Chamber and committees

The proposal is ambitious, but I think that it is welcome. It is a real attempt to try to make rail a choice for people who currently use cars, for example to commute. Since Covid, we have seen changes in how people are travelling. Over the piece, 70 per cent of commuting passengers are back, but that is not the full complement. We are also seeing strong returns elsewhere in the system—for example, Saturday is now the busiest day.

The preparatory work has been on-going since the announcement that the pilot would happen. We have just confirmed the date when it will start, which is 2 October.

One issue is capacity. I have made clear to ScotRail the need to ensure that the communication is very strong, and it has also made sure that, particularly on the Glasgow-Edinburgh line, all seven or eight carriages will be used for the journeys. To date, some trains have had only four carriages. That is not going to happen during the pilot period. Additional carriages will also come in in some of the other areas that have been added, particularly the Alexandria area.

The change is very welcome. I think that people will see it as a big step forward. It will help people with affordability, particularly given that, for many people, the cost of rail is prohibitive during peak journey times. However, I recommend that everybody watches ScotRail’s communications, because they may need to adjust when they travel. I suspect there will be far more appetite for rail travel.

It is a pilot, and we do not know what will happen or what changes there will be. Clearly, we have hybrid working, and the change may encourage more people to go back into offices. That is part of what we will look at, but we also want to assess whether it will lead to a shift from car to rail, with the associated decarbonisation and reduction in emissions.

One of the first things that I did as minister back in June was publish “A Network Fit For The Future: Vision for Scotland’s Public Electric Vehicle Charging Network”, in which we say that we are looking to work with the private sector to put in place an additional 6,000 EV chargers before 2026. As for current numbers, we understand that about 20,000 chargers in domestic and business settings have been receiving Government support. [Fiona Hyslop has corrected this contribution. See end of report.]

Going forward, local authorities are taking on responsibility for trying to ensure that their areas are fully covered. As far as investment is concerned, how we work with the private sector will be really important; indeed, ChargePlace Scotland has been supported by the Scottish Government for some time, and that contract will continue, I think, until 2026.

The Department for Transport produced a report on what it thought would be the number of EVs, but I think that it underestimated the number by about 16 per cent; we have far more electric vehicles on our roads than was anticipated in that initial research. As a result, we will work with other ministers to ensure that we have a good benchmark from which to monitor the number of EVs on our roads and the situation with charging. We have a very good rate of charging points compared with the rest of the UK outside London, which is very strong in this area. As everyone knows, however, we still need to improve.

The issue is the shift from initial subsidy. I have had plenty of letters from MSPs, saying, “Hang on a second—the price is going up now”, but that is because private operators are now operating systems that used to receive a great deal of subsidy. If they are not getting the electricity for free, they are obviously going to look for additional support.

I will ensure that the EV vision is sent to the committee—it might actually have been sent before you became a member, Mr Lumsden—but it is about how we work with private operators. When I launched it in the Michelin Scotland Innovation Parc in Dundee, which I know the committee has previously visited, I saw some of the innovative work that is being done there, including a mobile EV charging facility. That is quite an innovation that can be used in rural and remote areas, where there have been problems in the past, as well as for events. Quite a lot of private sector activity is happening, but the kind of roll-out that we all want is still a work in progress.

That discussion has to continue with unions, but it is important to provide certainty and stability by saying there will be no office closures. We want to ensure that there are workable and sensible operations for stations, and that has to involve getting the views of unions. Certainly, there are no strikes taking place in Scotland, and I want that attitude and relationship to continue so that we can continue to ensure that we have effective working with our unions.

I think that we are on track. We have about 73 chargers per 100,000 people, which means that we are the second strongest to London on provision, but we need far more. I think that everybody understands that. We now need to know how we can do that and how we can generate private funding for it, because we have already invested about £65 million—a lot of money—to kickstart that interventionist aspect. I am not going to say that I am satisfied; I do not think that that would be reasonable, because everybody knows that we need to improve in order to give confidence for everybody for travel.

Another thing that we want to look at—I know that the committee was interested in this—is how we promote tourism using electric vehicles. We need people to be confident about that, but we have some way to go. However, if that is our drive and aspiration, ensuring that we have EV charging available to people who want to hire electric vehicles and travel across our beautiful countryside using them will help rural areas.

