Episode 151: Liz Allan and Gemma Robinson - Transforming EV Infrastructure Across Scotland’s Highlands and Islands

Episode 151: Liz Allan and Gemma Robinson - Transforming EV Infrastructure Across Scotland’s Highlands and Islands.
Liz Allan speaks to Gemma Robinson, EV Project Manager at HITRANS (Highlands and Islands Transport Partnership), to explore the fascinating journey from Scotland's pioneering Charge Place Scotland network to the future of EV infrastructure in remote communities.

They discuss the unique challenges of building reliable charging networks in some of the UK's most remote locations, where geography, connectivity issues, and high energy costs create complex obstacles. They also explore the maintenance challenges facing the current Charge Place Scotland network, the collaborative approach HITRANS is taking with councils across Scotland's islands and Highlands, and how Full Circle CI's maintenance deep dive methodology transformed instinctive concerns into actionable data, enabling productive conversations with service providers and a roadmap for improvement. Gemma and Liz provide valuable insights for any local authority navigating the EV infrastructure transition, as well as how lessons learned can benefit councils across the UK who are just beginning their EV infrastructure journey.

Quote of the Episode:
"I would like a bigger voice for some of the rural and remote communities and a recognition that they need to do things differently for it to work in their communities. And I would also like to have the opportunity to make the choices that protect that nature for the future." - Gemma Robinson. 

Gemma Robinson Bio:
Gemma Robinson is the EV Project Manager at HITRANS, where she leads EV infrastructure strategy development for four Scottish councils, including Shetland, Western Isles, and Argyll and Bute, through the EVIF program. Her remarkable career path took her from product design graduate to primary school teacher specialising in special educational needs, then to co-founding Highland Teepees, a successful event business she ran for seven years across Scotland's private estates. After selling the company and briefly relocating to Yorkshire, Gemma returned to Scotland during the COVID-19 pandemic and transitioned into transport, bringing her project management expertise to the challenge of coordinating charging network development across Scotland's most remote communities. 

Gemma Robinson Links:
HITRANS Website:

Transcript

Liz Allan  [00:00:01]:
Today's episode features Gemma Robinson, the EV Project Manager in the Highlands and Islands, also known as HITRANS. Gemma, thank you ever so much for joining me. It's so lovely to see you on here, and it's your first podcast, isn't it, darling?

Gemma Robinson [00:00:20]:
Well, it's not, Liz.

Liz Allan  [00:00:22]:
Is it not?

Gemma Robinson [00:00:23]:
Oh, my goodness.

Liz Allan  [00:00:24]:
Sorry.

Gemma Robinson [00:00:24]:
No, it's not. I did one with Gary Comerford recently, a roundtable.

Liz Allan  [00:00:30]:
He always grabs people early on. Well, that's all right. But that's okay. So you don't need to be. You don't need to be nervous anyway, so that's good.

Liz Allan  [00:00:41]:
So, okay, can we start off by talking a little bit about what you did before you started working at High Trans? So, because you're up in Scotland at the moment, aren't you? But you weren't originally from Scotland. You moved up there.

Gemma Robinson [00:00:59]:
I've moved to the other end of the country. I grew up, and I went to university in Nottingham. I've gradually come further north, and I studied product design. I've always been torn between art and science, so that's what made me choose product design. And strangely, I just. I always like that innovation and improvement of things. So I think it sort of encompasses all of that. I knew that when I picked it, but I guess you.

Gemma Robinson [00:01:31]:
You sort of learn why you make decisions after them. So that's what I did at university. I then moved down to North Devon and did my PGCE. So I became a primary school teacher. I was a primary school teacher for about four years.

Liz Allan  [00:01:49]:
Wow.

Gemma Robinson [00:01:50]:
Teaching mostly depends on where you are, Primary one or reception, the really little ones. And I had special educational needs as my sort of speciality. Inclusion has always been really important to me, so that's why I chose that speciality. And then after about four years, my husband and I had all always come to Scotland separately, and we spent years trying to think of a business that we could start up here so that we could move to Scotland. And we ended up. We. We were actually planning our wedding, and we looked at getting a teepee brought up to Scotland from England. And it cost far too much.

Gemma Robinson [00:02:44]:
So we just. We decided, well, what if we bought a teepee and started a business in Scotland and used our own TPS? So that was the start of Highland Teepee's. We hired a large event Teepee, which accommodated around 50 people each. You could join them together so you could have a wedding of 250 people.

