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The Scottish Government has regular ongoing engagement with local authorities and Regional Transport Partnerships (RTPs) through a range of fora, including the Association of Transport Coordinating Officers (ATCO), RTP lead officer and chairs meetings and the Bus Stakeholder Group.

Local authorities work together on bus services informally and through formal channels such as ATCO and their RTP's.

The RTPs work together and with key stakeholders in the bus industry on issues of mutual interest. In particular, these RTPs with public transport responsibilities share good practice, for example, in the procurement of bus services; and the RTPs played a key role in the development of smart, multi-operator ticketing in Aberdeen (Grasshopper), Dundee (ABC), Strathclyde (Zone-card) and Sestran (One-ticket).

Our inspection regime is designed to ensure that the trunk road network is safe for use and fit for purpose and to provide the data required to support asset maintenance planning. The regime is set out in the Road Asset Management Plan for Scottish Trunk Roads which can be accessed at: http://www.transport.gov.scot/road/maintenance/road-asset-management-plan

We commission annual machine-based road condition surveys to ensure that we achieve best value from our structural maintenance programme. Deflectograph surveys provide an indication of road structural strength to estimate remaining useful life; Scanner surveys provide an assessment of current surface condition and SCRIM surveys provide a measure of wet skidding resistance.

Also, in accordance with their contractual requirements, our trunk road operating companies are required to carry out safety inspections, safety patrols, night time survey patrols, detailed inspections and condition surveys. Our operating company contracts can be accessed at: http://www.transport.gov.scot/road/maintenance/operating-companies .

Total expenditure on transport infrastructure, as reported within The National Transport Statistics 2015 edition and within the Transport Scotland Annual Report and Accounts, totals £18billion since 2007. The totals for each year are shown in the following table. A breakdown of transport infrastructure expenditure by local authority area is not available.

Source: Years 2007-08-2014-15 = Scottish National Statistics 2015 edition, Years 2015-16 and 2016-17 = Transport Scotland Annual Report and Accounts 2015-16 and published Scottish Budget.

Whilst total expenditure on transport infrastructure, as reported above, totals £18 billion since 2007 to date, a breakdown by local authority area is not possible. This is in part because some investments are of a national nature (Forth Replacement Crossing) and others span a number of local authority areas, such as the M80, the M74 and the M77 construction projects.

The National Out-of-Hours Review Report, Pulling together, was published in November 2015. As part of the implementation of the Review, we are currently considering bids from Health and Social Care Partnerships that explore all aspects of the Review’s recommendations.

We expect NHS boards and Health and Social Care Partnerships (HSCPs) to use the recommendations in the Review to inform local planning. However, since the integration of health and social care in April 2016, it is the responsibility of HSCPs to coordinate health and care services, commissioning NHS boards and councils to deliver services in line with a local strategic plan to meet the needs of its population. Over time, this will lead to a change in how services are provided with a greater emphasis on preventative services and allowing people to receive care and support in their home or local community rather than being admitted to hospital.

Additionally, our Strategic Framework for Action on Palliative and End of Life Care (SFA), which was published in December 2015, sets out our vision that by 2021 everyone who needs palliative and end of life care will have access to it. The SFA was informed by the recommendations in the Review and sets out a series of commitments to realise that ambition including supporting Healthcare Improvement Scotland in providing HSCPs with expertise on testing and implementing improvements in the identification and care co-ordination of those who can benefit from palliative and end of life care.

The National Out-of-Hours Review Report, Pulling together, was published in November 2015. As part of the implementation of the Review, we are currently considering bids from Health and Social Care Partnerships that explore all aspects of the Review’s recommendations including palliative care.

Sir Lewis Ritchie will be undertaking a further national engagement programme, building on the initial engagement programme to all board areas in Scotland, carried out as part of the original Primary Care Out of Hours Review process where he will discuss these bids in more detail.

This work has been carried out by existing members of staff as part of their normal duties. No-one is dedicated exclusively to this work and no additional staff have been employed or redeployed to take forward the work at this stage. In line with usual practice, the number of hours staff have spent on individual tasks has not been recorded.

The total cost of the transport summit was approximately £5,000.

An option for a more frequent weekday service between Dumfries and Carlisle formed part of the recent ScotRail Franchise tendering process.

As a result ScotRail are scheduled to introduce an enhanced timetable from December 2017.

Rail fares are set by franchisees on a commercial basis. For the majority of rail services between Dumfries and Galloway and the Central Belt, fares are set by ScotRail.

In the current franchise period, the Scottish Government has taken action to help keep ScotRail fares down: annual regulated ScotRail peak fares increases are capped at the level of the Retail Price Index (RPI) and off-peak regulated fares increases are capped at one per cent below RPI.

The regulation of fares on rail services from Glasgow to Lockerbie, operated by the InterCity West Coast franchise, is a matter for the UK Government.