Conference voices its concern and dissatisfaction with the current state of public transport within Scotland.
Conference notes the disappointing performance of Abellio ScotRail, which has continually failed to see real improvement in recent years. Conference acknowledges that Abellio have been warned in January 2019 that significant change is required to service and standards within ScotRail.
Conference further notes growing discontent within other areas of public transport, such as buses. Conference acknowledges with dismay the performance of several private operators such as McGill’s and that the cuts to number of bus routes, increased fare rises which have disproportionately affected young people and expresses concern that this trend extends to other service operators in other parts of Scotland.
Conference welcomes the growing public and political pressure for a degree of nationalisation of public transport within Scotland acknowledging, however, that power to affect such change remains reserved to the UK Parliament. Conference calls on legislative action to be taken to devolve the necessary powers to the Scottish Parliament to enact such changes, should they be determined to be feasible.
On the basis of devolution of these powers, Conference therefore invites the Scottish Government to consider investigating the feasibility of a publicly owned Scottish National Transport Authority to operate and regulate public transport within Scotland.
Conference additionally calls on active travel to play a greater role in Scottish transport strategy as part of the remit of the Scottish National Transport Authority as one of the best ways for addressing pollution, inequality and poor health.