Liz Allan  [00:03:04]:
Wow. Gosh.

Gemma Robinson [00:03:06]:
And we did that for seven years before selling it to, weirdly, the company that we first approached for that quote.

Liz Allan  [00:03:14]:
Did you? Excellent.

Gemma Robinson [00:03:16]:
They're based in Yorkshire, actually.

Liz Allan  [00:03:17]:
Oh, well, you know, Northerners.

Gemma Robinson [00:03:22]:
But it was an amazing seven years. We got to see some private estates in Scotland that were incredible. It was an amazing way to see Scotland. It was fantastic to be the director of a business and get to make the changes and improvements that you're always talking about. You had that split-second decision. You could. You could make a change overnight, and that's so refreshing. And when you come away from that and don't have that anymore, you really value it, I think, because there are so many departments and people and processes.

Gemma Robinson [00:03:59]:
That are involved.

Liz Allan  [00:04:01]:
Yeah. It means that you're quite agile, aren't you, when you're. When you're running your own business? So. So, yeah, yeah. But you. So. So how long? So how long did you have the Teepee business for? It was a few years, wasn't it?

Gemma Robinson [00:04:14]:
Yeah, we had it from 2010 to 2017, and we sold it and worked for the company we sold it to for a couple of years as part of the sale. So we. We moved to Yorkshire for a while, which is a beautiful place. And then ultimately we missed Scotland. Scotland's where our heart is. And we found a house on a small piece of woodland that we kind of fell in love with, bought it, and then decided to move and work out the details of the jobs when we got there.

Liz Allan  [00:04:50]:
Wow.

Gemma Robinson [00:04:50]:
So we moved up. We moved up, and then Covid hit. I was still working remotely, actually. And that was. That was obviously before COVID. People didn't work remotely. That was an interesting time because you didn't even have the team processes that you have now. However, I was made redundant and ended up doing various things during COVID just to make ends meet. But as Covid came to an end, I started looking for a proper job, and a job came up at High Trans, which was for project management, to deliver some faster chargers, 50 kilowatt chargers across North and West Scotland as part of a European project.

Gemma Robinson [00:05:46]:
So we worked with Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland as well, and it just brought together a lot of skill sets. I don't have project management training, but arguably all my roles have been in project management. Product design is project management, so is teaching to an extent and definitely running your own business. So it's. It's a very. An eclectic sort of winding, meandering way to. To what I do. But it just felt like I'd been in training for that role.

Gemma Robinson [00:06:20]:
So when I, when I started it, it just automatically felt right. It was my first role in transport, my first role in the public sector, apart from teaching, which is very different, but it just works for me. I like, I like, I like working in that sector and I really like working in transport. I've got a great team at High Trans. Very supportive, but also very. They give you a lot of freedom as well, which I really value. So. So yeah, that's my, my story so far.

Liz Allan  [00:06:57]:
I love that, especially like you say, that kind of ability to have trans. You know, you've got so many transferable skills, haven't you? And I think that's what people don't always realize, that, you know, you work at one place, you can. They are. You know, you have to look at other places where, where those skills can be transferred to. And, and you've got. You had loads. So, so that's brilliant. I have to ask you, was your husband from Scotland as well, or was he just from kind of down Bournemouth way as well?

Gemma Robinson [00:07:26]:
No, he's an orthener. We have the north-south debate constantly. No, he's from Cheshire. So.

Liz Allan  [00:07:41]:
So, can I just ask you? Because a lot of people don't realise what a transport authority is or, you know, so what, what is.

Liz Allan  [00:08:10]:
What does HITRANS do? Because it's separate from a council, it supports the council, and there are various types of transport organisations throughout the country, aren't there? So can you explain what one is?

Gemma Robinson [00:08:25]:
Yeah. H. So we. It stands for the Highlands and Islands Transport Partnership. We are one of seven regional transport partnerships across Scotland. And there's a different name for them, I think, in England, but like Transport for London is one. So the main aim is to coordinate some of the sort of transport initiatives that are happening. So we help councils to reach their government-set transport objectives, but we're also kind of statutory consultants on the sort of ferry development plans.

Gemma Robinson [00:09:03]:
And each regional transport partnership has a regional transport strategy that they work to deliver. And those vary a lot depending on the region and the needs of each region. So a lot of ours talks about kind of remote and rural transport, because.

