Hansard

The Convener Lab

PE1098 and PE1223, on school bus safety, are from Lynn Merrifield and Ron Beaty. I welcome Keith Brown, the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure and his...

Bill Butler Lab

Good afternoon, minister and colleagues. On 26 October 2010, Mike Penning MP said that the UK Government could“devolve powers on school transport if the Scot...

The Minister for Transport and Infrastructure (Keith Brown) SNP

If I may, convener, I will answer the question by way of a couple of opening remarks. I understand the committee’s frustration about the time that it has tak...

Bill Butler Lab

I know that this will be a difficult question to answer, but what approximate timeline does the minister envisage for getting the discussions between the leg...

Keith Brown SNP

The discussion should not be held up by our election, because officials can continue to work on it. Further work will depend on the new Parliament and on who...

Bill Butler Lab

I am grateful to the minister for that answer.

Nigel Don (North East Scotland) (SNP) SNP

Good afternoon, minister. Many points have been made in relation to this issue. Are there any with which it will not be possible to make progress because of ...

Keith Brown SNP

There are some issues on which we cannot make progress. The officials can flesh this out if necessary, but Westminster has said that it will not devolve traf...

Jill Mulholland (Transport Scotland)

That is right. The offer is not the devolution of road traffic legislation on issues such as overtaking. However, at this committee, Mr Penning said that he ...

Nigel Don SNP

Mr Penning has other things on his plate, but when he gets time to think about it, there is the prospect of UK-wide legislation to change some things.14:45

Keith Brown SNP

That is right. It would require legislation to insist that all buses had seat belts rather than legislation to insist, for example, that only buses that had ...

Cathie Craigie Lab

Can the minister expand on why we are not pursuing the proposal on overtaking school buses? I know that legislation on that is reserved to Westminster, but t...

Keith Brown SNP

I cannot speak for my predecessor, but I have not spoken about that specifically with Mike Penning. We ranged across a number of different subjects, but not ...

John Wilson SNP

As I understand it, local authorities can impose outside schools 20mph zones as well as zig-zag no-parking zones. Could not the power be transferred to local...

Keith Brown SNP

I think that I am right in saying that in the two examples that you gave the powers had to be devolved to local authorities, so that would have to be done fo...

John Wilson SNP

If Westminster could devolve powers in relation to 20mph zones and zig-zag no-parking zones, surely it could go one step further and help to stop overtaking ...

Nanette Milne Con

I presume that the problem is not just around schools and that it must also be a problem when a child gets off a bus at their destination. The law would ther...

Keith Brown SNP

In theory, there is the largest concentration of children around schools, although I imagine that one would want to apply the law more widely. However, our r...

Robin Harper Green

The minister talked about the likelihood that drivers would not observe the fact that they should not overtake buses. Of course, it is not only buses that st...

Keith Brown SNP

I am being passed some information. From memory, the twenty’s plenty initiative had to be devolved from Parliament to local authorities. I am not sure about ...

Ian Robertson (Transport Scotland)

It is difficult for a driver to judge whether he is doing 10mph. The speedometer is not accurate enough.

Robin Harper Green

In Jersey there are 15mph limits.

Ian Robertson

I think that there is one in Orkney as well. Generally, anything less than 20mph is a bit difficult.

Robin Harper Green

I will meet you halfway.

The Convener Lab

If there are no more questions, I ask the committee how it would like to deal with the petition.

Bill Butler Lab

We are all grateful to the minister for coming to the meeting. It appears from what he has said that some welcome progress has been made. I hope that as soon...

The Convener Lab

It might be useful for our successor committee to have a note about the possible legal constraints surrounding the issue, because that was new information fo...

The Convener Lab

I thank Keith Brown, Jill Mulholland and Ian Robertson for coming along. We have not made the minister late for his next meeting.