Chamber and committees

But the legislation that the committee is considering today—I go back to Douglas Lumsden’s line of questioning—tells the Scottish Government and the Welsh Government what they have to do. If a future Scottish Government were to say, “We actually think that we need a different model,” there is a piece of legislation that says, “No—you have to do this as your first option.” As someone who has spoken passionately about devolution, surely you must think that that tramples all over devolution, does it not?

Thanks, convener.

Cabinet secretary, this is happening because you agree with the policy of the current UK Government. I am talking about a future Scottish Government taking a different view. This legislation says, “No, no, no—you must do nationalisation.” Knowing you as I do, I think that, in the past, you would have been jumping up and down about it if the previous UK Government had attempted to do that.

But that is because you agree with—

One more?

It comes down to track capacity, does it not?

I thank the cabinet secretary for advance sight of the statement. I have to say that I was full of excitement and expectation but, once again, the cabinet secretary has dashed my hopes that we would get some good news. We warned that there could be a summer of ferries chaos, and there has been a summer of ferries chaos. Not a day goes by when we do not hear about more delays, cancellations and repairs. Islanders are long past being at their wits’ end.

There is little in the statement that we did not know already, but the cabinet secretary managed to save the worst until last in a doom-laden ending that would give Keir Starmer a run for his money. She warns of

“difficult decisions ... as ... business cases come to fruition”.

She mentioned Ardrossan, so is one of those difficult decisions about Ardrossan? Is the work on that port likely to be put on hold? If not, when are we likely to see progress?

Finally, will the cabinet secretary agree to a full debate on ferries in Government time, so that we can properly address all the issues?

Will the minister take an intervention?

I congratulate Sue Webber on securing this debate. For as long as I have known Sue, she has been championing this issue. It is not really about who has been campaigning the hardest, however—it is about bad planning. If a development of such a size has been planned and there is a railway going through it, there should be a station. That should have been planned and agreed at the start because, as Winchburgh has grown, the need for the station has become ever greater.

I was outside the Parliament for the handing in of the petition in April, together with Sue Webber and others—I see Foysol Choudhury across the chamber; he was there, too. I have been lucky enough to visit Winchburgh and I was shown round by representatives of Winchburgh Developments in May. I cycled along the canal that goes through Winchburgh over the summer. It is quite well connected by road and canal, but not rail—yet there is a railway line going through it. This is not difficult—it can be done.

The cabinet secretary, who is sat there on the front bench, knows that I live in East Kilbride. Money is now being spent on the East Kilbride line, and the town is getting a new station at Hairmyres, which will be fantastic, with a big new park and ride. That station will become the main station in East Kilbride, I suspect. That has been done with Scottish Government money.

Gordon MacDonald mentioned city deal money. I agree with him that that could be used—but that decision should have been taken years and years ago.

If we have an ambition to get cars off the road—the Scottish Government certainly has that ambition, and we would agree with it—train travel is the way forward. A 15-minute journey from Winchburgh into Edinburgh would take hundreds of thousands of cars off the road every year. Surely we can all agree that that should happen.

There is hope. Jim Fairlie has possibly provided some hope with the steering group, which met at the end of July. I hope that we can get beyond just having a business case and get an agreement to do something. Building a station is not all that complex—there just needs to be agreement to do it. Let us stop fighting about who will take the plaudits and who needs to spend the money.

I thank the minister for taking the intervention. I actually want to congratulate him for facilitating the steering group meetings. The message sounds quite positive. Is there now more confidence than there has been for some time? Is he confident that the station will happen? I am not pinning him down to any dates, but does he think that, as a result of the work that he appears to have led, we might actually see some progress?

I notice that Lorna Slater also wants to intervene; I will take an intervention from her next.

In answer to the minister, of course that could happen, but the committee picked up on the fact that someone who was in that position would know that they might not be able to serve their full term. That is an issue that it would be worth exploring, possibly at stage 2.