385s, reason for the delay, Hitachi, delays in the new Caledonian sleeper, reasons for the delay, CAF, the company that is manufacturing the new trains, and also the reason for the delay in the refurbishment of the high-speed trains, is Wabtec, the private sector company that is responsible for carrying out the refurbishment works as well. As much pressure as possible has been applied to these organisations to try and make progress. I am due to have a call with the global head of Wabtec to make it very clear in Japan that it is unacceptable that we are facing these delays, that it is having a marked impact on performance here in Scotland. I have also made it very clear to Sir Cole, who has got the Caledonian sleeper programme, that it has been unacceptable that new rolling stock has been delayed for the sleeper. Next week, I am having a call with the global head of Wabtec to make it clear that its failure to deliver the refurbishment programme and the timeline that it agreed to when it went into the contract is again unacceptable. It is having a direct impact on the quality of passenger services that can be delivered. As much as can be done to try and apply pressure to these companies who are responsible for carrying out the work, it is being applied. However, I accept that that has a direct impact. The lack of keeping to the timelines that it agreed to when it went into the contracts is having a direct impact on passenger services and the quality of passenger services that we expect passengers to receive. That is fine, but does that mean that there will be financial consequences for these companies and some sort of compensation coming back to the ScotRail or whoever is a result of that? In terms of the issue around the performance when it comes to ScotRail, which would be the attaches and the high-speed trains, there are penalty provisions in the franchise arrangement if they are not able to deliver on the commitments that are set out in the franchise arrangement. Some of that money, as you will be aware, has already been used and we circled into the rail infrastructure and rail services to try to improve those. We have already done that. In the contract with the Circle for the Sleeper Service, there are penalty provisions in that for their failure to be able to deliver on the commitments that are set out in it to provide a new role in the stock and time as well. The 365s that have been hired in to cover the gap, who is paying for them? Part of the money for that is coming from the penalties that have been applied to the franchise. Can you explain why Transport Scotland decided to make early contractual payments to Abilio? Part of the reason for that was because of the financial challenges that ScotRail Abilio was facing within the franchise as a result of a lack of growth in their patronage level, which was having a direct impact on their financial standing. That had largely come about as a result of a couple of significant issues. For example, the closure of the Queen Street tunnel had a direct impact. The delay in completing the Edinburgh to Glasgow improvement programme again had an impact on their ability to grow their service, and that had financial implications for them. The rebasing of it, the reprogramming of being able to draw down money earlier, was in recognition of that. Having said that, there is no additional cost to the taxpayer. That is simply drawing money forward at an earlier stage to meet some of the challenges that they face financially as a result of that lack of growth within their own intended projections when they were into the franchise, but it has got no additional cost to the taxpayer. Bill, can you say a wee bit more about some of the technical aspects about it? I have not got much to add to what you said, cabinet secretary, but I think it is just to say that this is using the provisions within the contract. At the time the contract is signed, there is a forecast revenue line that is included within the contract. It is the case that that revenue growth was held back by the delays to the electrification of the Edinburgh to Glasgow route and by the impact on the Queen Street tunnel closure, which was not known to the franchisee at the time of entering into the contract. We considered it appropriate to use the revenue support mechanism in the light of that change, but there is no increase in the total amount of money that is being paid by the Scottish Government to Scotland. Abelio will not be out of pocket because of the current delays, but it is fair that passengers will be out of pocket by facing yet another fair hike in January, at a time that performance is way below what everybody here believes is acceptable. Let me just be clear here in the point that came back to your last question. There is no additional cost to the taxpayer for drawing forward those early payments. There is no linkage to the idea of fair increases in January, which is a time when fair increases in the rail network across the whole of UK take place. It is not linked to the idea of drawing down some of the early payments from next year into this year. I think that we are very clear that we are saying that the payments are being paid in advance because of delays. Effectively, compensation, if you like, is being given to Abelio with advance payments because of delays, but nothing is being given to the passengers—the ones that you said, in fact, your phrase was, passengers deserve better. If passengers deserve better, why are we going ahead with those fair increases in January? I just want to emphasise this point that there is no additional cost to the taxpayer from drawing forward those early payments. They are drawing them forward into this year that they would have been taken to them in the next financial year, but when it comes to the next financial year, they will not be there because they have drawn forward into this financial year. There is no additional cost. I also want to emphasise that the fair increase is not related to that in any way. The fair increase is the RPI increase that takes place every year across the whole of the United Kingdom network. However, in Scotland, in recognition of that, we also cap that. For example, for those who are regulated of peak fairs, it is 1 per cent below RPI, and those peak fairs are RPI. That is the lowest increase for any part of the UK. It is actually one of the lowest fair increases since 2005 or 2007, over an extended period of time, possibly since we started to have responsibility for franchising the rail network in Scotland. However, I also recognise that any increase in fairs is unfortunate. However, it is also worth keeping in mind that two-thirds of the cost of rail in Scotland is met by the Scottish Government. When you compare that to that in England and Wales, that is significantly more, but it is only 50 per cent in England and Wales. We recognise that it is unfortunate, but we do our best to try to cap that. However, we also need to recognise the significant investment that the Scottish Government puts into rail by meaning two-thirds of the costs of rail in Scotland on an annual basis. However, you do not accept that, given how poor performance is, given the fact that performance is plummeting, you should not be reconsidering that fair increase. What I have said to you is about performance. It is not where it should be, but I also recognise that there is a course of action being taken to try to address these matters. As I have mentioned from the Donovan review through to the investments in your own stock, which has taken place, and additional infrastructure enhancements that have been carried out as well, all of which are about improving performance in moving forward. I am very clear about the need to make sure that they deliver on and improve performance, particularly as we move into the new timetable change that takes place this weekend, which will be completed in a year's time over the course of the next year. Cabinet Secretary, as you are aware, the Scottish Green Party supports the devolution of network rail, but it is not some magic get-out-of-jail card when it comes to accountability. I know that you are not necessarily presenting it as such, because what we are going to see is that we are going to see increasing episodes of extreme weather, which is going to contribute, so we will maybe come to that later. As a general principle, do you believe that any organisation that requires to rely on the goodwill of its staff to work on their days off has sufficient staff? I think that the reality would be that no, they do not if they are too dependent on it, which is why I welcome the fact that ScotRail is in the process of employing, I believe, in the region of around 140 extra staff, which will allow them to remove the need for rest-day working. We had Mr Hynes and his team in here, the Transport Scotland itself. It is quite cluttered, this system, of accountability. As in between the infrastructure, rolling stock, franchisees, etc. No, as between the franchisee Transport Scotland and the political accountability. Yes, it is in some ways, yes. I wonder if you have any plans to end the current ScotRail franchise when the first expiry date of 31 March 2022 comes around, given the current performance? No, not at the present time. Focus is on improving performance, particularly as we move into the timetable change that is taking place this weekend with the additional rolling stock that will come into place between now and May of next year, in improving how the franchise is working at the present time. What do you think the franchisee's attitude would have been if you had said, well, obviously we are giving consideration to that? Is it something that you are giving consideration to? With the worst performance figures in a long time, and I will not repeat them, because at the end of the day, customers are interested in percentage rates. They just want to know that the train turns up, and increasingly the train is not turning up or it is turning up late or it is arriving late. Let us take the scenario that we choose to end the contract early. We then get into a situation where we then have to put it back out for our franchisee to take over the contract, because we are legally obliged to do that. The challenges that the existing company that has the contract has will still be there. 