Hansard

This is one of those follow-that-speech moments—I will choose not to try to do that, for obvious reasons.

This has been a good debate. I welcome the Minister for Transport and Islands to his new job. I want to focus on three things: our overall approach; the distinctive roles that central Government and local government can play; and the money, which Jim Eadie has just said that we should focus on.

There is clear cross-party support for doing more on walking and cycling and on active travel; the bit that we are not so good at is joining up the dots between walking and cycling, between walking and buses, between walking and trains and between cycling and trains. I would add to that list other types of transport, as well. The trunk road network must be linked into our cycling ambitions because, over time, more people are commuting longer distances. Also, the statistics on cycling accidents show that, although many accidents happen in our urban areas—junctions are a key danger for cyclists, as are being overtaken and being crossed by lorries or buses—our rural roads network is where many fatalities happen. They are roads where drivers do not expect to see cyclists—narrow roads and roads with lots of corners or hills. Therefore, although local authorities are crucial, if we are to have an overall approach to active travel, every level of government must be signed up to it.

David Stewart’s speech was fantastic in how it addressed walking, and Nanette Milne’s comments on health were absolutely right. The fact that the British Medical Association has lobbied us today about the issue emphasises the case that several colleagues have made about the importance of active travel to our long-term health. Waking up to BBC Radio Scotland this week, I heard the statistic that people in their mid-50s and upwards who cycle regularly have a better biological and physical state than people who do not cycle. This is an issue not just for young people, but for every age category. We often focus on young people, and it is true that, if the right habits are not encouraged at the start, people will not have good habits in the future, but we must take a whole-population, whole-country approach to the issue.

The policy is absolutely crucial, there is cross-party support and work needs to be done at both central and local levels with both levels of government playing their part. However, at the end of the day, the political will must translate into money. The first budget that the first transport minister in the Scottish Executive had was under £300 million; the cabinet secretary now has a budget of £2 billion. If we track across the figure for walking and cycling—it does not go up from 1999 because the major investment happened not in the first year but in the years thereafter—we see that the investment in cycling and walking has in no way kept pace with investment in trunk roads, railways, ferries, air transport or buses. Because cycling investment involves a lot of small projects, it is much harder to get the big political hit and the big shift behind it; therefore, across the chamber, we must agree that we are going to do that. I am afraid to say that that means all of us piling into the transport minister, saying that we need to do more and being prepared to support him when he starts to put more money in.

At the final First Minister’s question time before the recess, the First Minister accused Opposition parties of not being supportive enough on climate change when controversial issues are raised. Do walking and cycling have to be seen as controversial? They involve the investment of relatively small amounts of money, they are incredibly local and they provide very good public health benefits. They are also good for the economy. We do not say enough about the fact that the promotion of cycling and walking is also good for the economy.

For me, it must be about infrastructure; exhorting people is not enough. Sometimes, a small number of people might feel guilty or decide that their health might be better if they get on their bike, but the truth is that most people want safer environments. If people are to be comfortable walking or cycling, we must make the built environment better. Alex Neil has just called in planning applications to build 1,200 houses in Edinburgh for determination by the Scottish Government. I will want to know, before those planning applications are approved in detail, that they include excellent cycling and walking routes that link those developments back into the city. We need to ensure that every new development—whether it is for housing, business or education—has the right level of investment in cycling and active travel, which means networking into the rest of the town, the city or the village.

Jim Eadie was absolutely right to praise what Edinburgh is doing. The radical roll-out of 20mph zones—in some streets, people would do well to get up to 20mph—will, in principle, promote the ambition to get many people cycling. However, it needs to be followed up with the creation of dedicated cycle routes, which is something that the Parliament needs to turn its mind to. If cars can park in the cycle lanes on the roads, they are only part-time cycle routes, not full-time cycle routes. That poses a challenge across the country.

We need sustained investment, and we need a higher level of investment. The commitment by the City of Edinburgh Council to spend 7 per cent of the city’s transport budget on cycling is excellent, but that ambition needs to be shared across the country and the Scottish Government needs to do more to lead the way. It needs to provide the greater clarity that Spokes has asked for so that we can track the money. That is absolutely essential. The next time that the minister holds a debate on active travel, I hope that the motion will be less self-congratulatory and will offer a bit more on what we can all do to meet the challenge.