellshill to Wick and Thurso, and I am sure that people will be grateful for that.
Let me say a word or two about flying and about Scotland's role. There is a consultation document on European new skies. Well, well! The list of consultees that the UK Government has chosen for the exercise is very telling. Among the hundreds of bodies that are being consulted, there is only one Scottish company—Loganair. Almost none of the air transport facilities that are provided in Scotland is provided by Scottish air transport companies. That perhaps indicates why I find it difficult to agree with the Scottish Tourist Board, whose website says:
"Scotland is a small country and travelling around it is quite easy, as is getting here."
That experience is alien to the majority of people whom I meet.
I turn to something that Alex Johnstone said. He referred to 18 glorious years of a Tory Government. Well, I have something rather surprising to say to Alex. I met a Tory voter when I was campaigning last year, and he had had some rather upsetting news. He had been to his doctor and heard that he had only four months to live. I said, "Why are you voting Tory? They will not help the health service." He said, "No, I'm voting Tory for the very first time, because four months under a Tory Government is like 18 years under anybody else."
That is cruel and in bad taste.
It is not fair to have to follow that—I did not quite get the point.
The Tory motion attaches about as much importance to transport and its effect on the economy as did the 18 years of Tory Government about which we have heard so much this morning. It is unacceptable that the Parliament and the Executive should be asked merely to note that transport is an important issue. It is important that the Executive and the Parliament establish a plan that will set in place a framework that will deliver improvements in our transport system—our roads, our rail services and our bus services.
Many members have said that the transport system that was inherited from the Tories was in a state of neglect. David Mundell said that the time for studies was over. In respect of my area, I agree with him and agree that we must look forward to the completion of the central Scotland multimodal study that is due to be completed soon.
The Tory record was to commission consultants' reports, hear findings and then do nothing. Bill Aitken is not here to respond, but he mentioned the debate on central Scotland's missing motorway link. In the days of the Tories, that was how we referred to the A80 corridor. In fact, from 1979 through the 1980s and the 1990s until 1997, the Tories promised to make decisions—they promised a decision in the summer, in the autumn, in the spring and even for Christmas—but in all those years, they did nothing. In the months before the general election, they made a number of promises on roads. They promised to build new roads and to finish off missing links. Those were empty promises with no substance and there was no cash to deliver.
The Tories also claimed to have a rail plan. In the 1990s, their plan for Croy—which has been mentioned—was to close the station. Thankfully, a public outcry stopped that, but services were reduced and the station was hardly used.
When I was elected to the Parliament, I travelled from Croy station to Edinburgh. I could take only one direct train in the morning and one direct train back in the evening. That service should be contrasted with the current service. Now there is a service every half-hour from Croy station and the journey time is 35 minutes. A number of lonely people used to stand on the platform; now, people struggle to find car parking spaces at Croy station. That shows that, if the Executive and the transport deliverers provide services that people want to use and arrange them to meet the needs of the travelling public, we will get people off our roads and back to using our rail and bus services. I look forward to working with ministers and local authorities to ensure that facilities are there to meet the public's needs.
Mr Mundell ridiculed the Auchenkilns roundabout proposals. The proposals that the Executive announced last week are exactly what the people of Cumbernauld and Kilsyth have been calling for for many years. We do not want a three-lane motorway through Cumbernauld and Kilsyth. In Cumbernauld, we realise that the section of the A80 that runs through the town plays an important part in the central Scotland transport network, but we do not want a three-lane motorway splitting our town in half. We want proper traffic management solutions to the problems at Auchenkilns and on the A73. The Executive is delivering on that and I look forward to working with it to ensure that we deliver what is best for the people of Cumbernauld and Kilsyth and the rest of Scotland.
Before we move to winding-up speeches, I should say that we are extending the debate by about 10 minutes as more members have asked to speak in this debate than in the debate on enterprise, which will follow.
