Meeting of the Parliament 11 September 2025
I take on board Sarah Boyack’s point. That is the whole point of the legislation. It does not have to involve a one-size-fits-all approach—there is a range of options for local authorities to take advantage of.
When we look at how Lothian Buses has taken that legislation and run with it, with a direct link back into the local community, we see that there are benefits there. However, I would not want to criticise private operators to any great extent. All I will say is that they have a business to run, and they have to be profitable to make the investments that are needed. We also have funding through the network support grant to allow the operators to put in place and run routes that are clearly not viable at that time.
Alasdair Allan talked about some of the Youth Parliament’s asks around extending funding. I would just reiterate that the network support grant is important in maintaining rural routes. We do not have any funding available to increase the under-22s scheme as it stands, but we have increased ferry provision, including the number of ferries that are available to our young travellers. When I was in Orkney and Shetland over the summer, people came to me and said that the provision that we have made is absolutely brilliant. If we could extend it, that would be great, but the budget does not allow us to do so right now. However, it demonstrates the importance that the Government places on ensuring connectivity.
A number of members have stated the value of that connectivity, not just in enabling people to get to their workplace and to education—there is the social aspect, too. Indeed, I picked that up when I was in Orkney, in particular: young people were travelling to some of the outer isles in ways that they would not have normally done, as a direct result of the free ferry travel that we have put in place.