60 per cent of the delays to the services that have been caused by Network Rail will still be there for the next part that comes in to take it over to deal with as well. They will not magic away by simply ending the contract. My view is that the existing structural arrangements in Rail do not meet the needs of passengers adequately. That is because of the way in which it is presently structured, both the infrastructure and the franchise arrangements. The focus has got to be on how we make the existing arrangements work to the best interests of the travelling public. That is about making sure that we are delivering the improvements that can make the changes that will help to improve passenger experience from rolling stock right through to major projects such as electrification programmes, which Network Rail needs to get much better at taking forward in terms of project management in particular. There are no plans to end the franchise on the basis that some of the challenges that existing franchise holders are facing will still be there, no matter who has the franchise. I am entirely right to say that, but that gets down to very raw politics. I do not intend to intrude in another question that I know is coming up, but it is comments like you have made that give the impression that, if you like, the Scottish Government has gone soft in the notion of having it publicly run exclusively in the interests of the Scottish public. No, we have not, and it is wrong to try and characterise it that way as well. It is a mishel perception, as far as I am concerned. You have just said that you are not going to consider that option of ending the franchise. Yes, because the structural arrangements that we would have in Rail would still be there if we ended existing franchise. We would have to put it back out for another franchise, and then we would have the same problems. Regardless of performance? Pardon? Regardless of performance? Regardless of performance? You will not consider ending the franchise. Just for the sake of ending the franchise? No, for the sake of making efforts to improve the performance. We hold the individuals in charge of that organisation accountable. The intern are accountable to you and Cabinet Secretary, you are accountable to the cast. I am not going to end a franchise purely on the basis of that that will be the answer to the challenges that we have around performance. Because so many of the challenges to the existing franchise are coming about as a result of areas that they do not have control over. What I do think that there is an opportunity is with the review of Rail, which has been carried out by Kenneth Williams, in looking at the existing structural arrangements for how rail is provided across the whole of the UK. To get a model that would deliver much more passenger-focused approach to how we deliver rail services in Scotland, which is accountable to this Parliament. That is what I am going to pursue, which then allows us to be in a position where we can address these performance issues more effectively for the travelling public in Scotland and to use a model that can better deliver that for the public as well. I think that a model may be suggested to you on future questions. The next question, then, is Jamie Greene. Thank you. Mr Finnie has touched on it already. With regard to the public sector bid that the Scottish Government wants to pursue, can you answer the following two questions for me? How much does the Government estimate that the bid will cost itself? In terms of its modelling, if it is successful in that bid, how much would it cost to run the franchise in terms of the cost to the taxpayer? Do you mean that if it is a public sector company in your latter question, your second question? What I am saying is that the Scottish Government wants to put a public sector bid into that franchise tender. What is the cost of the bid and if it is successful, what would the cost be of running the service? We have secured the right for a public sector organisation to be able to bid for any franchise, which we have required to put out to franchise under the existing legislation as it stands at the present moment, which is out with the gift that is controlled by the UK Government and by the Department of Transport and the UK Government. A bid on average for a franchise, I understand, is in the region of around £10 million for putting forward a bid. What we would then have to do is, if there was any public sector body in Scotland looking to lodge such a bid or bodies, it could be more than one that chooses to make such a bid. A bid is that it would need to be provided with financial resource to support them in being able to make such a franchise bid. That is the first question. The cost to the taxpayer of a bid, regardless of whether you win it or not, will be £10 million. That seems to be the average industry cost for putting together a bid for a franchise. The more important question is if that bid was successful. What estimates have the Government undertaking as to the cost to the taxpayer of running a public the-own service? That is the real question here. The cost would actually be the cost of the actual franchise that they are taking on, the overall cost of that. I can give Bill Keith a specific figure. We pay in the last year £394 million to ScotRail, of which £260 million goes on to Network Rail in track access charges. The net cost is about £134 million. I have done my maths right. Yes, £134 million. The big number does a lot of pass through to Network Rail for the infrastructure costs, so the net subsidy currently is in the £134 million. £394 million is what is given to ScotRail per annum. Yes, right. That is £260 million, which then gets paid by them to Network Rail. I understand, but is that the cost of running the service that is the subsidy given to the operators is different from how much it costs to run the service? Indeed. The other source of funding for ScotRail is the fare box from the passenger. In the current system, a bellio or the operator of the service, so therefore there is a risk associated with their involvement and any cost liabilities from their part. If they were removed from the equation and instead of a bellio, that party becomes the public, a government body, a public body, I guess what I am asking is what would that risk potentially be, because tell me what the subsidy is is not the same as tell me how much it is going to cost. Sorry. Of course, whoever holds a franchise takes on the liabilities that goes with that and the risks that go with that. You are asking for a figure about what those risks would actually be. I do not know if we can give you a figure because they could be for a whole variety of different things at different times. So, for example, if it was about delays in terms of performance, that would then have an impact on any payments that the penalties that they had to pay as well, so it could be a whole variety of different things, but the risk is carried by those who hold the franchise. Indeed, but you do not know what that risk might be. In effect, you are spending £10 million to put a bid in for something that you have no idea how much it is going to cost to the public. No, no. My understanding is that the £10 million figure is around the cost to actually submit a bid, to put a bid together. You would not necessarily be successful. It could cost you £10 million and not be successful. There is a cost associated with the franchising process, which is inherent in the existing legislative process within the rail network in the whole of the UK. However, I cannot give you a figure on how some of those risks would crystallise and the basis of it is due to penalty payments, about poor performance, etc., because it depends on a whole range of different factors, but the risk is carried by those who actually have the franchise. The franchise is obviously going to be won by those who actually put forward the best bid and it is in the taxpayer's interest. £10 million seems like a lot of money to lose if you are not successful, especially if it is public money, I assure you dad. Can I move on then, in a scenario? The answer is to get rid of franchising.  I smile in his face having heard the cabinet secretary just say that, because, of course, that is the nub of the issue. The nub of the issue is franchising. Mr Greene, of course, would do well to… I mean, I know he wants to use the word risks, but, of course, the tremendous benefit that was accrued to the UK Treasury by the failure twice on private franchises of the east coast, generating £800 million profit. I wonder if that is a model that the Scottish Government is looking at. Of course, once again, it is back in public ownership. Interestingly, I had a meeting with the chair of LNER just yesterday to discuss how their performance was. It would be fair to say that he is not pleased with their performance at all, given where they are at. I think that their PPMs are down in 72 per cent just now, which is very poor.  The point that I am making about getting rid of franchises is that the problem that I have around this idea of just saying this franchise and doing another franchise is that a lot of inherent problems are still ingrained in the system. Until that is addressed and it is more public and travelling public focused, I do not think that we will overcome some of those particular challenges sufficiently. I am incredibly conscious now of time and the need for short questions and short answers. I am going to bring Jamie in briefly and then the next question will be John. Just to clarify, based on the supplementary that was asked, is it the Scottish Government's official position that you would abolish franchising on the real network? I am presently considering, as a result of the UK rail review that is being carried out, I think that that would be a more optimal model for delivering rail services in Scotland. That could include not having a system that requires franchising. Jamie, I am sorry, Jamie. I have said one question. Jamie, I am sorry, I am going to have to move on. I apologise, but I have to try and keep things moving along. John, a question from you. Thank you, convener. I will move to a completely different subject. We have plans for two ferries that are being built, understand at Ferguson's. Some of the committee have been to visit Ferguson's and we also had evidence from CMAAL. So there appear to be delays and there are alleged cost overruns. Can you say anything about what you can do about this? What your view of the situation is at the moment? Are there any potential penalties for either CMAAL or Ferguson Marine? Where are we with it? Obviously, there is a delay at the present moment. Ferguson's is still indicating the expect to deliver. The MV Glenn Sanox, summer 2019, with the second vessel, which I think is 802, to be by spring 2020. As it stands just now, you may be aware from the evidence that you heard that CMAAL is heavily engaged with Ferguson's around delay in the contract and the sort of completion of the ferries. They have staff working with Ferguson's to try and address some of those issues. We have also had someone appointed independently to assess the progress that Ferguson's is making regarding on these two ferries and is reporting directly to CMAAL on the matter and to Transport Scotland or directly to CMAAL. Is there reporting back into Scottish Government colleagues in the economy? So around the progress that they are making in these issues. There is delays, which is unfortunate because the two new vessels are critical to helping to provide greater resilience on the ferry network in Scotland, given the increasing demand that it is facing. In relation to the wider claim that Ferguson's has, those were a design and build fixed price contract that they entered into. Any change to that is a matter that would have to be negotiated and dealt with through any discussions about any additional costs that they have incurred and ultimately could end up in the courts. You are saying that it is design and build and we have not seen the contract, so I do not know what it says. Ferguson's, from what I understand, understood that it was to be that they would work jointly with CMAAL on the final design and build of the ferries. They claimed that, because they did not get enough information from CMAAL, they had to, for example, start building the ferries from the middle rather than from the stern, and that inevitably has cost extra money. They are certainly claiming an amount that we do not yet know, but I was quite taken aback to read the CMAAL accounts that we just got recently, which include the statement that we have reviewed all potential claims with the benefit