Chamber and committees

As part of the Active Travel Task Force work, which I announced in November last year, a review of barriers to better infrastructure for pedestrians and cyclists is underway. The Task Force has received written and oral evidence from many stakeholders and will submit recommendations to me by the end of this year.

Transport Scotland works in partnership with local authorities and other partners to keep under review cycling and other active travel projects. Our Cycling Action Plan for Scotland 2017 outlines how we will deliver our vision with monitoring and evaluation as a core outcome.

The following table lists the local authorities which have adopted a cycling strategy or an active travel strategy. An active travel strategy is a strategy to encourage both walking and cycling, and therefore contains all the elements of a cycling strategy. Local authorities have developed them in response to action 4 of the Cycling Action Plan for Scotland 217, with guidance and support provided by Sustrans and Transport Scotland to assist their development.

The maintenance of cycle paths is the responsibility of the body which has adopted the path, for example, local authorities, Forestry Commission Scotland, Scottish Natural Heritage, Scottish Canals and in the case of trunk roads, Transport Scotland. Upgrades of existing cycle routes may qualify for capital funding through Sustrans funding programmes, such as Community Links and Safer Routes to School.

The process for re-designating the National Cycle Network (NCN) is the responsibility of Sustrans, the UK Charity which owns the NCN.

In re-designating a NCN path, the route manager or responsible party, mainly local authorities, would approach and discuss the route with Sustrans. The route would then be assessed against NCN standard criteria and strategic route assessment criteria. If it met these criteria, a route number would be issued and the responsible party would then be expected to sign the route to standard, with support from Sustrans.

As part of the criteria, the route would need to link communities, be of a given minimum distance and serve a core strategic purpose, for example, encouraging recreational cycling, cycle tourism, or everyday journeys.

Some local authorities such as Edinburgh, Fife and Moray and have their own numbering systems for signing local and regional routes that either don't meet NCN criteria or do not have 'national significance'.

All local authorities are able to bid into the Community Links fund, administered by Sustrans and funded by Transport Scotland, for building cycle paths in both urban and rural areas. Once built, the local authority or other bodies such as The Forestry Commission, Scottish Natural Heritage, the National Parks or Scottish Canals adopt the path and maintenance then becomes the responsibility of that organisation.

In 2017-18, the Scottish Government provided over £3 million pounds to expand and maintain the National Cycle Network, most of which is in rural areas.

Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that the Armed Forces, veterans and their families receive the best possible levels of support. We are keen to see the local Veterans First Point (V1P) services succeed and become financially sustainable in the future.

To help the NHS led partnerships as their UK Government LIBOR funding came to an agreed end, the Scottish Government offered all Partnerships interim funding on a 50:50 basis, and continues to fund the V1P Central Team for its network training and governance role. Six of the eight partnerships accepted this matched funding offer for 2017-18. In total this year the Scottish Government will provide £824,591 to support the network.

In addition, the Scottish Government has made further funding offers to all eight Partnerships for 2018-19 and 2019-20 on the basis of a 50 : 50 matched funding arrangement. Those areas which decide not to continue with a V1P service are expected to fulfil their statutory duties and provide services and support to meet the needs of veterans.

The Scottish Government is supportive of the research Citizens Advice Scotland and Ofcom are doing in relation to this issue. I am also reassured to note that the UK Consumer Protection Partnership, which is chaired by the UK Government’s Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, has agreed work to review existing evidence on parcel delivery surcharging as this is an important strand of work. This is being done with a view to coordinated action by partners to address any consumer detriment, as appropriate and I can reassure you that, for our part, we will seek to ensure that UK Ministers deliver much needed fairness in cases where the regime of charges is discriminatory against communities in Scotland, as we firmly believe that examples of unfairness will emerge from this analysis.

The projects in development, other than those already in construction, which will be taken forward by hub North Scotland Limited are:

Lossiemouth Learning Centre, Inverurie Community Campus, Alness Community Campus, Linkwood Primary School (Elgin), St Brendans Community Health (Barra), Isle of Skye Community Health and Badenoch and Strathspey Community Health (Aviemore).

The hub programme supports a long-term planning approach to identify the building needs of the participants in each territory, including the North Territory, to support the delivery of improved community services.

hub North Scotland has a contractual key performance indicator to monitor spend on projects with SMEs, which is achieved through monitoring the value of work packages placed with tier 2 sub-contractors.

For the Elgin High School project, there were 65 Tier 2 work packages valued at £23.22 million. Of the Tier 2 Subcontracts, local sub-contractors (from Moray, Aberdeenshire and Highland) were given the opportunity to bid for 40 work packages worth £19 million, with 18 of those Tier 2 Subcontracts being awarded to local subcontractors, with a total value of £12 million.

In addition, it is understood that some of the Tier 2 sub-contractors have sub-contracted with local Tier 3 and 4 sub-contractors and suppliers but we do not hold further details on that breakdown.

Local Energy Scotland who deliver our Community and Renewable Energy Scheme (CARES) maintain a voluntary register of community benefits payments. All developers of renewable energy developments and local communities in receipt of community benefit payments are encouraged to use the register. The following information is recorded: Name of Developers, Name of Development, Location, Capacity and Details of the Community Benefit Package. The Register can be viewed at http://www.localenergyscotland.org/view-the-register/