Liz Allan  [00:09:24]:
That's because that's massive as well, isn't it? I mean, if we talk about the different aspects of your work, you're working on one major project, aren't you? But it's, but it's, there are lots and lots of different aspects to that. Would you like to provide a brief overview of that project?

Gemma Robinson [00:09:43]:
Yeah. I work for three councils within the HITRANS area, as well as Shetland, to centrally resource their plans and strategy development for EV infrastructure. This is done through the EVIF program, the EV Infrastructure Funding Program, which is the Scottish equivalent of the LEVI program. There are some major differences. I don't, I don't fully know the ins and outs of Levi, so I can't really say what they are, but I know that there are some differences. However, we work to streamline and coordinate that strategy development. And bringing together those four councils, particularly those that have a lot of inhabited islands between them, just meant that we could share challenges, share learnings, and look at the solutions that would work across the board. And one of the nicest things of doing the job has been bringing those counsellors together and being able to share those challenges and build that relationship and understand that they're not on their own to make an EV network happen.

Liz Allan  [00:10:59]:
And I suppose if we look right back to 2013, so we're talking now about Charge Place Scotland, aren't we? So this, you know, kind of Scotland was, was massively ahead of the, you, you know, the rest of the UK with its charging infrastructure. And it was, it was back in 2013 when Charge Place Scotland was set up, and the HITRANS councils were part of that, weren't they? And I can't even remember how many councils, in total, were part of the Charge Place Scotland network. But that was, that was massive, wasn't it? And we're talking about not very many EVs in that category; then there are not many to choose from, with relatively low ranges and things like that. So, that was quite an innovative contract in its day.

Gemma Robinson [00:11:51]:
Yeah, yeah, it was massive. It was, it was done to, to kick start EV uptake up here and I, I think a lot of people would agree that it's done that and one of the, the main things that helped was having the RFID card access so that people just had one access method across the whole country and it just made it simple. I think CPS has achieved a lot.

Gemma Robinson [00:12:21]:
It's a very different setup from most CPOs. Technically, it's a Charge Point network operator. So it is. It is a bit different from. From a commercial CPO, but the model is changing. I think it was set up in 2013, and it's perhaps reached the limit of what it can do. And that's why we're looking to migrate off of ChargePlace Scotland now and come up with some different ways of operating the network. So that EVIF program, like LEVI, is made to attract private investment, so it's public funding, matching private investment, and tries to move the charging network from purely public funding to partly, at least, private funding as well.

Liz Allan  [00:13:21]:
Because the. The Charge Place Scotland contract itself is quite complicated, isn't it? You know me and you've talked about.

Gemma Robinson [00:13:31]:
That's an understatement, Liz. I know.

Liz Allan  [00:13:32]:
We could go into how I got involved with HITRANS in a minute, but it's kind of a long story. It's one of those where you think this. It's like an onion. You keep going. And there are more layers to it.

Liz Allan  [00:13:45]:
Yeah, and I think it's.

Gemma Robinson [00:13:46]:
There's a song about that. Well, just like a great big onion. Yeah.

Liz Allan  [00:13:53]:
But the contract and. And I think probably it was one of those. You start setting something off, and you don't know what you don't know. And that's one of my favourite phrases. And they're all a number. Number of councils signed up to Charge Place Scotland, and I think so. I did some research this morning.

Liz Allan  [00:14:17]:
It started with 55 chargers across the councils, but we're. Now we're into kind of like the 3000s, aren't we? I can't remember exactly how many, but. But it's changed so much and it's. It's given people the ability to charge on the road. And, you know, even just looking at some of the stuff we've. We've looked at, and like I say I'll go into that. We can go into that in a second. It just gives people that ability to be able to do that and be able to move to sort of a more sustainable, you know, way of.

Liz Allan  [00:14:52]:
Way of driving. And that's what the Scottish. Because Transport Scotland set it up, wasn't it? And that's what they aimed to. To push the infrastructure so that more people would actually drive EVs, thereby reducing emissions. And that's that was such a. Like I say, it was. It was kind of looked at as, 'Wow, look at this project.' It's. It's amazing.

Liz Allan  [00:15:15]:
And. And, yeah, and lots of layers. Lots of layers.

Gemma Robinson [00:15:18]:
Lots of layers. Yeah. And I think, you know, there's. There are 32 councils on it, but there are also 400-plus private hosts on it as well. So it's a. Yeah. Complex beast.