I welcome the £1.1 million that the Executive has announced to tackle the problems of congestion in and around Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire. Such money for pre-planning and feasibility studies is welcome. However, the time is rapidly approaching when we will need action to commit the Executive to funding publicly the integrated transport system that we desperately need in the north-east. I was pleased to hear Lewis Macdonald say that we can expect a concrete announcement later this year. A concrete commitment to fund the project is exactly what we need. When the Parliament journeys to Aberdeen in May, I hope that there will be an opportunity for Lewis Macdonald to make an announcement.
As usual, David Mundell's contribution to the debate was amusing and informative—it was particularly so today. Usually, only the SNP calls for a bottomless pit of public money to be spent, but the Conservatives gave a whole list of transport projects that they would fund. When I intervened and asked David Mundell how those projects would be funded, he confirmed that the money would come out of public funds and I thought that there had been a major Tory policy change. The reply was, "Oh, no." The implication is that they would remove £100 million from business support or the higher and further education budget. That is complete nonsense.
Does Mr Rumbles agree that decisions that relate to supporting the economy are about making hard choices? It is clear that a transport infrastructure is the fundamental requirement of Scotland's economy. Money would be better spent on that than on nice-to-have business projects.
That we can magic money out of a hat to spend on something is a typical Conservative con. The Conservatives do not want to tell the business community that we do not want to support it.
My colleague Nora Radcliffe made an important point when she said that we can create a safe, efficient and affordable transport network throughout Scotland. That will not happen overnight—nobody is claiming that it will—but there is a lot to be accomplished.
Bristow Muldoon successfully pointed out the failures of the previous Tory initiatives, notably the disastrous lack of investment in the railways and their privatisation. I was amused by Murdo Fraser's contribution to the debate. He spent a great deal of his speech listing what the Tories did for the roads when they were in power. When he was challenged, he completely failed to list what they had done for our railways.
Will the member give way?
I have already given way.
Members should consider the mess in which the Tories left the railways.
Are the member and his party still in favour of the electrification of the north-east railway? If they are, where will they get the £600 million for that?
The Liberal Democrats are keen on an integrated public transport system for the north-east, including electrification of the railways, and an integrated commuter system from Inverurie in the north to Stonehaven in my constituency in the south. We also want a western bypass around Aberdeen. I hope that Executive ministers will announce a commitment to many of those matters later this year.
Where would the money come from?
From the public purse. [Interruption.] I have never mentioned £600 million—I do not know where the Tories got that figure from.
Will the member give way?
I will give way if I have enough time.
Mr Rumbles is in his final minute.
The Conservatives should not even have turned up for this debate, let alone lodged a motion. They cannot lecture anybody on transport, given their appalling record in office. They went on a mission to attack public transport throughout Great Britain. The much-heralded revival of the railways has come unstuck as the full folly of John Major's botched privatisation plans has become apparent.
The Tories claim that no concrete plans have been announced in the transport delivery report. Do they think that rail links to Edinburgh airport and Glasgow airport, a light rail system in Edinburgh, the central Borders rail link—which are all Liberal Democrat manifesto pledges—and road upgradings can be achieved without any feasibility studies or pre-planning? Of course they cannot.
The SNP's transport policy is, if anything, a bit more laughable. Whatever policy position they hold now, another one will come along in a minute.
In conclusion, I hope that I do not misquote Karen Whitefield when I say that the Liberal Democrat-led coalition is delivering on our manifesto commitments. I will name just a few of them: a more integrated transport policy; better rural transport; expanded rail networks in the Borders; rail links to Edinburgh and Glasgow airports; hope for funding in the north-east; improved public transport; and a concessionary fares scheme for pensioners.
The debate has been interesting and, at times, amusing. Accusations have been made about the Liberal Democrats' horse-and-buggy approach, and demented Tories have had accusations thrown at them by the Labour party. We have had a lot of the usual special pleading for parochial interests. Members have spoken about their own pet projects, and rightly so. That is what happens: we represent people where we live and we should do that.
