Chamber and committees

None.

The ScottishGovernment has commissioned specialist transport consultants Halcrow to carryout a study of Road Equivalent Tariff (RET) as a mechanism for setting ferryfares in Scotland. This includes monitoring and evaluatinga pilot exercise in the Western Isles. The total estimated cost of the study isapproximately £375,000 covering the three stages of the study namely Stage 1:desk-based study, Stage 2: monitoring of the pilot and Stage 3: evaluation of the pilot and consideration of wider roll-out of RET. These figures do notinclude provision for any increase in subsidy required to compensate forreduced fares revenue arising from lower RET fares. The costs for Stages 2 and3 will be reconsidered in the light of the conclusions of Stage 1.

To date£22,393.37 has been paid to Halcrow for the RET study.

The cost estimatesare set out in Report 4, Volume 1 of the Forth Replacement Crossing Study whichis published online at www.forthreplacementcrossing.org.

An announcementis expected to be made before the end of the year on the replacement Forth crossing.

Within the Scottish Government there are three staff for whom the road equivalent tariffstudy forms a significant part of their workload. Other Scottish Governmentstaff will be involved in an advisory or line management capacity. Theconsultants Halcrow have allocated nine people to the study and another threewho will provide an independent view of the study team’s conclusions. BothHalcrow and the Scottish Government will also draw on relevant expertise asnecessary from outside their organisations during the course of the study.

The first stageof the study will be completed by the end of 2007. The timing of the nextstages will be subject to the decisions reached on the recommendations from thefirst stage.

We made it clearin announcing details of the road equivalent tariff (RET) study on 13 August 2007 that the initiative would benefit all categories offerry users. There will be no residency requirement for RET.

No decision hasbeen made regarding the financing of the replacement Forth Crossing.

Both bridge and tunneloptions are being considered in light of their ability to serve multi-modal trips.

However, heavy railhas not been included as an option for any replacement crossing as the existingrail infrastructure can be improved to meet foreseeable demand.

I refer themember to the answer to question S3W-5192 on 25 October 2007. All answers to written parliamentary questions areavailable on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can befound at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.

As part of thestudy the consultants have been asked to quantify both the costs and benefitswhich would arise should road equivalent tariff be applied on a permanent basisand rolled out to other ferry routes in the Clyde and Hebrides and Northern Isles networks and thelikely longer term impacts of such a roll out.