Hansard

I add my thanks to Mark Ruskell for bringing this important issue to the chamber. I also welcome the acknowledgment from the minister at last week’s portfolio questions on transport that there is a problem here. I heard him comment about driver shortages, and they undoubtedly exist, but that is not the whole story and I think that the minister is well aware of that.

As we try desperately hard to make it easier for people to go green when they make their transport choices, I worry that the situation with the X53 bus is yet another barrier in the way. Jackie Dunbar and Jim Fairlie made interesting points about trying to change people’s behaviour, and it is true that we must. If we are going to go green, it is important that we do not have too many barriers in the way of that.

However, the context is also important. This debate comes at a time when Stagecoach has reduced the Edinburgh to Perth X56 bus service by around half. Yesterday we learned that Stagecoach is announcing a merger with National Express and the loss of its Perth headquarters. There are worries about the sustainability of some of the Stagecoach services.

It also comes at a time when ScotRail plans to lengthen the rail journey time between Edinburgh and Perth by 10 minutes because of the new diversion via Dunfermline. That journey time is already pretty lengthy when compared with other UK and European journeys of the same distance—and, indeed, when compared with the rail journey time between Edinburgh and Perth over a century ago. As we know, there have also been issues around services at Kirkcaldy, Inverkeithing and Dunblane stations. The context is not great for passengers in Mid Scotland and Fife just now, especially for those who are based in our very rural locations.

The cross-country X53 bus service is a lifeline for many rural passengers, who will feel badly cut off by the loss of the bus service—that is certainly the message coming from Mid Scotland and Fife constituents. Mark Ruskell cited many examples of that, and he is quite right about people who have essential business to do but cannot get where they need to be quite so easily. Alexander Stewart made an interesting point about Stirling Council, which is obviously also worried about the situation, and I think that we need to pay a lot of attention to it.

I do not think that this decision sits well with modern transport policy, as we are supposed to be doing all that we can to encourage more people out of their cars and on to public transport. Neither does it sit well with the demographic changes that are happening across Mid Scotland and Fife, which in some key areas is seeing substantial growth, particularly along the M90 corridor. There has been extensive house building in Milnathort and Kinross.

I recently saw a statistic that suggested that Dunfermline is expected to grow by 30 per cent between 2016 and 2026. That is an awful lot of extra people who will be working in Edinburgh, Stirling, Glasgow, Perth and so on, and I hope that many of them will want to make use of public transport.

I thank Mark Ruskell again for highlighting this issue. Like many members, I have received a lot of communications on it, and I hope that the Scottish Government will address it. I know that there are extenuating circumstances with regard to some of the causes of the situation, but this is a very real issue that we need to do something about.