Official Report search · Parliament Workbench

Chamber

Meeting of the Parliament 13 January 2011

13 Jan 2011 · S3 · Meeting of the Parliament

Item of business

Freight Facilities Grants

McInnes, Alison LD North East Scotland Watch on SPTV

I congratulate Cathy Jamieson on securing this debate, which provides us with an opportunity to discuss not only the future of the freight facilities grant but also the wider issue of sustainable freight transport in Scotland. For that, I am grateful.

There are many innovative ways to make the transport sector more sustainable—encouraging the use of private electric vehicles, for example—but, if we are serious about our intentions to create a transport network that is fit for the 21st century and is aligned with our climate change targets, the issue of sustainable freight management cannot be ignored.

Like others, I am dismayed by the Scottish Government’s intention to withdraw support for the freight facilities grant. It is a tried and tested scheme that is designed specifically to make the transportation of freight more sustainable and we know that it has worked, bringing a reduction of 33.5 million heavy goods vehicle road miles per annum across Scotland.

In my own region, awards that were granted to Asda, W H Malcolm, ARR Craib Transport and DRS have resulted in the removal of around 12,000 lorry journeys from the A9 and A90 each year. Such grants are estimated to have provided roughly £4 million-worth of environmental benefits over the past five years.

Despite those positive results in the north east and throughout Scotland, there is much work still to be done, given that more than 1.5 billion HGV miles were travelled on the road network last year.

By withdrawing support for the FFG at this point, ministers are taking a puzzling approach that goes against the grain of the stated aims of transport and climate change policies. The national transport strategy states that the Government will

“Actively promote sustainable distribution strategies, aimed at enabling freight to use rail and sea as alternatives to road and reducing the environmental impact of freight ... on roads”.

Despite the Scottish National Party’s claim to be striving for a Scotland that is characterised by the sustainable movement of freight, it seems to be intent on jettisoning an initiative that is aligned with its policy objectives and is proven to work.

The TICC Committee raised concerns about the scheme’s closure in its budget submission to the Finance Committee, but the concern is wider than that. Members will all have heard the concerns of Direct Rail Services, the Rail Freight Group, ASLEF and the RMT. Transform Scotland has warned that the loss of the grant may even lead to some of the freight that is sustainably transported at present reverting back to road haulage. That is a worrying prospect indeed, and I hope that the minister will address it later in the debate.

Even if that fear proves to be unfounded, the suspension of the scheme at the very least immediately puts at risk five large-scale modal shift projects throughout Scotland. In my own region, that means that a project by Lafarge to take hundreds of lorry-loads of bagged cement off the road may now not go ahead.

The minister should know that I will find it difficult indeed to explain to my constituents why a Government that is supposedly committed to moving freight from road to rail is, in this case, acting to prevent that from happening.

I have so far focused on the benefits that the FFG provides in terms of sustainability and emissions levels, but we should not overlook the other benefits of taking freight off the road. In road safety terms, for example, HGVs are involved in accidents that represent a cost of £1.3 billion a year throughout the UK. By reducing the number of HGVs, we can reduce the frequency and severity of such accidents.

I am told that the cancellation of the grant will result in an additional cost of £2.4 million per annum in road maintenance. We know that councils are already facing crippling road maintenance bills because of the harsh winter—surely we should be doing all that we can to reduce the number of HGVs that are pounding the roads.

I appreciate that we are facing unprecedented economic times, and that consequently Governments must look again at their actions. Nevertheless, the cancellation of the grant without any indication of how the positive outcomes from the scheme will be achieved in other ways can be described only as short-sighted.

It would be helpful if the minister, in his speech at the end of the debate, could inform us of how his Government intends to fill the gap that the cancellation of the grant will leave and ensure that Scotland is travelling forwards, not backwards, with regard to sustainable freight management.

17:38

Search Hansard contributions

Meeting of the Parliament 13 January 2011

In the same item of business