Subsidies and support to Serco Northlink: FOI release

FOI reference: FOI/18/02994  
Date received: 18 October 2018  
Date responded: 26 October 2018

 

 

Details of the subsidies and other support given to Serco Northlink for the transport of:

 

1. people

 

2. livestock on the Aberdeen-Kirkwall ferry and the Stromness -Scrabster ferry crossings for the years 2016,2017 and any agreements in place for 2018.

 

 

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance the Scottish Government does not hold the specific information you have requested, split by the transport of people and livestock on both the Aberdeen to Kirkwall and the Stromness to Scrabster routes from 2016 onwards. The reasons why we don’t have the information are explained below. The Scottish Government does however hold overall financial information on the services provided by Serco NorthLink Ferries on the Northern Isles Ferry Service.

We can advise that all Scottish Government subsidies for ferry services supported by Transport Scotland are paid under Section 70 of the Transport (Scotland) Act 2001, and are in the public domain with the exception of the current financial year. Details can be found on the Transport Scotland website.

Transport Scotland also publishes expenditure over £25,000 on a monthly basis on their website and these monthly reports outline the grant payments made to Serco NorthLink Ferries for provision of the lifeline ferry service. Details can be found at the following link;
https://www.transport.gov.scot/about/expenditure/
Under section 25(1) of FOISA, we do not have to provide you with information if it is already reasonably accessible to you.

 

 

The Scottish Government does not have the information you have asked for because details of the subsidy for each individual route of the Northern Isles Ferry Service Public Service Contract is not held. This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.

 

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses