Hansard

I am publishing today the Executive's transport white paper, "Scotland's transport future". Copies have been placed in the Scottish Parliament information centre and are now available for all members.

Transport is important for our economy, for our communities and for every individual. Our challenge is to transform Scotland's transport, making it more reliable, accessible and customer friendly. It must deliver high-quality services to passengers and business. We are now investing more than ever in major projects: new railway lines and tram lines, the rail links to Glasgow and Edinburgh airports and road improvements. Our biggest commitment is to public transport. In 1998-99, less than a quarter—23 per cent—of the transport budget was spent on public transport. We now spend more than two thirds of the transport budget on buses, trains, ferries, cycling, walking and other forms of public transport.

We want to do more. The importance of transport is increasing. We want to make certain that we have the skills, experience and structures to deliver. In "Scotland's transport future", we set out our proposals. There will be a new transport agency for Scotland and a network of new regional transport partnerships. For the first time, there will be a national strategy for Scottish transport. After decades of neglect and underinvestment, we now have available record resources to deliver a truly integrated transport network for Scotland. The transport budget is substantial, rising to £1 billion per year in 2005-06. Between now and 2012, we plan to spend around £3 billion on major transport infrastructure projects. I have already mentioned the airport rail links; there are also the Stirling-Alloa-Kincardine line, Edinburgh trams, the Airdrie to Bathgate line, the Borders rail link and many more projects.

We are making progress, but I fully admit that there is still a long way to go. We want improvements. We have a broad cross-party consensus—which I welcome—on all the projects and all the funding, but we must now create the right environment in which to speed up delivery. Delivering the current programme requires the right people, the right skills and the right structures at central, regional and local levels.

Our proposals for the future are founded on the creation of a new national transport agency and the development of a long-term national transport strategy. We will also legislate to create a network of new statutory regional transport partnerships, which will enable planning and delivery of projects of regional or strategic significance in a way that builds on the good work of the existing informal regional transport partnerships. The national transport agency will be directly accountable to Scottish ministers. It will be a centre of expertise, skills and knowledge. It will be a professional organisation, which will be tasked with delivery.

I make it clear that we have no intention of transferring to the agency any transport powers that are currently exercised by local authorities, with the sole exception of the rail franchise powers of Strathclyde Passenger Transport. Wherever practicable, we want powers to be devolved from the centre to the new regional transport partnerships.

We want to extend the benefits of concessionary travel by introducing national schemes, one for younger people and the other for older and disabled people. To help to achieve that, we propose to create discretionary powers that would allow the agency or regional transport partnerships to operate such concessionary schemes.

At the moment, there are four regional transport bodies: the Highlands and Islands strategic transport partnership, or HITRANS; the south-east Scotland transport partnership, or SESTRAN; the north-east Scotland transport partnership, or NESTRANS; and the west of Scotland transport partnership, or WESTRANS. Each part of Scotland is different and has different transport needs. Those voluntary partnerships have already done a lot of excellent work in building transport strategies across their respective regions and we want to develop that approach. We propose to create a network of statutory regional transport partnerships to cover every part of Scotland. We will consult further with local government on the geographic coverage, powers and duties of the new partnerships, but the intention is to build on the four existing transport partnerships.

We do not intend to take a standard approach in all parts of Scotland. The new partnerships will be flexible enough to tailor their roles and functions to their particular regional needs. Their core membership will come from local government, with a representative from each of the councils in the region. We intend to make it possible for councils to agree to transfer specific transport powers and duties to the new partnerships. Following consultation, we will issue guidance on two or three basic models for the new partnerships. The partnerships will be able to include representation from the local business community and other external organisations of about a third of their total membership, so decisions that are made on issues will involve those who are best placed to address local transport needs.

The new partnerships will have to prepare a regional transport strategy to make the case for investment and for new infrastructure and to guide and co-ordinate the activities of member councils in their region. They will be able to requisition core funding from revenue support grants; to undertake prudential borrowing, under the prudential borrowing regime, to finance capital infrastructure investment; and to make the case for Scottish Executive funding from grants under section 70 of the Transport (Scotland) Act 2001. We will work closely with the four existing regional partnerships and with local government during the next few months to work out the best shape and function for the new bodies.

Strathclyde Passenger Transport in the west of Scotland is clearly a special case. We have made it clear that we wish to preserve the strengths of SPT and to build on the significant skills and experience of its work force. We are determined that there will be a strong regional transport partnership in the west of Scotland to which SPT's powers will transfer, with the exception of the other rail powers, which, as I said, will transfer to the new agency. Let me be clear that I expect the new regional partnership to continue to have a key role in the development, management and monitoring of rail services in its area.

Those are the structures that we propose to introduce. However, ensuring that our road network is developed and used as efficiently as possible is not just about major projects. Our proposals are also intended to improve the day-to-day management and maintenance of Scotland's roads by tightening the regulation of roadworks.

Recently, we consulted on how to reduce unnecessary disruption caused by utility company roadworks. Such roadworks are obviously a fact of life if we want to access essential services such as water, gas, electricity and telecommunications. However, I want to ensure that they cause minimum disruption for businesses, road users and the public. Repairs must be completed to the highest standards and tough action must be taken if there are failures.

We will do that by improving the quality and co-ordination of roadworks and through tougher enforcement when things go wrong. A new independent body will act as a watchdog and will monitor performance and quality with the power to rule on disputes and impose tough penalties for poor performance. The starting point for improvement will be the Scottish roadworks register, which roads authorities and utility companies have developed in partnership. The register is not well enough used at present, but it will become the single national planning tool for all roadworks in Scotland, with statutory backing.

In the context of the new national and regional transport arrangements, we also intend to carry out a two-phase review of our toll bridges. The review will examine all Scotland's toll bridges—Skye, Erskine, Tay and Forth—and we expect to have completed the first phase by the autumn of this year, with the overall review completed by summer 2005. The first phase will assess all existing tolls, including the way in which changes to tolls could help to achieve our environmental and economic objectives of reducing pollution and congestion. The second phase will include an examination of the broader issues of the management, operation and maintenance of the bridges.

We have already made it clear that we are committed to ending the discredited toll regime on the Skye bridge. Professional advisers have been appointed, discussions with Skye Bridge Ltd have begun and I believe that we can achieve that goal by the end of this year.

The white paper proposals represent a radical improvement in our ability to deliver new transport projects in Scotland. We want a national transport strategy with a powerful new agency and strong regional transport partnerships that are capable of delivering our £3 billion investment programme and of transforming our transport network.

The new approach gives us the opportunity to improve Scotland's future transport dramatically and to create safer, higher-quality and better-integrated services that respect our environment. Most important of all, it gives everyone in the Parliament and throughout Scotland an opportunity to work together in a new partnership to make certain that we deliver.