Chamber and committees

I received the final report of MVA's Stirling - Alloa - Kincardine Rail Line Reopening Benefit Study earlier this month. Copies of the report have been placed in the Parliament's Reference Centre.The report demonstrates that the project will have significant benefits by reconnecting Alloa to the national rail network; by taking freight trains off the Forth Bridge and improving passenger rail services between Fife and Edinburgh; and by reducing the cost of shipping coal to Longannet Power Station. The report concludes that for both the freight-only and combined passenger and freight options the benefits outweigh the costs.I am therefore releasing up to £2 million from Clackmannanshire Council's Public Transport Fund (PTF) award to allow the council and other partners in the project to undertake more detailed costings of the works required; to promote the necessary Parliamentary Order to construct the link, and to put together a funding package to complete the project securing contributions from those who will benefit from the new services.This is an important project with strategic benefits for the Scottish rail network. I have therefore asked my officials to work very closely with Clackmannanshire Council, Scottish Enterprise Forth Valley, the Strategic Rail Authority and other partners promoting the project to ensure this project is delivered as early as possible.Today's announcement also demonstrates that we are committed to delivering rail infrastructure improvements despite the current difficulties facing Railtrack.

On 25 February, I announced that local authorities are to receive an extra £20 million in grant in financial year 2001-02 to speed up their maintenance activity on local roads and bridges. This is in addition to an extra £70 million for capital investment, allocated to local authorities over the three years to March 2004, to tackle the backlog of repairs and maintenance to local roads and bridges. It will be a matter for each local authority to determine its own local priorities and to deal with its most serious problems first when spending these additional resources.

We shall lay before Parliament regulations to increase prescription and other National Health Service charges in Scotland from 1 April 2002. There will be a cash increase in the prescription charge of 10p, (1.64%) from £6.10 to £6.20 for each quantity of a drug or appliance dispensed.The cost of prescription prepayment certificates will rise to £32.40 for a four month certificate and £89.00 for an annual certificate. These offer savings for those needing more than five items in four months or 14 in one year. Prepayment certificates will, from 1 April, be available for purchase from community pharmacists and dispensing doctors.Prescription charges are expected to raise some £45.7 million for NHSScotland in 2002-03.Charges for elastic stockings and tights, wigs and most fabric supports supplied through the Hospital Service will be increased similarly.The maximum patient charge for a single course of dental treatment begun on or after 1 April 2002 will increase from £360 to £366.We have restricted the prescription charge increase to the same cash amount as the previous three years and the other increases are in line with this percentage increase.NHS charges in England, Wales and Northern Ireland are a matter for these Administrations.

The Scottish Executive is liaising closely with the UK Government on the implementation of the speed policy proposals in the GB road safety strategy Tomorrow's Roads - Safer for Everyone, copies of which are available in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (Bib. number 5711).The Executive provides funding to the Scottish Road Safety Campaign for the development of key road safety education initiatives and publicity messages. The campaign's "Foolsspeed" campaign aims to change driver attitudes to speed and speed choice. The campaign also arranges publicity to complement police enforcement campaigns focussing on a number of road safety issues, including speeding.The Executive has made it easier for local authorities to set 20 mph speed limits. Revised guidance, issued in August, provides advice on 20 mph zones, in which engineering measures ensure that the zones are self-enforcing; on mandatory 20 mph speed limits, with or without engineering measures; and on advisory 20 mph speed limits.The Executive is working with the Society of Chief Officers of Transportation in Scotland on the implementation of pilot part-time speed limits outside selected schools in Aberdeenshire, Angus, Edinburgh, Glasgow and West Lothian. 20 mph speed limits will apply outside the schools at times when children are arriving and leaving.On the trunk road network the Executive encourages compliance with speed limits by installing traffic calming measures which include speed cameras at locations where excessive speed is known to cause or contribute to the severity of accidents. Signs which are triggered by speeds over a particular threshold are to be trialled on the A9. The signs will say "Slow Down" and indicate the 60 mph speed limit.

