Chamber and committees

None.

The review was publishedby the Sustainable Development Commission, which is a jointly established non-departmentalpublic body with a UK-wide remit. The information requested is a matter for thecommission and is not held by the Scottish Government.

No.

The Airdrie to BathgateRail Link is a stand alone project and is not dependant on the Edinburgh AirportRail Link project for its delivery. There are no implications to project deliverability,timescales or cost if the Edinburgh Airport Rail Link does not go ahead.

The costs incurredby the Scottish Government during the period of the contract are as follows:

Year	Expenditure
1 October 2004 – 31 September 2005	£11,211,331
1 October 2005 – 31 September 2006	£12,595,283
1 October 2006 – 31 August 2007*	£11,380,143

Note: *Figures areonly available to 31 August 2007.

The current contractexpires on 3 October 2007. The contract may be extended for a furtheryear until 3 October 2008 and in which case the expenditure is estimatedto be in region £12,000,000.

Table 1 shows thenumber of employee jobs in the manufacturing and the financial intermediationindustries and the percentage of total employees jobs these industriesrepresent.

Table 1 Employee Jobsin Manufacturing and Financial Intermediation Industries

Year	Manufacturing		Financial Intermediation
	Level	% of Total Jobs	Level	% of Total Jobs
1997	320,200	15.4%	81,500	3.9%
1998	326,700	15.1%	82,900	3.8%
1999	315,000	14.5%	86,100	4.0%
2000	302,000	13.5%	93,600	4.2%
2001	285,000	12.4%	105,100	4.6%
2002	263,400	11.6%	106,900	4.7%
2003	243,300	10.5%	109,800	4.8%
2004	235,900	10.1%	112,600	4.8%
2005	229,700	9.6%	108,200	4.5%

Source:Annual Business Inquiry.

Notes:

1.These data are based on employee jobs rather than people in employment i.e. oneperson may have more than one job.

2.These data do not include self-employed jobs.

3.The manufacturing industry is defined as standard industrial classification Dand the financial intermediation industry is defined as standard industrialclassification J.

4.Data are rounded to the nearest hundred.

A total of 500copies of the document Principles and Priorities: The Government’s Programmefor Scotland were printed. The document was also placed on the ScottishGovernment website. Copies of the document were distributed to all MSPs, tomembers of the media and a small number made available within Government.

The total cost of the printing the document and associated tasks was approximately £7,000including VAT. No additional distribution costs have been incurred.

The ScottishGovernment is committed to a council tax freeze at 2007-08 levels in cashterms. I am currently in constructive discussions with local government on howbest this can be achieved.

The roundabouts onthe A75 trunk road to the east and west of Castle Douglas have recorded six andthree personal injury accidents respectively since 1997. The following table showshow many accidents have occurred in each year since 1997.

Year	A75 East of Castle Douglas (Allanton)	A75 West of Castle Douglas (Hightae)
1997	1	0
1998	1	1
1999	2	1
2000	0	1
2001	1	0
2002	1	0
2003	0	0
2004	0	0
2005	0	0
2006	0	0
Total	6	3

 

Transport Scotland has operational responsibility for this matter and canbe contacted for further information.

Transport Scotland is leading work to provide firm proposals forthe most cost-effective ways to improve reliability, bring down journey times andprovide capacity for the expected continuing growth in rail passenger numbers betweenEdinburgh and Glasgow. Electrification is one possible option for achieving thisand the costs, risks and timescales of such a project will be considered in thewider context of the above service improvements. The results of this will be reportedin September and will be considered as part of the Strategic Transport ProjectsReview.