Hansard

I thank Jackson Carlaw for his comments, as I have seldom had so many compliments in one speech. However, for the record, I am more of a Cliff Richard girl than a Mick Jagger one.

When I was growing up in the rural Borders, a car was a luxury that few could afford and, as a family with only one wage, we certainly could not. For us, the bus was the only way to get from A to B. To get to the now closed Peel hospital, the Woolies at Hawick where we could buy records—yes, I remember them—down to Kelso for the rugby or, for a real adventure, to take a trip up to Edinburgh, we had to go by bus. That was 30 years ago. In the intervening period, car ownership has become affordable for many. However, with bus deregulation, in constituencies such as mine, the car has become a necessity for many and something that they have to keep even when common sense tells them to get rid of it.

Rising fuel prices impact hardest on rural communities and harder still on the poorest families. Many families are seriously considering giving up their car. They will not forget that, two weeks ago, you lot in the other parties voted not to reduce VAT on fuel. That would have been a practical measure that could have put money into those people’s pockets this week and next, but there we go—a press release is far more important than practical help.

We cannot get away from the fact that many families never had a car to give up. My mother and thousands like her do not drive and, even if they did, they would not have the independent means to run a car. Their ability to have what members have and what we call a normal life—going to the shops, getting a job, going to hospital or college or just going out for a meal—is dictated by the availability of a bus. Few members know what it is like not to be able to do something simply because they do not have the ability to get there. The reality for many people in cities, towns and villages throughout Scotland is all too simple: the bus simply does not come to them or it stops too early in the evening or does not run at weekends. Those are the facts.

Take the young man living in Forth whom I met early in my time as an MSP. His ability to get a job was hampered because he could not get to work early enough in the morning and he could not take a job with a late shift because he could not get home late in the evening. That was because the buses did not run at those times. An elderly constituent of mine who has been married for 50 years and whose wife is in hospital cannot visit her because the bus does not run in the evening. That is no way of life for people.

Only in February, in the wonderful new world that the minister has created, a service that took an adult constituent of mine with learning difficulties to their supported employment was withdrawn at the stroke of a pen. That is the real world and those are real situations. Jackson Carlaw might not understand it—but then, the Tories got one out of 50-whatever-it-was in the previous election. They must do better in the next electoral test, but I doubt that they will.

Charlie Gordon pointed out that, yes, on some routes people are almost overrun with buses. One route in my area has three companies racing one another up and down the road. I welcome the inquiry by the Competition Commission, but in itself the inquiry is not good enough. The communities that I represent tell me that they want the Parliament to do more and to stop passing the buck to everyone else. When buses are removed without proper notice, it is the ordinary man and woman in the street who suffer. They are the ones who are left without the means to get to their work, to their shops and to their colleges.

As I have said, FirstBus has already withdrawn a particular service. The SNP is always keen to jump up and down; indeed, when the service was withdrawn, Aileen Campbell said in the Carluke Gazette:

“Provision of bus services should be more than just ... what’s profitable.”

I could not agree more. That is why I supported Charlie Gordon’s member’s bill. That is what it was about. If Aileen Campbell and her like on the SNP benches had supported it too, we would have been in a place to deliver the quality bus service that the people whom I represent want.

I know that the Tories do not support bus reregulation; they do not use buses, and they do not represent the kind of communities that I do. The more times that Jackson Carlaw mentions Margaret Thatcher, the more votes he racks up for the Labour Party. So bring it on. As long as he keeps reminding people of the kind of Scotland that she delivered, we will keep supporting him.

The Liberal Democrats do not believe in anything very much now, but it is the SNP that really surprises me. I was at a loss to understand why the SNP did not support Charlie Gordon’s bill. Was it just another broken promise like the ones on class sizes, a referendum, a local income tax, cancelling student debt, or the home-owner loan? No, it was far more sinister. The truth is out there now. The truth is that the SNP has 500,000 reasons for not supporting bus reregulation; it has 500,000 reasons for not supporting the poorest and most isolated people in Scotland. There are clear dividing lines in this election. I will stand up for the poor and for my constituents; the SNP will stand up for the people who fund its election campaign.

09:57