Liz Allan  [00:15:30]:
Yeah, just. Just a little bit. Just a little bit. So, shall we discuss how I got involved and how Full Circle became involved? Because you and I started chatting a little bit on LinkedIn, didn't we? And I was supposed to be meeting you, and we've still not met face to face, have we?

Gemma Robinson [00:15:50]:
It's ridiculous.

Liz Allan  [00:15:51]:
We've been talking for months now, and we've still not met face-to-face, but we've been chatting about various things. Would you like to provide some background on that?

Gemma Robinson [00:16:05]:
Yeah. So I think. I think I was always very intrigued by Full Circle Continuous Improvement, as a title and then as a business, as you started to talk about it. And I fully agree, from running a business that you don't know, what you don't know comes from partly that as well. But we started talking about some of your methods in that kind of continuous improvement, and you've obviously got your diagnostic tool, which is a really good starting point for anyone. But then you talked about being able to do a maintenance deep dive, and that sat really well with me. We had, as a region, struggled with a feeling that things weren't working in terms of maintenance.

Gemma Robinson [00:17:01]:
The current setup wasn't working for us, and we didn't have the backup behind it to be able to say why it wasn't working. So you came in, and I'm always going to use the analogy like a bloodhound.

Liz Allan  [00:17:22]:
There you go.

Gemma Robinson [00:17:26]:
So you were able to quantify, qualify evidence, I guess, what we'd been feeling, and just put some facts behind that to be able to take to the maintenance providers' back office to be able to talk to them about. And they've been really open to those suggestions. There are a lot of different processes in place that don't always join up because of how the systems have to develop. And I think a big part of what's come out of it is just needing to be able to communicate, particularly where those gaps are.

Liz Allan  [00:18:06]:
It's funny because when you're talking about being a bloodhound, I always say that because of my little spicy brain. I'm a bit like Tom Cruise in Minority Report, you know, where he's got all that information up here and he's pulling all of that. So. So we started off, didn't we, by having a session with the four councils. So the four councils that. That had these kinds of gut feelings. And when you work in improvement, it's kind of like you. You recognise that people have gut feelings.

Liz Allan  [00:18:35]:
It's great that you've got a gut feeling about something, but people are the other. Whoever you need to be speaking to about any problems that you've got aren't going to take you seriously until you've got backup, you know, until you've got. Until you can. Yeah, so. So it was really interesting to kind of get the managers in. We were just on Teams.

Liz Allan  [00:18:56]:
It's too far away, isn't it, really? We're talking a long way, you know, Shetland or Western Isles, Argyle and Bute. Although I have been to Argyle and Bute, and that was gorgeous. However, it's hard to get everybody into the room. At the same time, a Team's call can do. Just do that, can't it? And hearing some of the things that the council officers and the managers were saying, we feel it's this. We feel it's. That these things are happening, those things are happening.

Liz Allan  [00:19:25]:
And I totally got it, you know, and that's where my brain just goes off. Oh, because of my. Like I say, because of the way my brain works, but also because of my background. And I. I said to you, haven't I, that my background's been initially in service and maintenance and it. This stuff doesn't leave you. Not when you've got a brain like mine, anyway. But, you know, it just doesn't.

Liz Allan  [00:19:47]:
It doesn't leave you. It just. It's a bit like going back to the onion. It's putting more layers on. It turns into a cabbage anyway. But, you know, you. You end up building all of that information, but just having those initial conversations. I think in a way it was even good to have the council guys, you know, and girls talking, talking to one another, because even they don't always get a chance to sort of be working together on things, do they?

Gemma Robinson [00:20:15]:
No, I think in councils, certainly, that I talk to up here, a lot of them, it's either their full job, but they're the only one in the company doing it, or it's only part of their job. So, you know, they've got other responsibilities as well. So you can feel on your own with the sort of challenges from ev. And, you know, so much is happening in the industry all the time because of the pace it's evolving, that I think, I think just joining those people together and being able to share those challenges, being able to come up with solutions together has been really good.

Liz Allan  [00:20:54]:
And I think, because when we started moving through this process, some of the tools that I was kind of introducing as well, so we used like a Miro board, didn't we, so that their thoughts and ideas were going on to that you were on there. We can all see it live, and it worked quite well, didn't it? That was essentially a repository for all the information. So we were building on the. Right, these are the issues. But it's also, and I talk about root cause quite a lot. It's about, right, okay, those are the issues, but where does that come from? You know, so it was my job as part of what we did with the deep dive work to actually do my bloodhound stuff and just get to. Right, these are the issues. Where do they come from? Are there any other ones? How often, how often, how many, what were they? Why was that information not communicated? If it was, what was missing? What do we need to add? What was good, what was, you know, so it's kind of.

