Additional Assessment Findings

Where additional actions that are the responsibility of the Scottish Government, but only as a facilitator or convener, have been identified in other themes, details have been provided of how existing IAs for parent policies may cover such actions.

ICIA

Theme 4: Climate action 9 of NTS 2 states: “We will support households and businesses to make the switch to zero emission vehicles (national policy).” Analysis of CA9 in the ICIA states that island communities may be restricted by a lack of charging infrastructure and that due to grid connection costs, installation costs of charging stations on the islands can be significantly higher than that on the mainland. However, it concludes that the policy will not have a significant impact on transport challenges experienced by the islands, their economic prosperity, nor their unique social challenges, island infrastructure or natural environment and biodiversity.

Theme three and four of the Vision, broken down in the draft Implementation Plan, consider the wider costs of delivering an affordable public charging EV network and the use of green energy. The Scottish Government will facilitate conversations to ensure that charge point operators continue to harness Scotland’s renewable energy through supply agreements and maximising local generation where possible as well as encouraging continued dialogue between energy suppliers and transporters to forecast and provide for energy requirements. 

BRIA

This section is included to reflect the BRIAs undertaken for the various parent policy impact assessments, where there is a link to Vision themes one to four as explained previously. A BRIA looks at costs, benefits and risks of any proposed primary or secondary legislation and also voluntary regulation, codes of practice, guidance, or policy changes that may have an impact on the public, private or third sector.

The National Transport Strategy 2 Delivery Plan details actions which may in the future lead to change in existing policy, regulation or legislation. It sets out the BRIA questions for assessment of impacts and risks which NTS2 could have on business, local authorities and regulators. Strategic policy impact and risks related to these organisations are addressed in the NTS2 Delivery Plan BRIA, under Reduces inequalities (RI)1,3,4 and 5, Climate Action (CA) 1,2,3,6,10,11 and 12 and Economic Growth (EG) 10 and 11 Monitoring and review.

The consideration of all impacts for each assessment must be an ongoing and proactive effort throughout the refining process of the Implementation Plan. The monitoring and evaluation framework which will be developed upon finalisation of the plan should ensure that the actions taken by the Scottish Government promote positive impacts and establish mitigations, wherever possible, to any negative impacts that have been identified, where they fall within the Scottish Government’s remit. Where actions are the responsibility of other stakeholders, the Scottish Government will continue to monitor delivery with a view to developing appropriate policy interventions should they become necessary.