The final item of business this evening is a members’ business debate on motion S6M-09106, in the name of Mark Ruskell, on transforming local bus services. The debate will be concluded without any questions being put. As ever, I invite members who wish to participate in the debate to press their request-to-speak buttons.
Motion debated,
That the Parliament considers that buses have a critical role in tackling the climate emergency, building a fairer transport system, and improving access to opportunities; believes that the roll-out of the Young Persons’ (Under 22s) Free Bus Travel scheme has inspired a new generation of bus users, with, it understands, over 62 million journeys made so far; commends the work of community groups, such as the Glenfarg Community Transport Group, for transforming bus networks where they live and providing local communities with lifeline services; recognises what it sees as the central role of communities and local authorities in strengthening public transport connections and breaking the cycle of decline in bus services, including by using powers available through the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019; understands that section 34 of the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019 provides local transport authorities the ability to set up their own publicly-owned bus services, and welcomes the Scottish Government’s Community Bus Fund, which aims to provide start-up funding to empower local transport authorities to transform local bus services where they live.
17:56
I thank members from across the chamber who signed my motion to secure the debate, and I look forward to everyone’s contributions and the minister’s response.
Last week, I hosted a reception for Scottish bus week. Here, in Parliament, we had bus drivers, passenger groups, bus champions and transport organisations, who are all passionate about improving Scotland’s bus networks, and the room was alive with ideas. I want to especially thank Kevin Stewart for engaging and listening so well and reflecting that passion during his speech at the event, and I am sure that the whole chamber wishes Mr Stewart well.
In my region of Mid Scotland and Fife, I have seen the same thing: communities full of ideas of how to improve services where they live. We should take note of what those organisations and communities say, because we spend a lot of time in the chamber talking about what is wrong with bus services in Scotland, but we spend less time setting out how we want to transform our bus network. At the heart of our vision for better buses should be a few central principles.
First, buses must be reliable. One of the most common inquiries that I have from constituents about bus services is about short-notice cancellations of services. Whether it is McGill’s in Stirling and Clacks or Stagecoach in Perth and Fife, folks are finding it harder and harder to rely on buses to commute to work, head to school or meet up with family and friends. Cancelled services erode passenger confidence in bus services, particularly in rural areas where people can be left without any other option to make their journey.
Passengers and regulators such as the Traffic Commissioner for Scotland should be able to hold bus operators to account, but too often they are hampered by a lack of available evidence. Therefore, we need a Scottish equivalent of England’s bus open data system, which shares live data on bus fares and service information. We have the equivalent powers available in the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019, and it is time to make them a reality.
The member is right about buses being cancelled, often at short notice, which happens in cities, too. When we have raised that with First Bus and Strathclyde Partnership for Transport, they have said that the issue is often a shortage of drivers. Does the member agree that that is one of the issues?
Yes, absolutely. The bus industry has faced a number of headwinds, some of which are being caused by Brexit, and the driver shortage is very much part of that picture. However, fundamentally, where there is not a good reason for services being cancelled and passengers experiencing poor services, we need to hold the companies to account. The bus open data system is a really good way to do that, and I think that that would be welcomed by the traffic commissioner.
Secondly, our buses must be affordable. From subsidies to concessionary travel schemes, millions of pounds of Scottish Government money is given to bus operators. Despite that, private bus operators have recently hiked fares. There has been a 9 per cent increase in Glasgow, a 12 per cent increase in the Highlands and a 15 per cent increase in Perth and Fife.
Earlier this year, the former transport minister, Jenny Gilruth, committed to a review of all public subsidies for bus, to look at how increased conditionality on public funding could improve bus services. Applying conditions to public grants is not new. We need to see conditionality applied to all Scottish Government funding for private bus operators to prevent profiteering, fare hikes and cancellations.
We need to see an integrated ticketing system that allows people to take the bus, train, tram or metro using one ticket or travel card. I hope to see that in the Scottish Government’s upcoming fair fares review.
Will the member take an intervention?
If I have time, Presiding Officer, I would be delighted to.
I can give you the time back.
I thank the member for giving way. He is making a very good speech. He made the point about public subsidy of bus companies. Does he agree that simply providing that without having visibility of the profits that are being generated by privatised bus operators is not good enough and that we should consider using grants not in a blind way, but as a way to take public equity stakes in privatised bus companies?
I think that that is a useful contribution from Mr Sweeney. Later in my speech, I will come on to talk about how we need to reform the system so that we have much more public control over and transparency in the way that our public transport is being run in Scotland.