It is a matter of regret that members have talked about Edinburgh, Glasgow, central Scotland, Dumfries and Galloway, the north-east and Aberdeen, but no one—in particular no one from the Executive parties—has talked about the Highlands. Despite what is stated in the Executive amendment, no specific matters are being addressed in the Highlands and Islands and no one would take an intervention from my colleague, Fergus Ewing, so that that matter could be addressed.
The transport policy that was inherited from the Tories, quite some time ago, is still in place.
Will the member give way?
Wait until I have developed my point.
What has been inherited from the Tories is not only privatisation of the railways, which has led to such disaster, but privatisation of airports and the ports. The purpose of privatisation of the ports was to enable friends of the Tories to make lots of money developing the land, rather than developing the ports. Bus deregulation has also taken place. Predatory pricing policies have been used in the past few months to try to drive out Lothian Buses, as a direct consequence of Tory policies.
A variety of mechanisms have been used to fund—or, in the long term, not to fund—transport projects. Those mechanisms include private finance initiative and public-private partnership projects and proposals for congestion charging. I have a question for those who favour such mechanisms, especially PFI/PPP. Although that approach guarantees maintenance for the future, which has been one of the significant problems to result from lack of investment, how do we achieve equity in the areas where that approach is not taken? Why will folk who travel on roads that will have guaranteed maintenance over the lifetime get well maintained roads, but roads that are not covered by that mechanism will not get the same kind of arrangement?
If David Mundell wants to answer that question, I will be delighted to hear from him.
We have heard little about the SNP's policy and its ideas on funding. What has happened to the SNP's Ikea tax? Some weeks ago, the SNP floated the proposal that funding of new roads in Scotland should be paid for by taxing people who park in out-of-town shopping centres.
I am delighted that Mr Mundell did not bother to answer the question that I posed. The SNP has proposals for funding mechanisms. Those are dependent on our public services trust. We will use that mechanism to fund a variety of projects. We are considering a variety of innovative ideas for funding. There is nothing wrong with that.
I pose a question to those in the chamber: how can we deliver an integrated transport system when, as elected representatives in this Parliament, we can have no influence over a significant part of transport services?
I will be happy to hear from Bristow Muldoon why we cannot deliver an integrated transport system when we have no control over the railways.
I would like clarification. Is the SNP's proposal to introduce a shopping tax in shopping centres such as the Almondvale centre in Livingston? Is the SNP aware that that is a town centre shopping centre and not an out-of-town centre?
Having enjoyed a visit to Livingston last weekend, I put it to Bristow Muldoon that the current problem is that people who work in and visit hospitals have to pay to park there. We are considering innovative approaches to the issue. We have ruled out workplace parking charges. We are looking to provide an appropriate level playing field for development for all sorts of businesses, not to favour those who happen to be on the periphery.
We have a significant problem in delivering an integrated transport system because the Strategic Rail Authority and the Labour Government's proposals for addressing the problems related to Railtrack do not allow for any influence from this Parliament and its elected members. We cannot deliver an integrated transport policy on the current basis.
I commend the SNP amendment to the chamber.
Contrary to what has been said by one or two Opposition members, a good deal of evidence of the Executive's investment in transport is all around us. There are new trains in Fife and Strathclyde and new park-and-ride sites serve Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow. Bus quality corridors in all our major towns and cities give preference to bus travel and promote that mode of transport. New ferries for Caledonian MacBrayne serve the Clyde and the Western Isles and a new level of service will come in later this year for the northern isles. There are new terminal buildings at the airports in Inverness, Kirkwall and Stornoway. That emphasises our continuing commitment to Highland as well as lowland Scotland. Improvements have been delivered throughout rural Scotland through the rural transport fund. Considerable investment has been made in cycling, walking and safer streets projects, and in the progression of 94 schemes under the motorway and trunk road programme, including a new bridge over the Forth at Kincardine.
Amidst the list of largesse, can Lewis Macdonald say what investment has been made in any of the arteries that serve the Highlands, in particular the A82, the A9 and the A96? Is not it a fact that those are the roads that new Labour has forgotten?
Quite the contrary. If Mr Ewing had read the transport delivery report, which was published last week, he would have noted that the A96 improvements at Fochabers are one of the priorities that we established at an early stage and that we are taking forward under our motorway and trunk road programme. As I said, substantial and record sums are being spent on lifeline services in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland.
Action is being taken by the Executive to help local councils to address the backlog of repairs that are within their budgetary responsibility. Last year, we provided an additional £70 million and only last month a further £20 million was announced to assist councils in meeting those responsibilities.
Last week, Wendy Alexander presented to the chamber the Executive's vision of how to address the priority transport challenges of the future. The transport delivery report is evidence of our willingness to prioritise and plan ahead. The report recognises the central importance of tackling congestion in our major metropolitan areas. Our research forecasts indicate that over the next 20 years there will be an increase in road traffic in Scotland of 27 per cent, the vast majority of which will be concentrated in our major urban areas.
Above all, we must address the issues that such an increase raises. That is why so many of the priority projects that we have outlined are aimed at tackling urban and interurban congestion by improving and promoting public transport, providing alternatives to the car and seeking—as the transport delivery report makes clear—to stabilise road traffic usage at 2001 levels by 2021.
Our vision contains substantial, strategic, large-scale projects. However, as many members have indicated, it is not only the big strategic projects that matter. We are investing in many other ways to upgrade our transport infrastructure. We are undertaking a series of improvements on the A77 and A75 and we are talking to local partners about how to target that investment most effectively.
Only last week, we released a further £2 million to progress the Stirling-Alloa-Kincardine line, which will promote a public transport alternative for commuters and, by diverting freight, will free up capacity for passenger services on the Forth rail bridge. Next week, the new Forth estuary transport authority will be set up. It will have new powers to address transport issues such as the A8000, which will help to tackle congestion in Edinburgh.
We recognise the importance of the rail capacity issues that have been raised. That is why the strategic rail study will address those issues—for example, at Falkirk—and why we are pleased to report recent progress in the discussions on the west coast main line.
The minister considers railways a key priority. Like many other members, I have received a communication from Network Rail regarding its make-up; it has no shareholders and it is accountable to its members, who fall into three categories. Those are the SRA, industry members, who will be represented—
The intervention is rather long.
I have a question. The third component will be public interest members, who will be chosen from a wide range of stakeholder groups. Where is the Parliament's representation? What power will the Executive and the Parliament have over Railtrack's successor?
I will compensate Mr Macdonald for the time taken up by that intervention, although he should not have taken an intervention in the final minute of his speech.
I take that as a plus and a minus, Presiding Officer. Kenny MacAskill knows that we are working in close partnership with the SRA on the infrastructure provider, which is critical to the future of the railway system.
I am pleased to note the progress that has been made in talks between ScotRail's operators and the train drivers unions. I understand that an announcement has been made and that the threat of strike action in the coming two weeks has been lifted. That is good news.
I will touch on one or two other matters that members have raised. I confirm that this year, we hope to make progress on the assessment of Aberdeen's traffic flow and to complete the modelling within 12 months. I will meet Cathie Craigie to discuss the issues she raised about Croy and Auchenkilns. Her welcome for those projects reminds us of the progress that is being made here and now. We have developed projects and set out a larger vision, for which we invite the support of all members. They should agree with us on the priorities for Scotland's transport system and help us to make progress in achieving them. We welcome such support.
I congratulate David Mundell on his excellent speech, which laid out clearly our proposals—something that we have been trying to get out of the Government for the past two and a half years. His speech caused obvious confusion among the SNP members, which shows that we hit the button right on. I did not believe what we heard from the SNP members. I timed their speeches—Kenny MacAskill had a seven-minute slot, but six minutes and one second into it, he had made no comment on SNP policy. His rant was entertaining, but it contained absolutely nothing about policy on what is supposed to be one of the SNP's key issues.
