Hansard

Scott Barrie opened the debate by confessing that he has to cajole, threaten, persuade, sweet-talk and blackmail Labour members into serving on private bill committees. I leave members to guess which method was deployed in my case. I have suffered while serving on the Edinburgh Airport Rail Link Bill Committee, and now it is members' turn.

I will focus on a couple of general principles and address some of the detailed issues that were raised in the debate. On the general issue of tourism, the Executive's white paper "Scotland's transport future" notes that tourism is due to expand by 50 per cent in the next decade. For every 1,000 tourists who used the Edinburgh airport rail link, up to eight full-time equivalent jobs would be supported in the tourism sector. The value of tourism to Scotland is due to be about £13 billion by 2030. The promoter asserts that EARL will unlock several tourism markets, including business tourism for conferences and the short-break market, which is growing strongly. However, the key for that market is that people should be able to access destinations within three hours' travel of the airport. The promoter contends that improved reliability, journey time and the quality of the project will assist us to meet the needs of the short-break market.

The committee was astonished by VisitScotland's lack of engagement with EARL. According to VisitScotland's written evidence, it is the

"lead public sector agency for tourism"

in Scotland and its role is

"to provide leadership and direction for the development of Scottish tourism to ensure we leverage the maximum possible economic benefit".

However, it chose not to give oral evidence and belatedly submitted written evidence on the general principles of the scheme, which is supposed to bring tourism benefits to the whole country. The committee will bring its concerns to the attention of the Minister for Tourism, Culture and Sport, with a view to encouraging more joined-up working between the operator of EARL and VisitScotland.

The committee has concerns about whether the operating times of the scheme will serve the needs of business travellers. For example, the first train from Fife is scheduled for 7 am. We acknowledge that the promoter has analysed peaks of demand at Edinburgh airport and is confident that EARL's operating hours—between 5 am and midnight—will meet demand. As has been said, Network Rail explained that expanding those hours would be extremely challenging.

The committee agreed that the potential to enhance the business case for EARL through extended operating hours may have been missed, given the current operating timetable. If Parliament agrees to the general principles of the bill, we will return to the issue at consideration stage and seek evidence from Network Rail and the promoter on the ability of the rail timetable for the scheme to meet the needs of all airport passengers. The frequency of services could also have an impact on the potential short-break market and, combined with the reduction in reliability that will be experienced on some services, it could limit the market to Lothians and Fife.

On the quality of trains, we remain concerned that rolling stock for EARL has yet to be procured or even specified. Transport Scotland acknowledges that the operation of EARL could be delayed if additional rolling stock is not procured timeously. A number of issues relating to EARL rolling stock have not been resolved. They include the need for additional luggage capacity, the ability of rolling stock to tackle steep gradients, through a tunnel, at the proposed airport station and the fact that the tender for procurement of additional rolling stock will not be completed until the end of 2007. We remain concerned that, in balancing the competing demands for additional capacity on services such as Edinburgh to Glasgow with providing more luggage space on EARL services, there is a danger of having inappropriate or inferior rolling stock.

We heard evidence that the view in the United Kingdom Government's white paper "The Future of Air Transport" and Edinburgh airport's view is that passenger numbers at the airport could rise to between 20 million and 26 million by 2030. That is double the growth that could be predicated using the gross domestic product figures. It was not within the committee's remit to examine the sustainability of or the predictions on future air travel, but we were reassured by the promoter's modelling, which suggested that the predicted growth in passenger numbers would need to fall by 55 per cent before EARL's benefit to cost ratio was seriously hindered.

The committee agrees that, although EARL will facilitate a public transport hub interchange at Edinburgh airport, it will not in itself deliver that. I could make several other points on the scheme, but colleagues, including the minister, have touched on them. Therefore, in my remaining time, I will address some points that were made during the debate.

David McLetchie, in speaking to his amendment, said that he would not have started from here, with two central Scottish airports. That is certainly what was said to the man who was lost—"I wouldn't have started from here." We might add that we would not have started from here procedurally. In essence, we are administering the fag end of a parliamentary procedure that was introduced into the 19th century Westminster Parliament by the Tory landowning class to prevent railways being built. Doesn't it show?

Mr McLetchie was complimentary enough to say that the committee was made up of sceptics. We showed a healthy scepticism and gave the promoter a severe examination. We should be allowed to continue that important work. I do not understand Mr McLetchie's amendment, which asks for information that the committee has made clear it must have before it in the next stage of its deliberations. In essence, David McLetchie has said that there is not enough information. However, on the desk beside me, there are a couple of thousand pages of information. Mr McLetchie does not think that that is enough, which leads me to speculate that Edinburgh lawyers must have a system of payment that is based on piece-work.

Fergus Ewing said that the costs of £620 million are excessive and unknown—of course, they cannot be both. I gather that he thinks that the scheme is too dear. He does not want Edinburgh airport to be connected to 62 other stations in Scotland; he wants it to be connected only to the city of Edinburgh by a cheap and cheerful scheme, so that other cheap and cheerful schemes can be built in other parts of the country. He identified issues that the committee has already identified, such as the fact, to which I referred, that the required rolling stock for the scheme does not yet exist.

Christine Grahame quoted extensively from the committee's report, which is fine but, in view of the fact that the benefit to cost ratio for the Borders rail line is not particularly strong, it was imprudent of her politically to go in so hard against the Edinburgh airport rail link. Jamie McGrigor said that we did not get enough information about the Turnhouse alternative, but there are 105 pages of information on that—I do not know whether he read them and what he quoted from.

When it comes to the Greens, I could not eat a whole one, but if their opposition to the scheme was successful, they would ensure that the pre-eminent means of access to Edinburgh airport would be the motor car. I rather thought that that might be a pity.

Bruce Crawford said, correctly, that we have to make a leap of faith on the scheme at this stage. He was right that we are early on in the life of the scheme. However, he was wrong when he said that our standing orders do not allow the fairly basic financial detail to be acceptable at this stage.

Donald Gorrie was right—that is a first for me. Margo MacDonald was right as well. It would not be the first time that Gordon Brown has hit the oil producers with a windfall tax, so we do not have a problem with that in principle.

To break out of my quasi-judicial shackles for a moment, I point out that the big political story of the day is the coup d'état in the SNP, carried out by Fergus Ewing against Kenny MacAskill, which saw the SNP turn its back, in a parochial, pork-barrel way, on the development of Edinburgh and Glasgow city regions as the twin engines of economic development in Scotland.