My third point is that our buses must be accessible. That means ensuring two things: that communities have a bus service that they can access and that services meet the needs of all passengers. Rural communities are particularly vulnerable to the boom-and-bust cycle of profit-driven private bus services. From the withdrawal of the X53 service in 2021 to the recent axing of the 155 service connecting Tibbermore residents to Crieff and Perth, cash-strapped local authorities are expected to patch up what is effectively a broken commercial system.
Too often, rural communities are left with no public transport provision of any sort. However, communities such as the Glenfarg Community Transport Group are showing us what can be done. In April, the community group launched bus service 55, which runs on another recently axed route from Glenfarg to Kinross. I am pleased to say that it carried around 200 passengers in its first week. Such community-driven projects show exactly what buses can do when private profit is taken out of the picture. We need to see community transport groups such as that in Glenfarg integrated into Scotland’s bus network.
We also have one of the most expansive concessionary travel schemes in the world, with all under-22s, people over 60 and disabled people benefiting from free bus travel across Scotland, but we must aspire to go further to address the acute transport poverty that is faced by some communities. That means investing in a bus fleet that empowers anyone with a wheelchair, mobility requirements, a baby buggy or a bike to choose the bus, and extending free bus travel to people seeking asylum in Scotland, who are forced to live on only £45 a week—I commend Paul Sweeney’s leadership in that area.
Finally, we need system change, as I said earlier. Our buses must surely now be run in the public interest. Years of deregulation of bus services has left a fragile patchwork of services and operators in which the needs of passengers are secondary. From that broken system, we need to build an ecology of bus travel that shifts the balance of power away from for-profit models towards the public interest.
We already have some of the tools that we need to build this new system. Through the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019, local authorities can franchise and set up municipally owned services. Those models will not work for all local authorities, but some of them are desperate to get things moving. Glasgow City Council has already taken its first steps in exploring public control for buses, and Highland Council has invested in a fleet of buses to serve community needs. I hope that the community bus fund will provide a source of start-up capital to accelerate the radical shift in bus ownership that we desperately need to see.
Full transformation of Scotland’s bus services will require significant investment, but Tory austerity has a stranglehold on Scottish budgets. Therefore, it is more important than ever that we consider all possible ways to raise revenue and finance this reform. That means diverting funds from high-carbon road building projects to public transport, putting the workplace parking levy back on to our agenda and using the powers available to introduce local road user charges. We need all members and people across our local and national Governments, in our communities, organisations and passengers to back our buses and deliver the transformation in local bus networks that people in Scotland want and deserve
I look forward to working with colleagues from all parties, the Minister for Transport and communities on the ground to deliver on that ambition. I also look forward to the contribution of other members and the minister in this debate.
18:05
I am happy to speak on public and sustainable transport in general and on buses in particular. I therefore thank Mark Ruskell for the opportunity to do so.
To start on a positive note, there is a lot of good news. Free bus travel for under-22s and over-60s, which I have to say includes me, allows people to get out and about and go to work, study, visit family and friends and, as a result, improve their physical and mental health.
In Glasgow, we are seeing greatly increased numbers of electric vehicles, which help to improve air quality and tackle climate change, while also giving passengers a smoother, quieter ride. First Bus in Glasgow tells us that it will soon have more than 200 emission-free vehicles.
In Edinburgh, there is an exceptionally good bus service. Just last week, I was staying in Craigentinny, a part of the city that I did not know at all. However, between Google Maps, Lothian Buses’ own app and excellent signage at the bus stops, I could travel between there and Parliament with no problem.
However, I accept that it is not all good news. Bus passenger numbers in Glasgow and the west of Scotland have been falling since well before Covid and there is a variety of reasons for that. Many parts of Glasgow have a good local train service, which is usually faster, more predictable and gives a more comfortable journey than the bus. For example, the 64 bus takes about 38 minutes to get from Carmyle, in my constituency, to the city centre. In contrast, the train takes 14 minutes, so the bus really cannot compete with the train on that full journey, and I get a lot of complaints that the bus service is not good enough.
It has been suggested that public ownership would make all the difference to bus services, and there would be some obvious gains, such as any profits being reinvested in public services and perhaps a more joined-up approach to ticketing. However, ScotRail has moved into public ownership already and, as far as I can see, the services are pretty much as before. Lothian Buses previously told us at committee that it would make very little difference to its services whether it was publicly or privately owned. My own memory of public ownership by the likes of the Glasgow Corporation is that there were still many complaints about the service and the feeling was that solid Labour-voting areas—we might find it hard to believe that such areas used to exist—such as Castlemilk got a better bus service than other areas that voted in different way. If we want to increase bus or train services, pay the staff more or reduce fares, that comes at a cost, whoever the owner is. We can lower fares and raise taxes to pay for that if we want to—that is a perfectly feasible choice—but we should realise that the money available will not suddenly increase just because of public ownership.
So far, I hope that I have tried to make reasonable and logical points, as an accountant and member of the Finance Committee should be doing. However, another factor is at play here: the emotional side. Many people have an emotional love affair with their car. It gives them the sense that they have achieved something in life, that they are in control of their lives and they no longer have to walk to a bus stop or wait in the rain for a bus at the mercy of others. This is not just a debate about money and frequency of buses, although it certainly is that; it also has to be a debate about how we get people to fall out of love with their cars, and I am not quite sure how we do that.
I commend Mark Ruskell for his motion and the debate. We face some challenges in relation to sustainable transport, but I remain enthusiastic about public transport, including buses, and I certainly hope that all members of the Scottish Parliament will set an example by using them as much as they can. Thank you.
18:09
I congratulate Mark Ruskell on securing this debate, which is the second debate on buses that we have had in a short spell. Of course, there have been a number of events focusing on the issue of buses recently, including the reception that Mr Ruskell organised. Further, the cross-party group on sustainable transport, which I convene, has also been looking at public transport and how we can decarbonise buses, trains and ferries. There is a lot of interest in those issues in the Parliament and, indeed, a lot of agreement on the challenges and what should be done.
I was very taken by the recent Friends of the Earth paper called “On the Move—Investing in public transport”, which estimates that Scotland needs to shift around 3.7 billion car passenger miles a year to public transport, walking and cycling by 2030 to meet its carbon targets. It says that that will require an average increase in bus and tram passenger miles by around 80 per cent and a more than doubling of rail passenger miles in Scotland compared to pre-Covid levels. Of course, that will take a huge amount of public investment, which John Mason touched on in his excellent speech.
Mr Mason presented us with a challenge: how do we fall out of love with our cars? For me, it is not about falling out of love with our cars; it is about how we improve public transport so that people do not feel the need to drive. That is the challenge. Many people, including myself, like to use public transport, but it has to be there.
I thank the member for picking up on my point, but does he not agree that there are some people in our society who, if they could, would take their car into the pub, into the school and absolutely everywhere else, because they are so attached to it?
I have no doubt that that is true, but I think that there are also many people who would rather not use their car if they had a viable alternative. Mr Mason will be well aware that there are far too many bus deserts in this country—areas that just do not have a decent service. I live in one of those areas: East Kilbride. I got the bus down to Hamilton during Scottish bus week and I had to walk for half an hour to get to the bus stop that would get me there. That is a ludicrous situation.
We have lost a number of services over the years. I have lost a service—I used to have a decent service and now I do not. I was made aware of a service that runs between Crieff and Perth—the number 155—that is facing the axe on 1 July, and no reasonable alternative has been put forward. Local campaigns are being fought throughout the country, and we really need to do something about the situation.
Part of the answer might be to use the powers in the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019 that empower councils to take on bus services. However, we have to accept that there could be a colossal cost to that—it has been estimated that, in Glasgow, that could cost £200 million—and that it could take years to do. I am fully in favour of councils taking up those powers, but we need to accept the challenges around that.
We all want bus services to improve. Fares are part of the solution, I think. In England and elsewhere—places such as Germany, which have good systems in place—fares have been cut. We need to make buses more affordable, and the buses need to be there. That is the way that we will get people to use them.
18:14
I refer members to my entry in the register of members’ interests.
I thank Mark Ruskell for bringing this debate to the chamber and for highlighting in his motion the role of buses in tackling the climate emergency. We need to deliver a modal shift from cars and planes to public transport such as buses. However, as I am sure Mark Ruskell agrees, our current efforts to do that are inadequate. Graham Simpson has spoken about the limited bus services that are available in many parts of Scotland, and he mentioned the local campaigns throughout the country for better bus services. We need to encourage people to use buses, and the Scottish Government needs to do more to promote the use of the existing bus network.
I fully agree with the spirit of the motion and with Mark Ruskell’s speech. We need an affordable, reliable public bus service that tackles inequalities, supports the economy and helps to deliver Scotland’s climate aims.
The motion focuses on the community transport pilots that have been introduced and on bus passes for young people, which, of course, I warmly welcome, as I welcome all the other initiatives that have been introduced to encourage bus use. However, we need to be more ambitious and we must encourage the use of buses and significantly expand our bus network if we are to make buses the choice that people make.
Our current model is broken. Since the 1980s, when Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative Government deregulated buses, we have been left with an expensive, unreliable, fragmented and dysfunctional bus system that is slowly following apart. The Scottish Government seems to accept that the privatisation of rail did not work—although I note what John Mason said—so it is not clear why it thinks that a privatised model works better for buses. It may well be that the minister agrees with me on that point. I believe that this debate is not just about public interest; it is also about public sector ownership and control.
Between 1995 and 2020, fares rose by 58 per cent in real terms, and, since 2007, we have seen a 52 per cent reduction in bus journeys. Those are long-term trends that we are dealing with. As we all know, private operators throughout Scotland are cutting lifeline bus services—every MSP will know of examples of that in their local area. In North Ayrshire, services have been cut from the Garnock valley to Glasgow and from Irvine and the three towns, with the use of transport hubs at Prestwick, Irvine and Kilmarnock, which is significantly increasing transport times.
We need the Scottish Government to come forward with a plan to significantly expand the bus network. I believe that that includes capping fares to encourage people to use buses, and it also involves bringing buses under local control by enabling the expansion of the municipal provision of bus services—I say to John Mason that I do not believe that it is a coincidence that Lothian Buses is considered to provide the best-value service in Scotland.
The Transport (Scotland) Act 2019 gives the power to local authorities and transport authorities to set up municipal bus companies, but we now need the regulation to enable such municipal bus companies to become a reality.
It is true to say that we need more resources—we need to find a range of ways to increase funding—but I think that the point that has been made about conditionality highlights the fact that the significant investment that the Scottish Government has made in the privatised bus network has not always represented the best use of public funds.
I very much look forward to the further contributions to this debate.
18:18
I thank Mark Ruskell for bringing forward this debate—one in the spirit of members’ debates in which, in the main, we shine a light on the activities in our constituencies.
Borders Buses is the main provider of bus transport across the Borders and parts of Midlothian, and I commend it for surviving the Covid pandemic—a period during which it transported health workers for free. Now, the company is extending routes and consulting on others. It also has an app with a tracker, so there is no need to ask the usual questions, “Is the bus due?” and “Have I missed the bus?” It also lets people know whether there is wheelchair access to the bus. I have to say that, since Borders Buses took over from First Scotland East, much has improved, including the fleet. Therefore, I do not think that privatisation is always a bad thing. I think that the company makes a pretty good job of running that service. I would say that I am its critical friend.
Does Christine Grahame recognise that around 45 per cent of all private bus operators’ turnover is public money, delivered through subsidies, and that many of those buses have been bought through that subsidy from the public purse?
I certainly do not rule out municipal ownership, but I am watching a family-owned company that has pulled up the service in my constituency by its bootstraps. I criticise when that is necessary, but there has been huge improvement across the Scottish Borders and into Midlothian.
The extended concessionary fares do, of course, support those services, but the over-60s have not returned to using buses in pre-Covid numbers. I understand why that has happened, but it is having an impact on services.
In rural constituencies such as mine, regular bus providers cannot reach every hamlet and village, and a car can be a necessity. That brings me to the issue of community transport in the Borders and Midlothian. Gala wheels, which I have visited, provides affordable and accessible transport for disadvantaged, rurally excluded, sensory impaired and elderly residents in the central Borders. The service, which uses volunteer drivers—subject to their availability—makes a big difference to users, who are often lone pensioners with no family or friends to help them remain socially included. The service has three vehicles, an accessible 11-seater minibus and two smaller five to six-seat vehicles specially adapted for wheelchair use. It takes groups and individuals from throughout the central Borders on outings, for shopping, to lunch clubs and so on. Its sister service, Tweed wheels, provides a similar service using a minibus that has been adapted to take up to three passengers with wheelchairs and a smaller vehicle that can carry two people in wheelchairs plus four passengers.
In Midlothian, Lothian Community Transport Services, which is an independent organisation, provides, promotes and supports high-quality passenger transport services to not-for-profit organisations in Edinburgh, Midlothian and West Lothian. A community bus covers the villages of Temple and Carrington, the larger Gorebridge, Birkenside, Newtongrange—home of the National Mining Museum of Scotland—and Gowkshill, which the other bus services may not reach.
LCTS also runs a dial-a-bus service for people with mobility issues. Users must book, but it is available to them if they want to go shopping or visit the general practitioner surgery. On Mondays—I am giving you the bus timetable now—the service picks people up in Penicuik and Auchendinny at 9.30, drops them off in the town centre and collects them at 11.30. On Wednesday, the service goes from Penicuik and Auchendinny to the large shopping centre at Straiton.
Broomhill day centre in Penicuik provides transport to pick up elderly folk who spend the day there. It, too, depends on volunteer drivers. I visited the service recently and saw the driver checking the addresses where he would pick folk up.
Those are just a few examples, and I welcome the extension of those services through the £1 million that the Scottish Government has allocated to the community bus fund. That is particularly important in the rural area that I represent.
18:23
I congratulate Mark Ruskell on securing the debate.
It would be remiss of me, as a Lothian MSP and former councillor of the City of Edinburgh Council, if I did not mention during a transport debate the long-awaited opening of the Newhaven section of the Edinburgh tram network, which happened today. That is very welcome, good news for many parts of the city. Although I welcome the route’s completion, I restate my disappointment with the time that is being taken to publish the report of the inquiry into the tram project. The report was completed a few weeks ago, but we are still waiting to see what it says. The people of Edinburgh, and of Scotland, have been deeply inconvenienced for a number of years and we all deserve answers.
I am delighted to speak in this debate about local bus services. As someone who does not drive or cycle, I am a huge fan of buses and rely on the bus network to get me around Edinburgh and the Lothians. Without that, I would be dependent on the generosity of friends and family for lifts and would be completely incapable of helping my two daughters reach their various commitments around the city. I am free to roam the Lothians as and when I choose, enjoying the various excitements that our capital and the area beyond have to offer.
A well-run bus network is essential for disabled people. The ability to get around should be a priority rather than an afterthought. In places that are not well served by buses, the quality of life of disabled people is damaged. In my region of Lothian, we see both ends of the spectrum. Here, in the city of Edinburgh, we have a world-class service, yet just across the region in Midlothian, we have a much poorer service. To be fair, there are reasonably good transport links from Midlothian into Edinburgh, but getting from town to town in Midlothian is a completely different matter. The radial nature of a bus network that is centred on Edinburgh means that, often, there is no direct route between two locations that are close together geographically.
I thank the member for explaining some of the challenges with integrating services when we have a very fragmented set of companies running those services.
Does the member acknowledge that, with the benefit of hindsight, the deregulation of bus services in the 1980s was perhaps a wrong-headed move?
Well, in Lothian and Midlothian, the services are all run by Lothian Buses, so in my part of Midlothian we do not have a particularly fragmented service.
On my previous point, I will give an example. To get from Pathhead to Straiton, it is necessary to take one bus all the way to the edge of Holyrood park and then another one all the way back out, with the result that a journey that should probably take 15 minutes by bus can take more than an hour.
Would the member agree that, although there is a challenge with circular bus routes, often there is simply not the demand to make more direct routes pay, and that quite a heavy subsidy would be needed? In Glasgow, we have had the same problem.
I accept John Mason’s point, but there is a public service duty. There is a particular issue for people who do not drive who need to get between different parts of our regions. That is an issue that we need to consider.
Obviously, there are a number of factors that make it difficult to create effective transport links for every possible journey within Midlothian, but if we want our smaller communities to be as accessible as possible, and if we want people to drive less, we must provide the necessary infrastructure.
I want to briefly touch on one other issue, which has been brought to my attention by disability access panels from across Scotland. In my capacity as convener of the cross-party group on disability, I have been meeting access panels to find out what issues affect disabled people around Scotland. There have been a number of common issues, but one issue that comes up more than any other is that of access to public transport points. From the state of our pavements and roads to the rise of floating bus stops, we are not considering the needs of people with limited mobility. Public transport is useful only if people can access it.
Apparently, there are plans in the city of Edinburgh to review the number of bus stops, with a view to reducing them. I strongly advise against doing that. The extra distance between stops might seem small to an able-bodied person but, for many disabled people, it represents the difference between having the ability to get on a bus and being forced not to use a bus. I could go on, but I will not.
Buses are an excellent tool for disabled people, but only if they are able to access them.
18:29
I had not planned to speak in the debate, but I would like to offer some brief reflections on some of the issues that Mark Ruskell raised in his speech, and off the back of what Jeremy Balfour has just said about accessibility.
Buses themselves absolutely have to be accessible to wheelchair users and those with limited mobility, as well as to people with buggies and prams. Crucially, those two sets of users must not be put in competition with each other, as is often the case at the moment. Buses must also be accessible to people with a wider range of impairments.
I am the convener of the cross-party group on stroke, where we have heard regularly about people with aphasia often being challenged when sitting in accessible seats on buses. Much of this is about changing public attitudes to hidden disabilities, but practical things could also be done to provide support.