Police forces issue fixed penalties or make reports to the Procurator Fiscal on the basis of corroborated evidence of the speed of vehicles. It would be for the defence to introduce any evidence of a faulty speedometer as a defence or mitigation.

Work-Life balance, including encouraging the provision of part-time working and job sharing where appropriate, is a reserved issue. The Department of Trade and Industry launched the Work-Life Balance campaign, with an accompanying Challenge Fund, in March 2000.The campaign aims to persuade employers to introduce ways of working which meet the needs of the business and customers while simultaneously improving the work-life balance of their employees. It is directed at employers in the public, private and voluntary sectors and intended to benefit all employees whether or not they have caring responsibilities.The Challenge Fund provides free consultancy support for private, public and voluntary employers who want to introduce and develop innovative, flexible and diverse working patterns or practices for the benefit of the organisations, employees and customers. The Challenge Fund is supporting 14 projects in Scotland, and is currently inviting a further round of applications.

I am committed to a partnership approach to the protection and enhancement of Scotland's environment.We are working with the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA), the farming industry and other stakeholders to improve the guidance available to farmers on pollution prevention and to promote its adoption. A group drawn from SEPA, National Farmers Union Scotland (NFU Scotland), the Scottish Agricultural College (SAC) and the Executive is currently revising the Code of Good Practice on Prevention of Environmental Pollution From Agricultural Activity. The Executive has also collaborated with WWF Scotland, NFU Scotland, SAC, SEPA and Scottish Natural Heritage to establish a new advisory post at the college to advise on and publicise best practice on protection of the water environment. Other measures funded by the Executive include development of a CD-ROM planning tool on environmental management for agriculture and SAC on-going advisory work. We are also working to minimise the environmental impact of pesticides through voluntary measures in partnership with farmers, the agrochemical industry and the UK government.We are also sponsoring a research programme examining the impact, mechanisms and transport of agricultural diffuse pollution. Based on this research, the Scottish Executive issued an advice note on the prevention of agricultural diffuse pollution at bathing waters to farmers in at-risk catchments on 20 July 2001 (Bib. number 14970).Where appropriate we will regulate. SEPA already has statutory powers to require farmers to undertake work to bring facilities for the collection and storage of silage, slurry and fuel oil up to legally defined standards. Farmers are also required under the Groundwater Regulations 1998 to obtain authorisation from SEPA for disposing of sheep dip and other agricultural chemicals. To tackle the specific problem of nitrate pollution we are currently consulting with the farming industry and others on new Nitrate Vulnerable Zones (NVZ). Further consultation on the mandatory Action Programmes for the proposed NVZs will follow shortly. We are also extending pollution controls to intensive farming (pigs and poultry). New installations are already subject to the Pollution Prevention and Control (Scotland) Regulations 2000 and existing farms will be brought into that regime in 2007. We also plan to bring non-natural agricultural waste into the controlled waste regime. It is planned that draft regulations on this matter will be issued for consultation later in 2002.Finally, we established an Agriculture and Environment Working Group in September 2001 to advise ministers on the means of achieving a more joined-up approach to agriculture and environmental policy. The group's final report is to be submitted in the spring.

The answer to questions S1W-28144 and S1W-28145 on 29 August 2002, set out a number of initiatives which are helping to increase the supply of affordable housing in rural areas. Individual projects may sometimes provide housing specifically for essential workers, such as a teacher, in very small communities. However, the Scottish Executive has no plans to introduce any general measures targeted on public sector workers.

We have today agreed a timetable for the next steps in taking forward the work of the working group. Copies of the timetable are available in the Parliament's Reference Centre.

The study commissioned to assess the capacity of the Scottish electricity network to connect increasing amounts of renewable generation has now been completed. The results of the study will be published shortly, along with a report into Scotland's renewable resource.