Liz Allan  [00:21:56]:
I want to, I don't want to say the good, the bad, the ugly, because it's not, it's not quite like that. But it was highlighting all of the gaps, wasn't it, really?

Gemma Robinson [00:22:05]:
Yeah, yeah. And it comes at a key time because, as we said earlier, Charge Place Scotland is ending, and people have to migrate off that back office. Being able to understand what we need more than anything, what needs to change, and being able to take that into procurement for the next back office and the next maintenance provider, I think, is invaluable at this point in time. You know, some of the things that have come up have been. Because there had to be a national approach to some things and it couldn't be regionalised, but that's changing. And so I'm really hopeful that we will get a better result for the councils.

Liz Allan  [00:22:54]:
And I mean, and if you look at some of the councils in England, some of them are only just kind of moving forward with their infrastructure. So if we think about this as kind of lessons learned, you know, if you're watching and listening, you're actually from a council in England, probably you need to have a chat with Gemma, because these lessons learned, if you're quite, quite early on with the infrastructure, these are the things that you need to be talking to other councils about, you know, because actually it's. It's good learning from other places, isn't it?

Gemma Robinson [00:23:31]:
Yeah, absolutely. And I think when I started in, in High Trends and I was working on the faster project, it was a fairly. I. I hate saying straightforward, because it wasn't, that is, but it was, it was a fairly. It was a fairly small scope for a project that I needed to do. Where Evie has opened that up. You know, Scotland is broadening its sort of horizons in an EV sense and talking to people, knowing what's out there, knowing what other people do, how they've solved things, has been invaluable.

Liz Allan  [00:24:08]:
And actually, what we're talking about, the end result is making sure that all of the chargers in the HITRANS region are reliable, that the driver actually has a seamless charging experience, and they know that those chargers are going to be working. I mean, there are some real challenges, especially up in the Highlands area, aren't there? Because some of them are just so remote.

Gemma Robinson [00:24:37]:
Yeah, yeah. Just the geography makes it difficult, particularly in the middle of summer, to, you know, book a ferry, book accommodation. It can be weeks, it can be months before you can do that. That, in itself, is a challenge. But there are also things like connectivity challenges. So all of that kind of adds up to make. To make reliability more of a challenge. But there are a lot of opportunities in the region as well.

Gemma Robinson [00:25:10]:
Part of my strategy development is looking at, yes, those are the challenges, but what can we do to solve them? And as well as looking at the maintenance as one of the big things we'd like to improve for the future of EV charging up here, we're also looking at whether we can utilise local energy because it's massively constrained and curtailed up here. It costs an awful lot for the residents on the likes of Orkney and Shetland to power those. Anything electrical. Their electricity bills are, I think, on average twice that of those on the mainland.

Liz Allan  [00:25:54]:
And that seems madness, doesn't it?

Gemma Robinson [00:25:58]:
When they're producing a lot of the energy that the nation requires for the transition, that comes into the just transition, so there's a huge opportunity in terms of using locally produced energy, but that. That in itself is a big industry and a big learning curve to get into. There's a lot of red tape around making changes.

Liz Allan  [00:26:23]:
I was going to say because so am I right, there are regulations in Scotland that say. Say X percentage has to be exported. Or is. Is that the. But because that's. This. There's. There's some regulation.

Liz Allan  [00:26:38]:
That means that they, that's why they have to pay more for their electricity energy. In a local bay. Is that right or am I totally barking at the wrong tree?

Gemma Robinson [00:26:47]:
I don't. I don't fully understand it from that point of view, if I'm honest. From my point of view, from a HITRANS and transport perspective, a lot of people rely on personal transport more because there isn't the public transport, there isn't the road network, so they. They spend more on their transport. And that's partly where those high electricity costs would come from owning an EV.

Liz Allan  [00:27:18]:
Gosh.

Gemma Robinson [00:27:19]:
But in terms of. Yeah, there are a lot of policies. I don't fully understand the kind of buying and selling regulations up here, but I know it's something.