of legal and expert advice and have concluded that there are no contingent liabilities to be noted in the accounts. Given the discussion that we had on the Aberdeen western peripheral route, where there is acceptance that there could well be a bit of extra cost on both sides, I am somewhat gobsmacked to have to say that CMAAL think that there are going to be no extra costs for those ferries. Look, their accounts have got to be returned and what they believe is true and accurate at that particular point. If there is no substantiated claim at that particular point, then they cannot report that they have one. You have used the term claim several times. Any claim is one that would have to be assessed, evidence-based and data to support it. Ultimately, if it cannot be resolved between CMAAL and Ferguson's directly, it may be a matter that will end up having to be resolved in another place, but at this stage there are claims and they have to be substantiated. I accept that, but my parallels with the Aberdeen road as well, where I thought that you were very balanced in your answers, that there could be claims and they will work their way through. By my understanding, that is the difference between a liability, which there is not at the moment, and a contingent liability, which is something that could arise given certain circumstances. For CMAAL to claim that there is not even a contingent liability, let alone a real liability, I find that somewhat surprising. Well, they would have to be able to substantiate that and how they have arrived at that position, and also any subsequent claim whether the information that they have provided was accurate at the time when they provided it within their accounts. Sorry, John, have you finished? Cabinet Secretary, I mean it would concern me that CMAAL are within your remit. Folks and Marine have not lodged accounts since 2015. There are no accounts for 2016 or 2017, which would perhaps be viewed by most people as very suspicious that a company has not lodged accounts for two years in arrears and a company's house could strike them off from being a company for doing that. If there were liabilities within their accounts or potential liabilities, there should be a balance between them, but we cannot check the accounts, so we have no way of verifying whether there is an outstanding claim. Does that not cause you concern, especially as the Government has left lent them £45 million? It is important that Ferguson Marine. I cannot be responsible for Ferguson Marine in what they do with their accounts. The taxpayers' money? Exactly. That is why any claim has to be substantiated. We have a company that has not lodged accounts. They are responsible for issuing their own accounts. I cannot make them issue their accounts, but any claim has to go through the proper due process to be substantiated, just in the same way that it would be for something like the AWPR. I absolutely understand that, but if I was dealing with a company where I had a contract with them for £97 million, I would have lent them £45 million on top of that, and they had not lodged accounts for two years. Let me tell you that I would be very worried, and I believe that you should be worried. John, do you want to come back on that? On that point, do you think that it is the case that the claim is so horrendous that, when they publish their accounts, that claim will be in the public domain? Ferguson Marine would have to explain that. Has the Government no responsibility or some kind of more direct control? The two sides—Seamall is also a separate legal entity. Is it the Government's position that we do not know where the fault is in all this, and we are taking Seamall's side, or we are taking Ferguson Marine's side, or neither side, or what is the Government's position? Our view is that Seamall and Ferguson Marine need to resolve any dispute that they have around any potential claims. As a process for that to be carried out, it is for them to engage in that process in order to resolve any outstanding claims that they have. If Seamall had to settle for a higher amount, the Government would automatically have to write that check. It would have to be substantiated, because I have absolutely no doubt that in Audit Scotland looking at it and the committee looking at it, you would want to be satisfied that the taxpayer's interests have been taken account of here. Jamie, a brief question, followed by— Sure.  You are talking about protecting the taxpayer's interests. It is not protecting the taxpayer's interests that those projects are going over budget in the first place, regardless of whose liability it is. Whether it is the ScotRail delayed carriages, it is Hattachi's fault, HST, it is Wabtex's fault, sleeper trains, it is the manufacturer's fault, the new ferries, it is the manufacturer's fault, or AWPR, it is the contractor's fault, it is always someone else's fault. At which point, cabinet secretary, do you take responsibility for any of this? It is their fault. You have just listed to me companies that are running over. What does that say about how you managed these projects? That is a good question. You might want to ask Hattachi. As I asked our global president just last week, Hattachi have failed to meet the several targets that they set for delivering carriages as well. You have been through them all. Let's not go through them all again. With all due respect, convener, he has put those specific allegations to me. Is it that Wabtex has failed time and time again to meet the targets that they were set as well? CAF has failed to meet the targets that were set for them when it came to delivering the new rolling stock for the sleeper. The contractors who have made a claim on what you call an AWPR, if they have a claim, they need to substantiate their claim. That is a claim that they have incurred because it entered into a contract, which was a fixed-cost contract that they went into with their eyes wide open. The responsibility lies with them. I am simply pointing that out, and they need to take responsibility for their failure to deliver on things that they went into contracts in the green that they would do. But Transport Scotland takes no responsibility at all for any of those failures? From some of the question, it would appear that the taxpayer should just accept the errors of private sector companies in failing to deliver on contracts that they enter into. Those are companies that go into those contracts with their eyes wide open. If they fail to deliver on it, that is their responsibility. What we then try to do is to make sure that any issues that arise of an impact on travelling public or use of roads is that we try to minimise that in progressed matters. However, what I am not prepared to do is accept responsibility for the failures of organisations in the private sector that I have not delivered on commitments that they gave. Cabinet Secretary, we are going to move on to the next question, which, briefly, Colin, is from you before we move on to John Finnie. Just on the issue of coming back to this ferry contract, there are two organisations involved, one of which is obviously publicly owned. Given that this is taxpayers' money, given that those are lifeline public services, what are the Government doing to show leadership and to bring people together to try to resolve the dispute instead of simply saying that it is for others to sort out? What are we doing? What is the Government doing to bring people together to sort this out? It would be fair to say that there have been a range of meetings taking place between the Scottish Government, CMAL and Ferguson's to try to find a resolution to some of the challenges that have been faced. Not just myself, I have been involved in that. The Cabinet Secretary for Finance has been involved in it as well, given that they have lead responsibility for the loan arrangements for Ferguson's marine. Alongside that, given the delay that there is going to be with the two vessels that they are constructing, we are also reviewing a resisting ferry plan to look at how that can be improved and enhanced. There is also a ferry action plan that has been taken forward at the present time to look at improving communications to the travelling public and how CalMac are dealing with some of the adverse weather incidents that they are experiencing. There is a range of work that has been taken to try to improve the arrangements with ferry services overall. At the same time, there is also work that has been undertaken internally in government between the different parties to try to get a resolution to some of those matters. My primary focus is to, from a transport perspective, to see those vessels completed as soon as possible so that they can get into the network to provide us with additional resilience in the network, given the challenges that we face at the present time. He brings in John on his question, which is an excellent question. Thank you, convener. Cabinet Secretary, can you provide an update on the review of ferry service procurement, please? We published our details of that last December, which set out that we have been engaging with the European Commission on this matter about the possibility of direct awards. The feedback from the commission has been that the threshold to offer direct awards is very high and very challenging. It will be a challenge for us to meet. Officials in the ferry division in Transport Scotland have been working on this and looking at it. They might say a bit more about the work that we are undertaking on this matter, but we have been engaging with the commission around possibly progressing this further, but it will be complex. Any decision in the matter would be when it would be taken around 2022, when the new contracts are due to be reconsidered. In the cabinet secretary said that it is pretty challenging, but we are continuing to pursue this. In the meantime, we are procuring another ferry service that is progressing satisfactorily with the new contract in place for autumn next year. Work is progressing, but the time scales are running the contract until 2024. A couple of years in advance of that, we need to make a future decision about the way forward, whether we can make direct awards as Government references or whether we need to continue to attend to the services. Thank you for that. I wonder to the extent that Techel and Altmark has been talked about. Of course, we could be in a situation in a few months' time where will that have any continuing relevancy if the UK was out with the European Union? I did say if, cabinet secretary. Presumably, that is a contingency that you have to look at, and it could be a game changer in respect of this particular issue. Who knows where we will be in that issue in the coming days and weeks, but clearly depending on what happens, it could have an impact on the matter, given that it is a state aid issue and that it is a matter that the commission has a clear interest in. We will have to factor that into our planning and thinking going forward, depending on what the outcome is. Rich, you are going to ask a very brief question. Just brief, coming near the budget, are you building in each year, are you looking at building in each year to replace ageing ferries? We have invested £1.4 billion in our ferries since 2007. We have added eight additional ferries to the network over that period of time. The two ferries that are in procurement at present time are in construction at present time and are critical to helping to provide us with greater resilience. What we will be looking at as part of the review of the ferry plan is to look at what other ferries we might have to look at replacing in the years ahead and how that will then fit into our programme of procurement work. Cabinet Secretary, as you know, we write to you extensively about this, and we look forward to a detailed response post 12 December, which I know you will be looking forward to producing. The next question is from Gail Ross. Cabinet Secretary, the Cycling Action Plan for Scotland published in January 2017 aimed for 10 per cent of everyday journeys to be made by bike by 2020, but there has only been a slight increase from 2.3 per cent in 2010 to 3.7 per cent in 2017. There are also variations from region to region. I think that 0.4 per cent is sterling up to 9.8 per cent in Edinburgh. Do you believe that this target is going to be reached and what are you doing to get us there? I think that it is going to be a challenge to reach the target now. A couple of key issues around increasing the number of people who are choosing to cycle. One is education and two is infrastructure. Doubling the active travel budget up to £80 million in the last year has allowed us to put additional investment into supporting infrastructure improvements, which I think can help to encourage people to engage more in active travel options, including that of cycling. Greater education provision. I have been very clear with my officials given the regional variations that you have mentioned. I am also conscious that there can be social variations that we are reaching into in our more deprived communities to ensure that they do not lose out on the opportunity to take an active travel option, including that of cycling. I want to look at how we can help to support planning around social housing provision that helps to deliver greater cycling infrastructure as part of its planning and design as it goes forward. We are hardwining it into our thinking and our planning when we are developing those types of programmes. We have been having discussions with the counterparts on the planning side within the Scottish Government on how that can help to be embedded into designs in the future. It is worth recording that we are seeing an increase in the number of people who are choosing to cycle for short distances, so that last couple of miles is on the increase. Having said that, it is around 4 per cent. It is the highest that has ever been, but it is still a way off what we want it to actually be. The summary would say that it is going to be challenging to reach that target, to be perfectly frank, but we have a number of things in the stream that can help to support us in continuing to move in the right direction. A significant increase in the active travel budget is one of the key factors that can help to deliver the infrastructure, which I think will be one of the most important elements to helping to support people to make a more active travel option. I was going to mention the deprivation issue, which I know featured quite heavily in the second and last edition of the Holyrood magazine, which I was quite interested to read and also your take on that. What about rural areas? Obviously, it can be very difficult, especially in the wintertime, to undertake any kind of long journey on a bicycle. What infrastructure can you provide in more rural areas, as opposed to the urban areas? It is a challenge. I do not know whether it would be heated gloves. There are lots of things that ministers can have an influence on, but the weather is not one of them. I know that as a transport secretary. For example, one of the things that I have introduced in Dundee is that the train station is the new cycling hub that I have created there, which is a heated facility for storing bikes and so on. I think that people can also store some of their kit possibly as well, which allows people to make that choice, even though the weather might not be that great. The following shot of tunnels for cyclists to use to keep them out of the elements is looking at endpoints of the locations where we could potentially create infrastructure that might make it more attractive for people to cycle. Knowing that, at the other end, you have got somewhere where you can dry your bike and you can dry your kit, some of that might be about employers providing those facilities as well to encourage their staff to be able to make those options. Beyond that, there will always be a challenge for anybody to cycle the elements very often and get the better of you one way or the other. If we could just move on to the next one. I am going to ask you a question on the letter that you wrote to the committee on the national transport strategy. It was to be out for consultation in early 2019 with a publication in summer 2019. What does officials have advised that those timescales are under review mean, except that you have kicked it into the long grass? No, it has not been kicked into the long grass because the strategy will be published by the end of next year. The reality is that we are facing significant challenges within Transport Scotland around resource management to meet some of our planning for Brexit, which has allowed us to look at reassigning staff into our unit. It is planning for the potential implications that Brexit could have, which means that we do not have the same resource to be able to deploy to some of the other areas of work that we would wish to move on with. That has resulted in us having to look at delaying some of the work that we would take forward over the national transport strategy. However, the intention is that the national transport strategy will be published by the end of next year. It should be said that there is already work on going around the NTS. We have already had engagement with a whole range of different stakeholders and organisations who have an interest in what the future shape of their transport strategy should be, because that will be for the next 20 to 30 years looking ahead. We intend to have a draft published in the spring of next year, which will allow for greater engagement with the completed strategy at the end of the year. Is reviewing it larger than the basis of having to look at reallocating staff to deal with Brexit issues? I am always nervous about seasons and when a season actually starts and ends because it seems to stretch itself. Could you give me a month when you think that the consultation will start on the national transport strategy? When the consultation will start, I would hope that we will be in a position by the end of me next year to be in a position where that can happen. Maureen Watt is the next question. Yes, cabinet secretary. We have been discussing the transport bill. We have been trying to reconcile the fact that bus patronage is continuing to decline, as it has been for decades. However, if we are going to meet our climate change targets and decarbonisation, we have to increase active travel and travel by public transport. How do you reconcile all that in order that we meet our climate change targets? Clearly transport is a big contributor to overall climate change figures. Active travel, by doubling the active travel budget, is a key part of which is to help to deliver more infrastructure, more programmes to encourage people to take active travel options and to look at how we can design some of our public realm in a way that encourages people to take an active travel option. Alongside that, the work that we are doing around decarbonisation, for example, setting our target for no longer people to find themselves in a position where they have to purchase a diesel or a petrol vehicle by 2032, which is eight years ahead of the UK Government targetness, to try to look at reducing the level of vehicles that contribute to our climate change challenge. Alongside the introduction of low-emission zones in our four big cities, to look at how we can improve air quality in those areas and to encourage people to look at more active travel options, but also greener travel when they are choosing to travel, whether it be electric vehicles or hybrid vehicles or low-emission vehicles. There is no single solution. It is a multitude of different things that we need to take forward from the active travel element to investing in public transport, to support people when making use of that and to help to support the transition to low-carbon vehicles and the introduction of low-emission zones and how that will help to support people in making more active travel choices and improve vehicles, which will cause less pollution. One of the things that we have learned is that bus operators say that people will not go on the bus because they can get stuck in traffic like everyone else. Is there anything that you can do to help local authorities to introduce more bus lanes, for example? We had some of this discussion when I was here giving evidence on the transport bill. Part of the success of the introduction of low-emission zones will be around other actions that local authorities can take to help to give greater bus prioritisation. I heard that the average speed of a busking through somewhere like Glasgow is 3mph, so if you can get that up to 6mph, you can increase the journey time much better or decrease the journey time for passengers and give it much greater reliability. The PILs are there for councils to take forward bus prioritisation and the introduction of low-emission zones is one of the measures that can help to support that and help to add to that, because greater reliability around the time that it will be taken and journeys is one of the key things that can help to encourage people to choose to use the bus. I will bring in John, because I am conscious that I should have brought you in earlier. Sorry, John. That is okay, thank you, convener. We are told in our papers here, cabinet secretary, that the national transport Scotland is a transport strategy as the Scottish Government's long-term vision. I would like to quote from Transport Scotland's recently published Transport Forecasts, because it is quite a bleak vision. Just half a dozen statistics, if I may, and an increase—this is on the baseline of 2014—by 2037, an increase of 25 per cent in person trips by car, 44 per cent increase in goods vehicle trips, 37 per cent increase in vehicle miles, and then, no surprise, that increases journey times, it will add to congestion, and the very damning prediction that is continuing to decline in urban bus passengers of 7 per cent. What feature is the trying to get finances dealing with these individually? The idea that just by changing the fuel itself is going to be sufficient and having low emissions zone is going to be sufficient, that is not going to tackle the issues of congestion that Morian alluded to there. Similarly, more goods being conveyed by road, is it not time to change the approach? The answer that I repeatedly get when I raise the issue of the carriage of freight by rail, that this is a commercial private sector matter not to do with the Government, surely is absolutely essential. If we have that damning figure, a 44 per cent increase in goods vehicles trips, then we should be looking at better ways of conveying that. In terms of freight, it is not just a matter that is a commercial decision. In Scottish Government, we provide funding to help to support freight programmes. For example, the work that has been carried out in Blackford and just outside Gumblain will allow us to get a freight link into, I am just giving it a practical example, a freight link into Highland Spring, which will have a massive impact. The number of vehicles that they use for carrying their products to market, we are putting investment into that to help to facilitate it. I do not want you to think that I am of the view that it is purely a commercial view. No, the Government has got a role to play in helping to support and promote it, and that is a practical example of that happening. There is also the issue about companies making the choice to use freight on rail rather than by road. That might be a commercial decision, but it is a commercial decision that can be heavily influenced by Government. For instance, Government should not be providing money significant sums of money to, for instance, an industrial venture that is beside a rail track and does not make it a condition that at least there is consideration of carriage of goods by rail. That is a fair point that you raise, but there is always a need as well for commercial operators and companies to choose to want to look at utilising rail freight for the distribution of their goods. For example, when we had the whisky train a number of years ago, I remember reading a report on that, which was heavily supported by Government at the time, the challenge was actually getting the companies to make use of it as opposed to using road as well. The challenges that we had, for example, in using the ferry link into Ebrugge, the challenge was getting road users to move into using the sea link, as opposed to travelling down through England to the ports in the south-east of England to cross into mainland Europe. There are challenges around that, but I do not, for a minute, want you to think that we do not have an interest in trying to encourage greater use of rail freight. We are specifically taking forward some action to try and help to support and encourage more of that. Prestwick airport and taxpayers' money Over the last five financial years, the Scottish Government has loaned Prestwick airport £40 million. The figures that we have for operating profit and loss accounts for the last nine years of the company show annual losses each and every year and operating losses cumulative loss of £57 million. My question is whether you must have looked at this and thought when are we ever going to get our taxpayers' money back? Have you any idea? As it stands just now, Prestwick airport, which is a major piece of national infrastructure, is extremely important to the Ayrshire economy, given the businesses that are associated with Prestwick airport. It is in the region of about £38.5 million from the Scottish Government today. It is able to draw down in this financial year just under £8 million for its continuing work. I recently met the chief executive and the chair of Prestwick airport, who have assured me that they are pursuing every possible avenue to reduce their cost base and to increase their revenue. They also engage with interested parties who may have an interest in taking over Prestwick as a commercial concern. It is a very challenging environment in the aviation sector, with overcapacity. The recent impact on fuel prices has had on an airline like Flybee. It will remain very challenging to get more passenger flights in there. However, the wider industries that are supported by Prestwick are extremely important to the Ayrshire economy, which is why the Scottish Government stepped in at the time to take on ownership of it. What we will continue to do is to see where there are private sector interested parties in taking on responsibility or to take over responsibility for Prestwick going forward. They have a cost to the taxpayer, but I also recognise the value that it has to the local economy, which cannot be underestimated. We are giving another loan to the company—this is financial year, are we? It is a loan that is available to them to draw down up to about £7.9 million. From the discussions that I have had with the chair and the chief executive, in this financial year, they feel that they have made more progress in reducing their cost base and also increasing their revenue into the business. If you look at the last nine years' operating losses, they are very similar. The last year, if we have figures, is £6.4 million, previous year £6.5 million, previous year £6 million, previous year £5 million. Right back to 2008, £5 million. It is pretty standard stuff, and there does not seem going on the past record much prospect of the Scottish taxpayer ever getting their money back. Are you confident that we will actually get any money back? Well, keep in mind that those loans are provided on the basis of their commercial loans. They are at commercial rates as well. Any party that was coming in to look at taking ownership of or to purchase press week, they would all feature as part of any negotiations, given that those are cost loans that are linked to press week directly itself. When you ask me directly a question and we are going to get that money back, I wish I could give you a very clear answer on it, but I cannot at the present time because it is dependent upon whether there is another party that wants to come in and take ownership of press week, and it would then be dependent upon what was in those negotiations going forward. I just want to make the point that the reason that the Government has stepped in and makes those loans available to press week is because of the critical nature that the airport has to the wider industry that is supported by press week airport. In the two and a half years that have been on this committee looking at this issue, those are the responses from previous ministers and in fact from the company, and yet we do not see any evidence of any new operators at the airport. There is one schedule airline, Ryanair, two schedule freight customers, Cargo Lux and Air France. Is there any real prospect of getting any more people to use this airport? I think that in aviation sector, particularly passenger side schedule flights will remain very challenging. We can see with Ryanair moving from a significant number of flights from Glasgow to Edinburgh just the way the change is going on, so that is always going to be challenging. There are bespoke services that press week provides, which is unique not just in Scotland but in the UK and to some extent in Europe, which is why it still attracts some of the services that it does provide, particularly around unusual freight. I am told that the abnormal types of freight that they can cope with, which other airports do not deal with because of the equipment infrastructure that they have. Of course, they operate at arm's length to the Government for state aid purposes, but I got a clear impression from the chair and chief executive last week that they are in a position where they believe that they are making progress on reducing their cost base and increasing their revenue by trying to pursue some of the bespoke services that they offer more effectively. They hope to make better progress with that in this financial year. On the issue of another buyer or operator, you appreciate that that is not going to be in the public domain for commercially sensitive reasons, but the opportunity remains there for other operators to come in and look at purchasing the airport if they wish to do so. There are a list of questions. To each person who wants to ask a question, you will get to ask one question, and I would really ask the Cabinet Secretary to keep your answers as brief as possible. Starting off, Colin. Thanks, convener. Last week, the First Minister said that all Government agencies should pay the living wage. Given that the press with the airport is owned by the Government, do you think that it is acceptable that they still do not pay the living wage? In what representations have you made to them to ensure that they do start to pay the living wage? Which one do you want me to answer then? Can I ask you, cabinet secretary, to answer them both briefly, but can I say to other members that if you ask two questions, I will pick one for them to answer? Yes, I do, and I understand from press week that they are making progress to ensure that their employees are covered by the living wage. It was suggested that one option is that if the passengers are losing a lot of money, but the freight and other things are making money, we could drop the passengers altogether and carry on as a freight-only or special airport. Is that an option? Not at the present moment. The freight is a specialist service that they offer, but to lose their passenger services at the present time would be a loss of revenue for them, which they would not want to undertake. I do not think that that is set out in the business plan that has been set forward by press week, which is a five-year business plan that is already working on. I am not convinced that the passenger business is actually profit making, but maybe we can check that in terms of the numbers. Just in terms of the potential sale, do you think that coming with a price tag of all that historic debt that the Government has loaned to the business is making it an appealing sale to potential private investors? At which point—and it is a single question—has the Government considered drawing a line under those loans, or is it still seeking to get back as much as it can? You seem to be keen for me to give a lot of money to private sector companies. I am not going to get into a negotiation around what would be on the table or off the table with any particular dealer for press week. It would be completely inappropriate. I have a very simple question. Based on the fact that £40 million has been learned to press week airport, can you confirm whether evaluation of the assets of press week airport by an independent value has given a value in excess of £40 million? Is there details of that? That is part of the work that is going on at the present time. Sorry. So it is part of the work that is being carried out at the present time? So when it is available, will you be able to answer that question? Yes. So that was two questions. I chastise myself for that. Stuart Stevenson, the last question. Thank you very much. We have touched on greenhouse gas emissions. We are seeing it going up in transport. I will maybe just ask a very tightly focused question with the transfer of many train services from diesel to electricity. Clearly, that is an opportunity to reduce emissions. Given that Network Rail is the biggest purchaser of electricity anywhere in the UK, I believe, would it be possible to persuade them to transfer their electricity contract to a renewable electricity-only contract and, thus, reduce the figures in what is the significant area of rising carbon emissions? That is a very reasonable point. I know that ScotRail has made significant progress in reducing its own carbon footprint, if you want to put it that way. If Network Rail could make a contribution to that as well, that would be the right thing to do. I thank you, cabinet secretary. That has been a long session. I would normally suspend the meeting to allow you to depart, but I am going to ask if you could depart quietly so that I can continue the meeting so that I do not lose committee members at the same time. I will move on to agenda item 4, which is the European Union Withdrawal Act notifications. There are, in fact, seven in relation to UK SIs as detailed on the agenda. Those cover genetically modified organisms, common agricultural policy and animal health. All the instruments are being laid in the UK Parliament in relation to the European Union Withdrawal Act. All seven have been categorised by the Scottish Government in general as category A, making minor or technical amendments. Two of the proposed SIs on common agricultural policy could also be considered as category B, to the extent that the transition from an EU to a UK framework would be a major significant development. I would ask if any members of the committee have any comments on this. I am going to go with John First and Lenster. I have no issue, but I will be supporting. I would particularly like to comment the genetic modification SIVMA and the question about whether the laws that it stands go far enough to protect Scotland from GM crops and products. The basis for that is the statement by Michael Gove. If I quote a headline from the times recently, Michael Gove pledges genetic food revolution. A suggestion that Mr Gove may plan to overrule an EU high court decision from the summer, which classed gene editing as genetic modification. We could end up in a position where we normally have a ban or very tight controls on GM, but the definition of what GM is is very narrow and may mean that, essentially, GM procedures are allowed. Is there a joint process for deciding the definition of GM and GM processes in the future, or understanding whether that would be a matter that would be simply left to the UK Government to define? That would be uncertain if it were. Thank you for that. Just very briefly, convener, you point out that some of the measures might be category B, and I just ask that the Government do notify us if in their view it has moved from A to B, so that we can give any necessary further consideration. I think that that is a good point. I do not think that they will be viewed as that in due course, but I think that it would be from what I have heard unless anyone else has anyone else got anything to add. From what I have heard, providing we add the questions that Mr Finney has asked to the questions, I think that we should, probably as a committee, confirm its content for the consent to the UKSI's referred to the notifications and note or request a response from the Scottish Government on the wider policy matters that have been indicated in the papers and the point that John Youve raised. Are we agreed to do that? That is agreed, and that concludes this part of the meeting. We will now move briefly into private session.


Coming up on DTNS the Libra Association insists. It's still viable Apple TV comes to Roku You heard that right and Google announces the Pixel 4 and more This is the Daily Tech news for Tuesday October 15th 2019 in Los Angeles. I'm Tom Merritt And oh my god, there's no studio feline in the lovely illuminated Paris. I'm Patrick Beja And I'm Roger Chang the show's producer. Yes, Sarah out sick today, but we apologize for that But we have been having a great time on good day internet Patrick has been evaluating my French We talked a lot about fortnight and how epic got away with what they got away with This weekend. We'll tell you a tiny bit about that here in a second But if you want that full expanded discussion, you got to check out good day internet at patreon.com slash DTNS All right, let's start with a few tech things you should know AMC theaters launched an on-demand video store in the United States AMC theaters on demand It'll make 2,000 films from major US studios available for purchase or rental AMC stubs members That's their loyalty program who use their first transaction to buy or rent a movie from Lionsgate or paramount pictures Can choose an additional three movies from a selection of that studio's films little promotion You can use AMC theaters on demand at AMC theaters comm the AMC theaters mobile app on a Roku and on some smart TVs With more services and devices to be added in the near future Welcome to 2008 after After taking the fortnight game down for a couple of days after an asteroid Destroyed the map in-game fortnight chapter 2 has launched it features as expected a new map and new skins as well as new ways to level Sony will launch its 360 reality audio technology later this year for Amazon music HD Deezer title and nugs net the format places elements of a music track around the listener in a virtual sphere kind of Surrounding them with sound Sony says about a thousand songs will be available at launch Including tracks from Pharrell Bob Dylan and Billy Joel with live performances from Charlie XCX and Codeline Amazon Echo studio will support 360 reality audio with other speakers requiring a Sony decoder And it also works with most headphones if you just want to plug it in that way All right, let's follow up on something that happened kind of at the end of last week after we finished DTNS Patrick Indeed late Friday Blizzard changed its position on punishing Hearthstone competitor named Blitzchung Blitzchung Chung He was oh, I'm sorry the text is confusing me For saying a Hong Kong protest movement slogan during a post game interview So he said something pro Hong Kong and then was punished for it Blitzchung's outright ban has been reduced to a six-month Suspension it was a one-month ban and he will a one-year ban that was turned into six months Suspension and he will now get to keep his prize money The two casters who interviewed him had their firings changed to six months suspensions as well President Blizzard president Jane that We Focused on the game and claim the specific views expressed were not at issue and relationships in China had no influence on the decision mixed reactions to To this change a lot of people and I think fairly so saying well, okay at least they they took a second look and and let Blitzchung keep his money Those are the positives out of it, but quite a few people also saying This is still not okay with them that they punished him at all for that Blizzard trying to walk the line of saying it's not because China told us to it's because we want the focus to be on the game And he was saying something that turned the focus away from the game Yeah, which is a difficult Claim to accept that the problem is the language I felt of the Communication didn't feel very genuine and I should add that I used to work for Blizzard work there for five years So keep that in mind but it didn't feel very genuine when sincerity was what was what was needed in that instance in my opinion and they made it sound like he was trying to tickle the boxes about corporate values and Defending those values in a situation which is clearly difficult for them. So it didn't feel very appropriate for the situation and the claim that China had nothing to do with it is Impossible to believe. Yeah, severity and the swiftness of the initial punishment Was so strong that even if it wasn't like they directly thought. Oh, do you think China would like it? I mean it it obviously influenced them so that or at least it it's difficult to believe it didn't that being said That being said, I think the current state of the punishment feels more Appropriate and if they had done that to begin with I think people would have had a lot less of a problem with it But of course, it's a Second try. I think the the way if you want to look at it with a little bit of genuine positivity Blitzchang will be able to compete in the next round of Grand Masters next year He might choose not to but if he does it will mean that with all of this focus and his pro Hong Kong stance He will still be competing in the competition next year and the visibility will be quite strong So I think in that sense I'm understanding it as a way to Split the difference and still giving him the opportunity to be visible, which is I'm guessing if they were to if they wanted to please China a hundred percent They might not have wanted this to happen, but well, there's so much going on here I mean Brack wrote I want to be clear our relationship in China had no influence on our decision BS, I'm sorry. I agree 100% just if he had said I want to be clear China does not get to decide what happens with with Blitzchang. I'd probably be okay. All right Yeah, I mean you have to take into account what's going on in China and your market and everything But you're the diss you're the one who makes the final decision Okay, fair but to try to get me to believe our relationships had no influence. This didn't happen this fast Without influence being felt may maybe Xi Jinping didn't pick up the phone and call Blizzard immediately and say, you know fire that guy But they didn't have to no one from the Chinese government had to reach out That's not how this works You know that that is going to get you in trouble and you do something to head off any repercussions Which is why Blizzard acted too fast in my opinion and this is Brack saying we acted too fast He doesn't say because we were scared Yeah, which is what I think and and that's why they overreacted and punished him too harshly and now they're trying to dial it back But I you know, yeah, you can we had one of the DTNs listeners point out that you know There's things like Colin Kaepernick in the US where speaking out has has gotten him sort of shadow banned from the NFL but even that was not as quick and as very much related to exactly what was happening as this and And I think that has everything to do with the fact that it was about China and because It's such a hot button issue Everyone knows China is intolerant of any kind of expression of support of Hong Kong the NBA thing had already happened at that point and so They they were extra sensitive to it and of course they reacted because of it it might be that the Asian team was the one that made the decision and that global team is the one Then even then you can't claim It had nothing to do with it. That's no, I'm sorry All right last week privacy advocates warned that a note in iOS 13 mentioned that the safari browser uses Chinese company 10 cents Safe browsing system along with Google's safe browsing program in order to warn about malicious web pages Now both these systems may log IP addresses in the process Apple says that the safe browsing providers send a list to the safari browser which never shares the actual URL you visit with the safe browsing provider whether it's 10 cent or Google the list is only received from 10 cent on a phone If that phone's region code is set to mainland China Otherwise, it's from Google now Johns Hopkins cryptographer Matthew Green says that while Google uses hashes for you are all matching Sometimes safari may ask Google for more matching hashes Which could reveal the IP address to Google and Apple didn't say anything about the IP address So that part is true. It's unknown how 10 cent handles requests But it may do the same but it comes down to whether you believe Apple if Apple saying the thing I want to hear which is no we only use 10 cent in mainland China where we can't use Google and we only an outside of mainland China We use Google and if there's a problem with how the Google thing works great Let's talk about it But I think a lot of people were worried that oh, I guess safari is sending my browsing information to 10 cent and that's far from What's happening here? And that's been reported on I think rather poorly because of the frenzy probably around China and Apple When there are things that are genuinely concerning we should call them out It seems unlikely this is actually one of them and they've been using 10 cent as safe browsing in China for a while This just sort of came to light with the iOS 13 mention of it And I think it was taken out of context So on the one hand I have my opinions about the you know the Blizzard China relationship as you heard this I think is a red herring I don't think there's much going on here outside of the fact that you can't use a Google product in China And you may think that you know 10 cent could be doing something a farious with Chinese user stuff that that that's a Perfectly legitimate topic area for conversation But I that's not what a lot of the stories that I saw were trying to imply and I don't think there's any chance Again less apples flat out lying and somebody can catch them in the lie I it sounds like Apple is not using this outside of mainland China Right. I mean there are many things we can discuss about the relationship between Apple and China many of them problematic But let's yeah, let's let's keep things a little bit factual and in this case. Yeah, what you're about to say next sounds like It's not factual, but it is Roku announced That Apple is launching an Apple TV app for most Roku's starting Tuesday The Apple let users access purchased or rented TV shows and movies as well as programs from Apple TV channels like HBO and CBS all-access Apple TV plus original shows will be available through the Roku app starting November 1st For $4 and 99 cents a month Now this answers a big question for me Which was if they're using Apple TV plus as a loss leader on Phones by giving you a year free How are they expecting to make the money back if they're switching from being a devices revenue generating company to a services revenue Generating company. This is one of the things I would expect to see you're going to put Apple TV plus out there as something to bring in People from other platforms the way Apple music went to Android Apple TV plus apparently gonna go to Roku, which makes sense Roku is the set-top box maker that is most popular It is well fire TV is pretty popular too, but I'm guessing they couldn't get Amazon on board for that So so Roku seems like a logical choice here Yeah, and the granddaddy of these hell freezing over moments, which was literally the way it was described on stage was iTunes coming to Windows Yeah, right and that was also a move to get people hooked and to push the iPods and that Ecosystem and it worked out for Apple. So it's not that surprising. They're doing it again. No I was surprised. I didn't hear about it earlier I guess but it probably took some time to code test and get get the platform to agree and all that although With Roku, they're pretty open. So the platform agreeing was probably not a big deal there And also over the weekend visa Mastercard PayPal Stripe eBay booking holdings and Mercado Pago all Decided not to join the Libra Association citing various regulatory compliance concerns if you listen to Good Day internet on Friday You heard us reacting to the beginnings of the story breaking especially visa and Mastercard leaving the association Acknowledged that its plan for a June 2020 launch may be delayed because of regulatory hurdles, but 21 companies still remain. What's that? 21 Keep going don't pay attention to 21 companies still remain including one payment processor The Netherlands pay you those 21 members met Monday to ratify governing documents in Geneva, Switzerland and elect the Libra Association board we've talked about the Libra Association is existing But it's really only existed as a concept until now now they have Bylaws and they have a board of directors. So now they are in fact a legal association The five-member board includes Facebook's David Marcus as you might expect as well as representatives from Andreessen Horowitz Cryptocurrency company Zapo pay you the Netherlands payment company and micro lending nonprofit Kiva Former PayPal senior director of payments and engineering Bertrand Perez is a Libra Association member and was officially named COO and Interim managing director of the Association the Libra Association also claimed that 1500 organizations have expressed interest in joining and a hundred eighty of those meet criteria for membership But Patrick if you don't have visa Mastercard and PayPal on board I'm not saying Libra Association can't navigate the regulatory issues and can't launch But you need those companies back on board if you want to make this thing viable if you want to make them viable as a Having a bridge with the real world Yeah, it could still be viable for internet payments for lack of a better term And I'm pretty sure Facebook is gonna keep soldering on but yes, those are I mean it's incredible that all of those left at the same time and It chops off an entire part of Libra's use case use cases They might come back But certainly this is expressing lot of Cold fitness at the idea of Libra when a few months ago there was seemingly more enthusiasm Yeah, and this takes me from thinking Libra Association is a very well designed system with the right support And it should work if it's allowed to to thinking Libra Association has a very good chance of never becoming anything And one thing to note Andreessen Horowitz's representative has been suggesting instead of the basket of currencies Maybe they peg Libra to the dollar because that would make it more acceptable to regulatory systems But that takes away a lot of the viability of the model If they can get regulatory approval of this it is of course possible to visa Mastercard PayPal stripe Etc join back up later, which case this could could get restarted But having the regulatory resistance they have and now not having the bank type places the payment processors on board I think it looks unlikely to me Yeah, I wouldn't go that far, but it's certainly more of an uphill challenge and The I mean, yeah, we'll see we'll see Well folks, if you want to get all the tech headlines in about five minutes each day subscribe to daily tech headlines calm Let's get into those Google announcements Their announcement was very interesting very laid back a lot of talk about concepts Baratunde Thurston did some video snippets that they use to quite effect and then they just kind of like sprinkle in Details it wasn't the the typical like here's our product. Here's what it looks like. Here's the specs Here's the price and release state. It was very interesting talked a lot about ambient computing and being helpful For instance at the very beginning of the the keynote They just kind of threw out the Google stadia launches November 19th and the pixel will be the first phone to support it And yeah, you can get the founders edition for 130 dollars in pre-order or on launch November 19th I This is such a low-key way to announce the launch of a major product it confirms again to me that this is a beta and They don't want everyone rushing in and this is you know when you launch a service like this You want everyone to be talking about it? Doing it like that is not going to be conducive to a lot of press. They also had a couple of hardware announcements that are coming Down the line for instance pixel buds The wireless earbuds hands-free access long-range Bluetooth They wouldn't give us an actual range, but it sounds like it's just typical range of other Bluetooth three rooms or a football field Come with a hook that stabilize them in the ear and keep them almost flush So they don't hang out like a lot of them do especially the AirPods Volume dynamically adjust to ambient noise beam forming mics Help pick up your voice better They claim five hours of listening time on a charge 24 hours with the charging case not come until spring of 2020 for 179 bucks the Pixelbook go laptop however is available soon Has a magnesium case in black and pink also has a grippable wavy bottom 13 millimeters thick Ways two pounds with the claim 12-hour battery life and a quiet keyboard Intel Core m3 i5 or i7 processors 8 or 16 gigs ram 6428 and 256 solid-state drives you can get the black version for pre-order now with the pink coming soon and Each cost 649 dollars really affordable chromo s laptop here Yeah, I'm I'll go back to the pixel buds for just a second. It's kind of incredible how much The AirPods have influenced that well They have created this category and everyone including myself We're laughing at them when they first announced them But once we got our hands on the product We realized how well-designed they are and they've all danced around the design But in the end it seems every big company has a version of this which is very similar to that product So that's that's something that continues to impress me. It's rare nowadays that Apple's defined Apple defines a product category But they did there Yeah pixel book. I'm personally not a big chromo s user. So Okay. Yeah anyone Google also stressing that the nest is their home brand with a lot of nest announcements the nest mini Used to be a Google home mini now. It's called the nest mini This new one has a third mic so it picks up your voice better comes with a wall mount They've really improved the sound with software They have they say two times stronger bass, but everybody listened to it said yeah, it's got better bass It's got better sound Uses ultrasound to light up the controls when your hand is near which is kind of nifty because there's not physical buttons And also use that ultrasound to tune your audio to adapt to noise the nest mini available for pre-order for 49 bucks shipping October 22nd Google also announced a program to migrate works with nest devices to Google devices will need to pass a security review to migrate But that's good news if you were worried works with nest was just gonna get cut off Looks like there's a path forward for some devices anyway This will allow things like non-nest security systems to view and control your nest camera Or do things like have your lights flash red if the smoke alarm goes off That's part of home routines which launches early next year Nests can also hear breaking glass or barking dogs. Why you'd want it to hear barking dogs in my house I would they would just be going off all the time, but it can send you alert if you want It'll call the appropriate emergency dispatcher if you ask it to and the Google home app will now have a feed of what's happening with your home devices in it New nest aware whole home pricing you won't pay by device anymore one monthly rate for all your nest devices $6 per month with a 30-day event history and $12 a month for the 60-day event history and 10-day video history That's rolling out in early 2020 and the nest Wi-Fi router and Wi-Fi point Are the new mesh Wi-Fi products two times the speed and 25% better coverage than the previous Google Wi-Fi? One router and one point supposedly will cover about 85% of the homes in the US Settings are now in the Google home app They're kind of motion everything into Google home the router contains Bluetooth low energy and thread support So it can act as a smart home hub and the nest point the extender has Google assistant speaker and mic in it So it can act like a nest mini available for pre-order now shipping November 4th a two-pack Which is just the router and the and one point 269 bucks and a three-pack for 349 bucks at least clarity or some measure of it It's good that they are Kind of explaining to us what nest is and what Google is and All of those categories that have become very confusing I don't know how long that would last but for now I think that's a good thing Yeah This is the most focused that nest and Google home have felt in a while all all of these announcements felt like they were Bringing it together rather than causing more confusion for once So that's that's good. And then of course the star of the show the pixel 4 With the project solely radar motion sensing chip in it called motion sense Claims that that makes it the fastest face unlock because motion sense knows when you're moving towards Your phone to pick it up. You can also wave over it to change tracks Silence a call interact with games motion sense is processed on the phone And it's not shared with other services Google made a lot of effort to talk about privacy today The Titan M security chip and pixel phones will let you delete your Google assistant data by asking Google assistant Also Google assistant has an on-device language model So it doesn't have to go to the cloud for all your Google assistant requests Some can be done right there so it never gets shared with the cloud. No one else ever sees it Six gigabytes of RAM you can get 64 or 128 gigabytes of solid-state drive storage There's the 5.7 inch screen on the pixel 4 with a 2800 milliamp hour battery and a 6.3 inch screen on the pixel 4 XL with a 3700 milliamp hour battery couple of the other features they mentioned the recorder app can now Transcribe voice recordings in real time on the pixel 4 that let you search for things later and find parts of your recording That's all done on the device The OLED display has a 90 Hertz refresh rate that will adjust automatically by activity to try to preserve battery life You're also no longer getting Google photos as part of a pixel 4 purchase instead You get three months of Google 100 gigabyte storage a lot of people upset about that Let's talk about the camera It's a square on the back that uses computational photography 2x telephoto lens that's hybrid optical digital live HDR plus with some machine learning to approximate HDR plus in the viewfinder so that what you see is what you get Dual exposure controls while you're composing a shot brightness and shadow are the two controls some learning based white balancing in all photo modes now New portrait mode with computing depth from dual pixels and dual cameras So you can do farther back portraits and large objects They're working on fur and the night side brought an astrophotography mode so you can capture the moon or a moonlit landscape You can't do both at once yet But they said a software update is coming that might increase the dynamic range close enough to do it You can get the pixel 4 in black white or orange although they have you know funny Google names for those Pre-order starting at 799 dollars for the 4 899 dollars for the XL shipping October 24th on all major US carriers Now a few more things to notice before I let you give your impression Patrick no headphones included in the box You can't get the pixel buds yet, but there's no headphones in this box no adapter in the box You do get a hundred dollar Google store credit when you buy one so presumably you could buy some wired headphones But that seems annoying the motion sense chip uses a 60 gigahertz ISM band which is not allowed for commercial use in India So pixel 4 not coming to India and Google confirmed to the Verge that the pixel 4 will not support the daydream VR Platform and Google will no longer be selling the daydream view mobile headset A spokesperson told the Verge that usage has been declining and added asking people to put their phone in a headset and lose Access to the apps they use throughout the day causes immense friction So my read there is that Google is pivoting to create a standalone virtual reality headset All of the Oculus go and we may see that in the next year or two There's a lot in there, but I think the most interesting one is Solely or now they're motion. It's marketing one motion sense. There you go. I'm not sure What to think about it? It seems gimmicky and and this kind of thing has been tried before and hasn't really caught on but of course it might not have been as Polished as this could be. I think in the end, of course, we'll have hands-on and people will tell us and we will try Ourselves to see if it's good. I think it might still be gimmicky. I feel like it. It's two context specific and The uses the use cases will be Relatively limited. What do you agree with you? It feels like a thing that is gonna look cool when you show it off But is not yet to the point that you'll use it a lot And and I'm not saying it won't get there But this is this is the first gen Introducing the concept whether they'll start to find uses get more apps on board with it that that will be seen over the next year I think I mean just the the fact that Essentially the phone has to be not lying. It doesn't have to be lying flat But the only times when you're not having it in your hand is Going to be when it's lying flat and if you have it in one hand, I suspect you touch the screen You don't stop waving your hand around. I mean, I guess you could but it's not as a So that alone makes it a little bit if he on my on my for me Everything else seems great great updates to the pixel phone the photography Aspects are interesting but not incredible the you know, 90 Hertz all the display is pretty cool But again, not amazing Yeah, it's it's cool. It's a solid phone and it's priced appropriately. I think it's seven hundred forty nine dollars It's cheaper than most major flagship phones And it's a good solid phones. This is not going to win the war for the further for Google By any stretch, but it's going to keep them in the fight Indeed I Bought one. So I'll be letting you know how it goes once I get it how much project solid you use Yeah, yeah, exactly. 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Again, some of you guys are struggling, but I want to make sure this is simple. Two hands to the sock. Baseball bat, softball bat, golf club. Two hands to the sock. Some of you guys are like diving and hugging it. I need to control it. Chest to the heel. My chest can't be on the calf. There's a reason why I need my chest to the heel. So I'm controlling the sock. Chest to heel. I'm driving off my toes. I'm not just falling down. I'm shooting off my toes. That's why I got feet in the mat. I'm shoulder and hip, not shoulder and elbow. And it's super important that I bring my heel to my butt. And when I do, I flex my core. See how I twisted my body under the leg. It's not just me fall, and then pick the leg up. Because when I try to duck an ankle, when I just flop to my side, and then pick the leg up, I'm going to sit up into this bent knee. Maybe right there. I'm going to sit up into this mess, which is nothing. I can't wrestle here. I have to have this leg straight. So that's why we dive out and pull it straight. And that's why this heel comes to my butt. So I can winch your life from my body under. Then my top hand shoots under. Top hand shoots under. This will be the classic mistake. We try to sit up here. I just handcuffed myself. That's why there's a certain way we need to do this duck with our hands on the sock. So when I winch your life from my body under, top hand shoots under.  I'm still not athletic very much here. So I've got to get feet in the mat to have my chest forward. This hand attacks the bottom shoulder. That's one of the most important things if you don't learn anything at this camp. If you get in a scramble, if you can find their bottom shoulder with one of your hands, that's really, really, really good. That stops a lot of rolling around. One more time on this ankle duck. As slow as you need to. On my knees, my toes are in the mat. I'm diving out, but that momentum out is pulling the leg straight.  Windshield wipers my body under. I'm flexing my core. Then my top hand swims and sits up. Then I'm driving on my feet trying to get my chest over my foot.  Windshield wipers my body under. Top hand shoots under. Notice my right hand's still on it to make sure I can control it to get my top hand under here. And then I'm coming to hurdle stretch so I can drive into them. Okay, find that bottom shoulder. Halfway fast. So we're here. On my knees, diving out. Here, driving forward. And there'll be different reactions we get from this guy. As we're sparring later today, we'll work them out. If I don't know the answer, we'll figure it out. I'm not going to lie to you and make something up. If I don't know the answer, I'll figure it out. Make some calls, get on the internet. Ask Sam to a podcast about it. I don't know. We'll figure it out. I've got to get my top hand and my body under to get to that hurdle stretch. Everybody, everybody get on your knees. Spread out a little bit and get on your knees. Let's go.


In ancient times, many Buddhist pilgrims from China made the long and arduous journey to India to visit holy places. Among them were Xuanzang in the 7th century AD. Like Fahien of the 4th century AD and others, Xuanzang wrote enthusiastic accounts of his travels in India. These are written from a religious pilgrim's point of view. Nevertheless, they provide much information about ancient India. The parlors ruled in eastern India from the 8th to the 12th centuries. This period saw the greatest heights in the development of Buddhist logic. Many vast universities flourished and spread their influence to the other countries of Asia. The inscriptions show that many kings of the Pala dynasty followed the path of the Buddha. They also show that several others of the same dynasty followed other faiths. Best of all, the same kings are clearly seen to be equally generous to Hindus and Buddhists. In the spiritual climate which continued from ancient times, we see that in the early medieval period there were no boundaries between faiths. The same person is most often described as a devotee of different deities depending upon the occasion. Examples of this are numberless. Such religious divisions are a later construct by scholars who have tried to understand Indian history from a vastly different perspective. Akbar was the greatest king of the Turko-Mongol Mughal dynasty that invaded India and ruled from the year 1526 onwards. Some of his closest confidants, ministers and advisors were Hindu. The artists of Akbar's court remain famous till today. Seventeen such painters received special titles of preeminence from the king. Of them, thirteen were Hindus. In the late 16th century, Akbar created a universal faith, Dine-ilahi. Hindus, Jainas, Parsis and Christians were invited to a special house of worship. Here the beliefs of all faiths were freely discussed. Across the whole of India, the medieval period saw the happy blend of the ideas and practices of bhakti and Sufism. This truly continued the ancient cosmopolitan traditions of India. There were poets and saints in all parts of the country whose path of compassion was followed by persons of all faiths. As in ancient times, art, poetry and music were found to be means for the transportation of the self, a means to elevate ourselves, to take us far from the cares and confusions of the material world to a place of peace and oneness with the divine. In fact, the word Hindu did not exist in the Indian languages. It was used by the people to the northwest of India to mean those living beyond the river Indus. Today's Hindu religion was in fact created under colonial rule as late as in the 19th century. India's is an ancient spiritual culture with the most compassionate view of the whole of creation, a vision which values the air we breathe and every plant and insect in creation. Surely there's a great deal for us to learn from this ancient culture of love for all that there is.