People with aphasia and other verbal communication issues often have an issue with communicating to a bus driver where they want to go and then trying to get the correct fare, and often it is even more difficult when there is a queue of people behind who are impatient to get on. Audio and visual stop announcements make it easier for everyone to know where they are going, and I am always struck by the difference between operators in my Central Scotland region and those here in Lothian. For refugees and others coming to Scotland, such adaptations are useful in allowing them to access their areas.
Being able to get to the bus is, as Jeremy Balfour has just said, a real issue, too. Since the closure of the bus station in Falkirk, many buses terminate in the town centre. Although the street that the buses are on is accessible, relatively flat and well maintained, the surrounding streets are quite steep. As Graham Simpson said earlier, if we cannot get to the bus, we cannot use it.
Expanding the bus network is not just a transport issue; we need to look at it on a cross-portfolio basis. It is a local planning issue, too, because we continue to build estates where there is no connectivity and a reliance on cars. If people have to walk to the edge of the estate in which they live and then further for the bus, and then have to sit on the bus while it goes all around the houses, they are not going to be enticed out of their cars.
That is just local travel. It would take hours and probably require a transit via Glasgow city centre to get from the side of the region where I live to where Graham Simpson lives. We also need better links with other forms of public transport.
Gillian Mackay makes an excellent point about the region that we both represent. I live at one end of the region and I think that she lives at the other end. For me to get to Falkirk from East Kilbride would involve several public transport legs, so I end up driving and wishing I did not have to.
Absolutely—and that is in a region called Central Scotland. Out in the South of Scotland or more rural parts, as Christine Grahame has said, the problem gets even more magnified, with only single services available to get places. The same is certainly true across many bits of Central Scotland, too.
I raise those examples because they are in relatively urban areas. Linking with other forms of public transport and active travel is really important, too. For example, going from Grangemouth in my region to Polmont train station is either a 10-minute drive on a bad day or a mile-and-a-half walk. However, those who want to travel on a bus have to get one from Grangemouth into central Falkirk, then have to go back out via Redding in order to get back to nearer Polmont train station—all for a mile of difference. Small changes to such links can lead to big changes to public behaviour patterns and we need that level of detail if we are to see buses as a real alternative.
I thank my colleague Mark Russell again for bringing this debate to the chamber and I look forward to working with members across the chamber more on the issue.
18:33
I thank Mr Ruskell, a Mid Scotland and Fife member, for lodging this members’ business motion, which I was pleased to sign. I thank him, in particular, for his and his team’s steadfast support for the campaign to extend the current concessionary travel schemes to asylum seekers. The campaign, which was launched back in December 2021, currently has public support from, I think, every party represented in the Scottish Parliament, which is fantastic to see. Indeed, the Government has committed to exploring the possibility of implementing the policy in its programme for government, and for that, I and others are truly grateful.
The campaign focuses on one simple premise: the extension of the current concessionary travel schemes in Scotland to people who are seeking asylum and are subject to immigration control and who, as a result, are not able to access normal social security provisions or work to earn an income. It could not be any simpler than that, really. It has resulted in a pilot in Glasgow to evaluate the impact of such an extension, and we look forward to the outcomes of that.
The campaign also has the backing of third sector charities and organisations, including the Scottish Refugee Council, the Voices Network, Maryhill Integration Network and many others, from anti-poverty groups such as the Poverty Alliance to mental health organisations such as the Mental Health Foundation and faith leaders across Scotland. We have heard from people with lived experience of their trauma from dealing with this country’s hostile asylum system and the impact that concessionary travel would have on their mental wellbeing, their ability to integrate into our society and the feeling of purpose and agency that they would subsequently have. It would be a real liberation psychologically and physically for thousands in Scotland.
When we started the campaign, we coined the slogan, “For such small change, it would make a huge difference”, and we stand by that, because it is as true today as it was in December 2021. In the grand scheme of the Scottish Government budget, the costs are negligible, with implementation less than half a million pounds a year, or less than 0.1 per cent of the Scottish Government’s annual budget.
Politics is about choices and priorities, and in today’s society, in which the United Kingdom Government does everything in its power to use asylum seekers as a lightning rod for its failures across the public policy landscape, we in this Parliament have an opportunity to stand against such gratuitous and appalling demonisation. It is an opportunity for us all collectively to say that those people are our neighbours; that they are some of the most vulnerable people in the world and suffer significant trauma; that they are our friends; and, most important, that they are welcome here and should be given every opportunity to fulfil their potential as human beings and as citizens.
