Ministerial car costs over last 5 years: FOI release

Information requested

1. How much money has been spent overall on the ministerial car service over the last five years with a breakdown by year and what the money was spent on?
2. Full list of ministerial vehicles currently used, including how often they have been used over the last two years.
3. How much money is spent on average per every ministerial trip undertaken?
4. How much money was spent on the ministerial car service on March 23 and March 24 2023 ferrying ministers about? If it can be broken down per day, that would be great?
5. All correspondence between the Scottish Government and outside bodies, including between government officials, regarding the use of the ministerial car service on March 23 to take government ministers home from the Ghillie Dhu in Edinburgh?

Response

In response to your question 1

1. How much money has been spent overall on the ministerial car service over the last five years with a breakdown by year and what the money was spent on?

Full operating costs for the Government Car Service for the last five years are provided in the table below.

Year	Fuel (£)	Vehicle Maintenance (£)	Staffing (£)	Private Hire (£)	Travel and subsistence (£)	Total (£)
2018 / 19	101,360	63,203	862,522	286,216	9,830	1,323,131
2019 / 20	80,812	39,313	940,611	274,441	9,800	1,344,978
2020 / 21	26,760	19,886	833,773	22,016	567	903,002
2021 / 22	47,457	24,632	884,769	86,732	1,377	1,044,967
2022 / 23	99,204	43,897	1,065,133	162,485	7,268	1,377,987

In response to your question 2

2. Full list of ministerial vehicles currently used, including how often they have been used over the last two years.

The list of current vehicles used are as follows:

Make and model	Fuel type	Number on fleet
Kia EV6	Electric	3
Kia E-Niro	Electric	1
Kia Optima	Plug-in hybrid electric	8
Tesla Model 3	Electric	10
Volvo S90	Plug-in hybrid electric	1
Volvo V90	Plug-in hybrid electric	8

We do not hold information on how often they have been used over the last 2 years.

This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.

In response to your question 3.

3. How much money is spent on average per every ministerial trip undertaken?

GCS vehicles are operated as a shared resource and often cover multiple journeys each day, therefore we do not record journey costs.

This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.

In response to your questions 4 and 5.

4. How much money was spent on the ministerial car service on March 23 and March 24 2023 ferrying ministers about? If it can be broken down per day, that would be great?

5. All correspondence between the Scottish Government and outside bodies, including between government officials, regarding the use of the ministerial car service on March 23 to take government ministers home from the Ghillie Dhu in Edinburgh?

The Scottish Government does not have the information you have asked for.

This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.

About FOI

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.