My answer will be similar to the answer that I gave to your first question with regard to when the governance issue will be resolved. The issues are all connected, including what happens to the governance, CHFS 3, the wider improvement delivery exercise and the islands connectivity plan. Those issues are all part and parcel of the same thing, and I am looking at them in the round. The committee recommended that the issues should be looked at in the round, because some of them were being dealt with sequentially.

I cannot give you certainty on the date, but I can tell you that, in terms of my priorities, I am having regular and constant contact with my officials in order to get us into a position in which I can make that announcement. As I said in my previous answer, I know that the committee has a keen interest in that decision, and I will alert you about when that will be made.

Bus travel is crucial. Obviously, different parts of the country have different types of connectivity, but in many parts of Scotland people who use public transport use the bus. I think that the figure was that 79 per cent of people who use public transport use the bus. It is already part of our transport mix.

This is about connectivity. When I was talking about the fair fares review and the idea of accessibility and affordability—I am now going back to the convener’s point about active travel—I said that how we integrate transport hubs such as railways stations with our bus network is really important. The work that took place in Lanarkshire on Motherwell train station, in partnership with the regional transport authority, was very important in ensuring that there is alignment between buses and trains and that it is easy for people to use bus travel to connect to rail travel.

Everyone is aware of the challenge: despite the considerable subsidy of the bus system—which has been important—we have a deregulated system, so people and companies can decide which routes to run. They run the buses commercially, unless they are subsidised by local authorities, so they have to make decisions about that. That is where some challenges are.

There is the community bus fund, which is offered in agreement with local authorities, and information about that will be published fairly soon. That is helping us to work out the priorities. The bus partnership fund is, as well. If I am honest, the bus partnership fund is a bit slower than I would have expected, in terms of how it can be delivered to get more focus on bus travel. The more people use buses, the more they can be prioritised. I know that that is quite controversial in some places, but it makes services more reliable, and the more reliable buses are, the more people are likely to use them instead of their cars.

It is a chicken-and-egg situation. A lot of the work has to be done with regional transport partnerships and councils. I have met the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities lead on the subject, Councillor Gail Macgregor, a number of times since I have come into post. That relationship is key because local councils determine how they want to prioritise bus travel.

That was a broad answer, but it touched on a number of issues.

It might be helpful if I write to the committee about bus funding issues.

We might have to ask about ScotRail’s experiences and observations. There are tensions that can cause difficulties and people can behave in ways that they should not.

No, I think that things have moved on a bit since then.

I am acutely aware of the timescale for the provision for retendering or, indeed, extension. I am not going to give you any information about what I will recommend to my Cabinet colleagues that we should do on that, but you will be one of the first to know, because of your responsibilities and interests. That is as much as I can tell you just now.

On driving improvement, you are right to identify the tensions. Clearly, there are merits and demerits in terms of the committee’s recommendations, and you acknowledge that. On the views of islanders, I would lean heavily on my experience of talking to ferry committees in meetings and on visits over the past few months. They want to see service change and improvement. Some of that is about attitude, behaviour and relationship management. I do not underestimate or shy away from the fact that the fleet’s lack of resilience has consequences, which CalMac has to deal with. I also make it clear that communities continuously support and praise CalMac’s front-line staff, who often have to deal with the immediate issues.

There are changes that I expect to see, particularly in business-to-business aspects, such as the role of freight, whose economic value and importance we must recognise, as I know the committee has done. If we want to see the expansion of economic activity in our islands that we need—it is happening in relation to renewable energy and whisky from Islay, for example—that must be built into the changes, improvements and service standards that CalMac or any future operator has to deliver on. We can build such service standards into any future contract.

It is incumbent on the board, whose chair I have met, to address what I expect from it. I cannot and should not have to micromanage CalMac. My relationship is with the board, so I will make clear to it my expectations. I reassure the committee that, in my very first meeting with the chair of David MacBrayne, I made it clear that customer focus is a key aspect that I want delivery on.

I know that the committee wants me to answer everything now. I cannot do that, but I will make sure that you are the first to know when such decisions are finally taken.