On that point, although it is essential to provide that access, we know that, for all citizens in this country, our bus service could do with being much improved. There are issues of cost that we need to look at carefully. In a cost of living crisis, many people are finding access to the bus system unaffordable, and nowhere more so than in Glasgow. I would just contrast the publicly owned system in Edinburgh, where the cost of a single bus fare is £1.80, with the privatised and unregulated system in Glasgow, where the fare is £2.65. Such a difference is unacceptable, and it is a measure of the failure of the 1986 deregulation and privatisation of the system.
I encourage the minister in his speech to make reference to chapter 2 of the 2019 act. We really need to get that activated, because it contains the provisions for franchising. Public control and extending ownership is one thing—and the arguments for it have been rehearsed in the chamber this evening, with the Conservative member for Central Scotland indicating that it would entail massive capital expenditure—but we could emulate, for example, Manchester, which had a breakthrough achievement when it re-regulated its system as of March 2021. It is the first region in the UK, I think, to do so since the 1986 deregulation was introduced.
What Manchester is hoping to do is take control of the fare box. If the regional transport authority can do that, it gets the private operators’ attention, because it can compel routes, package routes to ensure that operators cannot cherry pick the profitable ones and ditch the loss-making ones, and bring coherence to the public transport planning landscape. As has been discussed tonight, we have a form of lemon socialism whereby we privatise the profits and socialise the losses.
Will the member take an intervention?
Do I have time to give way?
Very briefly.
I am enjoying the member’s contribution about the benefits of franchising. Will he acknowledge, though, that what he is suggesting needs leadership not only from the Scottish Government but from councils? Councils need to engage with the Scottish Government and say that they want to use those powers and the community bus fund, and that they want to develop a vision, perhaps in the way that Andy Burnham has done in Greater Manchester.
Mr Sweeney, could you respond slightly more briefly, and then conclude?
Absolutely. I had a really constructive meeting with Strathclyde Partnership for Transport, which said that it might need additional legislation to safeguard its right to introduce franchising. Therefore, although the power in the 2019 act needs to be activated, we also need that collaboration with SPT and other transport planning authorities to ensure that we make the most of the opportunity. I invite the minister to refer to that.
So do I. Thank you, Mr Sweeney. I call the minister to respond to the debate.
18:38
I thank all members who have contributed. In particular, I thank Mark Ruskell for bringing the debate to the chamber. I also thank him for opening his speech by expressing such kind remarks about Kevin Stewart. I am sure that he spoke for all members in the chamber.
I hope that members will understand that I am responding to the debate in lieu of a serving transport minister, and I hope that I will be forgiven if, on occasion, I have to pick up specific examples and pass them to the new minister, when one is appointed. I hope that members will take this opportunity to shape the new minister’s inbox before one has even been appointed by the First Minister and the Parliament.
We have to begin by acknowledging that all members recognise that buses provide an essential service. They not only give people access to the services and facilities that they need, but reduce our carbon emissions, thereby helping to tackle the climate emergency. Bus services play a vital role in supporting delivery of the vision that has been set out in the First Minister’s “Equality, opportunity, community: New leadership—A fresh start” prospectus.
I know that Kevin Stewart was delighted to speak at the Scottish bus week reception that Mark Ruskell mentioned. He met some of the “Love my bus” champions and was impressed by the appetite that was shown by everybody involved—in particular, those who had worked throughout the pandemic to keep essential bus services running safely—to innovate and respond to changing needs and demands.
While listening to some of the comments that were made during the debate, I was reflecting on people’s appetite for saying what they need from bus services. Way back in the early days of social media, when Twitter was a nice place to be instead of the bin fire that it has become, I set up a better buses campaign. The idea was to get people to share their experiences of the bus services. I could tweet when I was on my way to meet First Bus in Glasgow and, by the time I got to its offices to have the meeting, 20, 30, 40 or 50 people were telling me about their experience of the buses. They gave praise and criticism. Criticism came when the services were not good enough, and praise was often given when a driver went out of their way to be extra helpful. People care about this; they have an appetite for bus services that meet their needs.
Members across the chamber picked up on many local issues, including short-notice cancellations and cuts to services being made when—as Katy Clark rightly said—we should be talking about an appetite for expansion rather than firefighting cuts, pricing issues, signage and so on. Several members made important points about accessibility. Paul Sweeney’s speech focused on asylum seekers having access to buses and the transformational change that that could make.
Mark Ruskell called for conditionality in how the Scottish Government provides funding and support for bus services. I hope that the new transport minister will heed those comments and note how they have been made by members across the chamber. Mark Ruskell also recognised that Scotland already has one of the most extensive concessionary travel schemes. I hope that that is celebrated.
A couple of slightly more conceptual issues were raised. There was a question about personal preferences and whether people are too attached to their cars. Do we need to break that attachment or make bus services more attractive in a positive way? There might be a few irredeemable Jeremy Clarksons out there, but there is a great deal of evidence that many people who drive want to drive less, and that others who do not have a car want public transport and active transport choices that work for them.
That is why the Scottish Government is committed to a long-term sustainable future for bus services in Scotland. Indeed, in the current financial year, it is providing £420 million support for bus services and concessionary fares. We are into phase 2 of the zero-emission bus challenge fund.
Will the minister take an intervention?
I will give way briefly.
The minister has mentioned fares a couple of times. There seems to be general agreement that we need simpler fares and, probably, lower fares. The Government has committed to publishing a fair fares review. Does the minister know when that will be published? It is long awaited.
I am certainly eagerly awaiting it. It is very much part of the Bute house agreement that we negotiated. I am sure that the new transport minister will be keen to update Parliament on it as soon as possible.
The Scottish Government has a range of support in place. I mentioned the zero-emissions bus challenge fund of up £58 million to support bus operators of all sizes to work collaboratively to make transformational change towards zero emissions the default choice for Scotland’s bus services. Scotland’s zero-emissions fleet is double that of England, so I am proud to say that, by launching the second phase of the fund, we will continue to see that number grow.
As everyone in the chamber will appreciate, improving journey times and reliability will also contribute to high-quality bus services and encourage motorists to get out of their cars and on to the buses. That is why we are investing in bus priority infrastructure through our bus partnership fund. Through that fund, £26 million of bus priority funding has already been provided to eleven partnerships covering 28 local authorities. The initial funding is for implementation of bus priority measures and to support local authorities, working with their partners, to identify and develop more projects for delivery.
The bus partnerships may well be making progress, but I do not think that we are seeing good enough progress being made on bundling routes, fare capping, common livery or the critical control of the fare box. Does the minister recognise that those things can come only with activation of chapter 2 of the 2019 act and getting the act fully firing on all cylinders?
Indeed. If I can have a tiny bit of time to make up for that intervention, I will be able to come to that in a moment.
I will briefly touch on comments that were made about community transport organisations, such as the Glenfarg Community Transport Group. Community transport makes a major contribution to reducing isolation and increasing community access for people who would otherwise be unable to use conventional bus services, or where suitable services are too limited. The Scottish Government provides funding to the Community Transport Association to develop and advise the sector in Scotland. Community transport is just one part of the answer to Katy Clark’s valid questions about public versus private provision. She assertively made the case for public ownership. Jeremy Balfour seemed to make the case equally clearly, but possibly accidentally. Either way, the Scottish Government’s policies and plans continue to develop to give local authorities the flexible tools that Paul Sweeney has rightly said they need in order to address transport issues.
Through the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019, local transport authorities have the power to run their own bus services. Further secondary legislation to allow bus franchising and partnership working will be introduced later this year.
Will the member take an intervention?
I can give you the time back, minister.
As there is time for one more intervention, I will be happy to take it.
As long as the minister will not miss his bus.
I made the point that there is a family-owned bus company in my patch that is doing a jolly good job, so I would have concerns if the local authority were to take over running that bus service. In my view, there should be a mix. Lothian Buses is particularly good, but it serves a large urban area with a large travelling population. My area is not like that.
We recognise that Scotland is not a single homogeneous entity; there are different needs in different contexts in various parts of the country, and we should take that into account. A point has also been made that, although buses that are run by the private sector might operate well in some places and badly in others, a great deal of their revenue and capital investment comes from the public purse. Mark Ruskell touched on conditionality and how we make sure that we get good value for public investment, which will be critical regardless of whether services are run by the public sector, the third sector or the private sector.
We encourage local authorities to consider the range of powers that exist for them under the 2019 act and to make sure that they are used fully so that they can deliver good-quality bus services for local communities. In addition, the community bus fund will provide support for local transport authorities to assess the options to improve services in their areas. We are working actively with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities and other partners to develop the detail of that fund and to work on plans for its delivery.
During the debate, we have heard different views, but it is clear we have a shared understanding of the importance of having a modern, affordable and accessible bus service for all of Scotland. I thank Mark Ruskell for securing the debate in the chamber and members for their contributions.
Meeting closed at 18:48.Previous
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