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The details requested of ScotRail’s fleet of trains are commercially sensitive, however information concerning the fleets can be requested via:-

Information Requests | ScotRail

The member may wish to note that the fleet end dates are contained within the ScotRail Grant Agreement (page 19) available via:-

ScotRail+Grant+Agreement+-+24+June+2022_Published.pdf (squarespace.com)

Through grant funding the Scottish Government has invested over £65 million since 2011 to support the installation of charge points operating on the ChargePlace Scotland network.

The total value of the contracts to operate the ‘back-office’ service to manage the network since its inception is £6,136,820.

The economic impact of the pilot removal of peak fares from the rail system will depend primarily on how rail and other demand responds to the change. As Scotland is leading the UK with such a measure, it is necessary to pilot the change in order to determine if a permanent change would represent value for money.

Analysis undertaken before the scheme was announced, based on historical data, suggested that there are sufficient grounds to explore the impacts through a pilot which will also allow operational impacts to be assessed.

Officials met with representatives from British Glass on 2 May to discuss the Deposit Return Scheme. Officials were clear in that meeting that Ministers strongly believe in the inclusion of glass in the DRS, due to the environmental and economic benefits this would bring and in line with the shared understanding across the UK at the time the Scottish regulations were approved. Officials will continue to engage with British Glass at appropriate times in the future, in line with wider stakeholder engagement.

The Scottish Government remains absolutely committed to improving the A96 and the current plan is to fully dual the route. We continue to push forward the transparent evidence-based review of the corridor that is currently being undertaken with outcomes from this expected to be ready for consultation this summer.

Scotland’s Deposit Return Scheme has been based on successful schemes across Europe. The Minister has been thoroughly briefed by Zero Waste Scotland on relevant research findings throughout the policy’s development.

As stated in question S6W-18000 on 31 May 2023 research was undertaken by Zero Waste Scotland, who designed the scheme, and met with a range of international scheme administrators and operators, many of whom had schemes that include glass, such as Estonia, Lithuania, Germany, Iceland, Denmark and Finland.

This research and briefing has meant that the minister has been fully appraised of the main characteristics of schemes across Europe and has not therefore personally travelled to the countries listed.

All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

By the end of May 2023, there were 67,615 cardholders under the Young Persons’ Free Bus Travel Scheme in Glasgow. This represents 67% of the estimated eligible population in the local authority area.

Cardholder data is supplied by the National Entitlement Card Programme Office (NECPO) and is provided by local authority. As such, data is not available by constituency area. The figure includes travel products collected from the Transport Scot Pass Collect mobile app.

In March 2022, the Child Poverty Action Group reported that free bus travel can save a total of £3,000 in the lifetime cost of a child in Scotland, compared to those living in England.

I refer the member to my statement of 7 June 2023 which has been published on the Scottish Parliament website. The process for considering an exclusion for Scotland’s DRS from the Internal Market Act led to the unilateral UK Government decision on 26 May not to agree a full exclusion by removing glass and imposing uncertain conditions on interoperability. This decision left the Scottish Government with no other option than to delay launch until October 2025 at the earliest, according to UK Government aspirations for their scheme. We regularly publish information and will consider any updated publication in light of these further substantive developments. UK Government has not challenged the accuracy of our published timeline.

Transport Scotland has not made a decision to privatise charge points on the ChargePlace Scotland network.

ChargePlace Scotland’s charging assets are owned by over 400 separate organisations across the public, private and third sectors and therefore are not all in public ownership. These organisations are responsible for procurement, maintenance and commercial decisions relating to their own charge point assets.

ChargePlace Scotland is a charge point management service paid for by the Scottish Government under a Framework Agreement to provide back-office, frontline call-handling and fault management functions on behalf of the charge point owners.

There were 17 new build or substantial refurbishment projects completed in the Glasgow Kelvin constituency between 2007-08 and 2021-22 relating to primary schools. None were reported for Secondary schools. Data is collected only for builds or refurbishments with a cost of £500,000 or more for primary and £1 million or more for secondary schools.