Buses would be bought through a capital fund. It is not necessarily our responsibility to fund local authorities to buy buses, but we have funded and supported them significantly to transfer buses within their local areas. As has been indicated, the operating model for Lothian Buses is different from that of others in relation to the transfer from diesel buses to electric ones. In the case of Aberdeen, the transfer is to hydrogen. That has happened through bids for capital funding.

I think that you are talking about the operation of buses. Local authorities have a responsibility to help when there is a problem. For example, some operators have pulled out of some areas. About £55 million has been spent by local authorities in that regard. That is part of the local government settlement.

On the development of the powers in the 2019 act, local authorities are interested in different models and are trying to take forward that work, which is primarily policy work. If they come up with their own solutions, they will have to take them to their own committees and so on. However, funding for the development and policy work is available, as it was previously.

With regard to your question about the 2024-25 budget and whether all the local authorities will do everything overnight and set up everything next year, I am not aware of the pace of the work being such that there would be major demands on the 2024-25 budget.

The principles of it are probably achieved by formal bus partnerships and franchising, because we are trying to set out something that is more sustainable just now in the financing of the bus market. A huge amount of money is going into concessionary travel, but it was set up in the previous legislation so that operators would be no worse off but no better off. It helps patronage and, hopefully, as we discussed previously, younger people, for example, will become fare-paying passengers. I have heard that and have had that discussion about franchising with councils in Glasgow. Bundling can enable the geographical coverage of an area to be complete.

As we all know, there are certain times of the day when buses are more popular. You can understand the position of operators. Remember that we are in a market that has been deregulated for a long time. Obviously, private operators need to ensure that they are making some kind of profit so that their services are viable, and it is therefore more attractive to do certain routes rather than others. That has led to local authorities having to pick up the pieces in areas where buses have been withdrawn in particular ways.

The whole point of the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019 and, I hope, the fair fares review is to try to provide more sustainability in the system. I have written to the committee to say that we are expecting that review imminently. That is what we need for bus services. If we are going to get more people back on to the bus, they need to know that they have sustainable, reliable services and services at different times of the day, because we know that people are working on different shift patterns. In answer to your question on whether this will help to address the problems that you have, my answer is yes. It will not necessarily just be through franchising. It would also be possible to build it into the bus partnership, for example, and the schemes that come as a result of that.

I detect from the questions very little concern about these actual regulations on the objection system, so I simply refer the committee to my opening remarks, in which I set out the rationale for the legislation. From a technical point of view, this is about making sure that we have all the systems in place, and the regulations complete what is required for bus services improvement partnerships to ensure that, when they are developed, any plans that are put in place have co-operative agreement and buy-in from all concerned, and that, if operators have an objection, there is an understood mechanism and route by which they can raise it.

With that, convener, I am happy to move the motion.

Motion moved,

That the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee recommends that the Bus Services Improvement Partnerships (Objections) (Scotland) Regulations 2024 [draft] be approved.—[Fiona Hyslop]

That is not quite the case. You referred to Lothian Buses, which is a municipal bus company that is owned by the local authority. These regulations are not anything to do with that—

This discussion does not relate to the regulations that are in front of us; I think that everybody will acknowledge that your question is about wider issues.

I might ask Bettina Sizeland whether she can give more information on the developments. My understanding from my discussions with different transport authorities is that it is important, as the convener referred to, that a lot of the issues are driven by local authorities themselves. The South West of Scotland Transport Partnership has interests, and I had a meeting with it two weeks ago about its different models. It is still working on them. I do not want to speak for it, because it is an autonomous body, but, in the summer, it gave an indication that it has been considering the type of scheme that it would want to have. In the Highlands, people are also interested in different models. It is quite interesting that rural areas in particular are taking forward work in that area.

In Glasgow, the transport authority is interested in wider issues that also affect other local authorities. I do not know the details of the talks that have taken place, because the issue is not my direct responsibility, but we provided enabling powers in the 2019 act so that people could take that work forward. There is strong lobbying in different areas for a franchise model in Glasgow.

All that work is at an early stage, as all the local authorities would acknowledge. That might address the initial question about the funding that is available for the next financial year.

Would Bettina Sizeland like to add anything?

I am not familiar with the different local buses and the numbers that you referred to, but the principles—

We are, as I will set out if you let me continue, convener. The 2019 act provides for local authorities to run their own bus companies, like Lothian Buses, and bus partnerships, which are the subject of the regulations. It also provides for them to develop franchises. The funding that supports the development of policies relating to those aspects of the 2019 act, to which you referred, is still in the budget. It comes under the community bus fund, and £1 million in revenue funding and £5 million in capital funding have been set aside for that for 2024-25. Your question was whether the budget supports the work of the 2019 act? Yes, it does, and that is the mechanism by which it does so.

There continues to be funding for buses through the network support grant, which primarily goes to supporting the operation of bus services. There is also the concessionary scheme, which has been given a small uplift in funding. Funding to support the operation of bus services is still being provided. That is still being fully funded, as it was in 2023-24.

It is something that every MSP should be thinking about.

You will understand that I was not the transport minister who took the 2019 act through Parliament and, as the committee has pointed out, there have been a number of things since then, too. The choices that local authorities face with regard to the different models are exactly as the member has said. Some will, for example, want to take on full bus ownership in all its aspects and implementations; indeed, many look enviously at the Lothian Buses system. Some will want to look at franchising, while others will want to consider bus services improvement partnerships, as they might better reflect some of the informal bus partnerships that currently exist and might therefore require less resource funding.

I think that Sarah Boyack is referring not only to the capital resource—in these operations, you are still dealing primarily with buses that are owned or leased—but to the people resource that local authorities will need to run partnerships. You should remember that local authorities are already local transport authorities, with significant departments that run their transport work, and these are decisions that they will make.

I ask Bettina Sizeland to look back at the different models and the work that has been done. Obviously, part of that will involve sharing best practice and looking at other parts of the country and the rest of the UK to consider different models and the cost benefit aspects. That is why people are interested in Manchester, although there are negatives to that system, too. Indeed, people will tell you about the amount of resource and time that it took to set it up.

So it is not all easy sailing—there are challenges to face. However, that is the sort of information that we want to share and, as I have said, the guidance that will come out later this year will address some of those issues, too.

Yes—sorry. With regard to the quality of delivery of services, I suppose that, in that respect, conditionality will come down to the expectations of customers. I will take that issue back and discuss with CPT and, indeed, the bus providers whether the conditions of a grant should include, say, buses having to be warm. However, I know that that will be a challenge in certain parts on a day such as this, and the buses might not be of that quality.

Interestingly, again, there can be a lot of variability across the country. I do not know to what extent we can enforce, within the conditions of a grant, a requirement to meet a certain level of service. As you have said, that is more for the traffic commissioner.

With your agreement, convener, I will take that issue away and think more about the conditions of service. My understanding is that conditionality has more to do with standards of operation in relation to the workforce and fair work first principles.