I turn to the speeches of members of the coalition parties. I watched the expression on Wendy Alexander's face when Mike Rumbles, on behalf of the coalition, committed what comes to at least £1 billion of spend, when all the parts are added up. To get the euro into the debate, I say for Mr Rumbles's benefit that the £600 million for the electrification of the east coast line would be €1 billion.
Will the member take an intervention?
A little later. I must make progress.
The Labour members gave us tirade after tirade, but they ducked the issue of their so-called plan, which has been turned into a report. They said nothing about the past five years. Lewis Macdonald began by saying that the Executive has a list of priorities and that it will meet the challenges. We are still waiting to hear those priorities in rank order and the costs that are involved. We are none the wiser on those issues.
Will the member take an intervention?
Not at the moment.
Ms Alexander said that the document is a route map. To where is it a route map? It has no destination marked on it. If one has a route map, one knows the destination, one has planned a route and one knows the date, times and commitments that are involved. We are going into initiative after initiative.
Karen Whitefield attacked David Mundell viciously, which was dreadful. He welcomed the park-and-ride facility at Croy and the roundabout at Auchenkilns, but Karen spent a long time attacking him. I did not understand that.
To get down to the nitty-gritty, I will list examples of issues on which the deputy minister might have been helpful. He had two opportunities to be helpful, but he made no suggestion for dealing with potholes in rural roads and gave no commitment or notion of a policy on how he will get local authorities to deliver their responsibilities.
On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Are you aware that a member has been throwing things in the chamber?
I do not know that it is in order to sneak in school. I ask all members to behave a little bit better.
May I continue deputy headmaster?
We have had no clarity. Last week, there was an Executive statement on transport. We expect the Executive to lay out its plans in such statements. This morning, there has been a series of rants and raves about what the Conservatives did not do when they were in power. Labour has been in Government for five years; before that, it made a series of commitments about what it would do in power. Those commitments are around eight or nine years old, but there has been no delivery.
There is no recognition that taxes on road users must go back into the road network. That is vital for business and tourism. Neither of the ministers recognises that the problem in many rural areas is that there is no option other than to depend on the motor car. Brian Adam, who is sadly missing from the chamber, was right when he mentioned the infrastructure requirements for all parts of Scotland. I do not represent the Highlands, but the deputy minister made no comments about the problems there. One or two of my colleagues listed local issues—
Did those include the western bypass for Aberdeen and the electrification of the east coast line?
One day, Mr Rumbles will catch up with the fact that the Conservative party has said for a long time that there should be a bypass for Aberdeen to suit the needs of Aberdeen and the need for links to Inverness and up the coast to Banff and Buchan. The bypass is in our plans.
How will you pay for it?
I should not answer questions from a sedentary position. The bypass was in the list that David Mundell read out.
Will the member take an intervention?
No, thank you. The deputy minister said nothing about congestion charges, which were mentioned during last week's statement. We must know how the Executive will fund its proposals and how it intends to implement the charges. New powers have been given to local authorities; I assume that that means that if authorities do not introduce congestion charges, the money will be taken from their block grant.
The Transport (Scotland) Act 2001 clearly gives the power to raise congestion charges to local authorities. We will not issue directions to councils on whether they should use those powers.
I am not sure why the minister bothered to make that comment. Why did the Executive introduce the power if it has no intention of using it?
It is vital that members recognise the content of David Mundell's speech as the way forward for the Conservative party's strategy. Our proposals are affordable and our priorities are different from those of the Executive. We know how to use a budget. That does not mean simply adding more money, as the Liberal Democrats would have it.
It is interesting that the SNP made no proposals on policy or funding. For the first time, the SNP did not mention oil and did not seem to mention independence. The moving of the Conservative motion raised the level of parliamentary debate on transport and provided a good start to the day's business. We will do the same job in the enterprise debate.