Liz Allan  [00:27:30]:
Yeah, there's. There's something. We'll probably have to get you to chat to Dougie Blair because he'll probably know all of that kind of stuff. He's been on the podcast before, but he's. He's a very good font of knowledge. But if we kind of come. Come back to the councils, the output that we kind of put together from all of this. The Deep dive itself was a massive report, wasn't it? I mean, God, it took me weeks.

Liz Allan  [00:28:01]:
It really took, you know, took me weeks to actually write this report because we're talking four councils with kind of various levels of data and kind of pulling it all together. And. But the reason for that was, like I said, you've got to go from that gut feeling to something that you can. Evidence to kind of go back to the provider and say, can you just have a look at this, please? And that was. And that was a very. It was a long process, wasn't it, really?

Gemma Robinson [00:28:33]:
Yeah, it was and it's now. It's now evolved into a very, I think, practical action list that we're working through, through weekly. So it takes a while yet to establish that team to talk to and to pull out the parts of the report that are relevant to which parts of their team and things. But yeah, I think we've made some huge leaps and bounds, I think, recently in what's going to come of that. So that's exactly exciting.

Liz Allan  [00:29:09]:
It's. But it is really good because, I mean, we're looking at. So, the report that I kind of put together for HITRANS and the councils. So each council had its own section because, you know, there were certain issues that were across the four councils, but there were certain issues that were unique to that specific council. So it was about pulling out and kind of saying, right, these, these are the things that you're all experiencing, but, but these are unique to you and you, and you, etc. But also actually having a, a kind of coming out the other end with a, it's not just a report, it's like you said, about the actions. It's kind of right. This is what we can do in the short term, and this is what we can do in the medium term.

Liz Allan  [00:29:52]:
This is longer, you know, and the idea is. And, and my, my point about quick wins is quick wins, when you're talking about improvement, is something that gives people confidence. It makes people. When, when you're ma. When you're taking a load of things that people have gone, God, that's not working. You know, actually, if you put a list together and kind of go right, we can do these quite quickly. And you know, it's these, some of these are little, some of the, a bit more complicated, but it gives that, it's that level of comfort and kind of, oh, okay, so it is working, you know, so you kind of get those out of the way. So people start getting those.

Liz Allan  [00:30:28]:
That, that level of confidence and just feeling right, okay, so I guess it's.

Gemma Robinson [00:30:35]:
Feedback on the, on the input they've, they've put in, they've made an effort to try and understand the problem and they want that, yeah, they want that feedback of, of making something happen and come from it.

Liz Allan  [00:30:48]:
And it, and it is quite hard because like you said, now we're, we're talking to the provider and actually that's, that's been really interesting as well, hasn't it? And, and, and talking to them and, and actually bringing everybody together. It's this, this process is about bringing everybody along, isn't it? Not just point, it's not pointing fingers. And I'm not. That's, you know, that's not what I'm about, and I know that that's not what you're about. We're just on about. It's the truth, really. This is the truth. Your version of the truth is this.

Liz Allan  [00:31:21]:
Etc. And, and, but let's kind of work together to, to kind of make it work for everybody.

Gemma Robinson [00:31:30]:
Yeah, yeah. It's keeping in mind that the focus is on improving things.

Liz Allan  [00:31:39]:
Yeah. And building a level of trust, you know, in the way that you communicate with each other. Because, you know, it's the same with any, you know, even when you were working for yourself. And it's the same with me, you know, you end up just, I'm thinking everybody, whoever works, you know, you end up just so focused on what you're doing. You need to. And you know, you need to get to a point where you're talking to. Yes, you're in that business; they're in that business. That business is involved as well, or the supply chain or whatever.

Liz Allan  [00:32:16]:
But it's coming together to have those common conversations and just saying, ' Right, these are the things that we. ' Can we have a look at this, please?

Gemma Robinson [00:32:25]:
Yeah, it's really easy to get, I guess, just completely immersed in your own bubble, and sometimes you just need to talk to other people and understand that actually, from their bubble, it looks very different.

Liz Allan  [00:32:41]:
I mean, I've talked to other councils in England as well, and you've kind of got your whole procurement process that you know, that people go through. So in England, I know that people have actually been going through procurement in the councils for EV charging through LEVI, and then they send out the tenders, and you know, the responses come in, and then, but then you've got procurement, and then it moves to somebody else. And that could be. And it depends on which council it is, whether that's. That's highways, whether that's, you know, kind of a sustainability section or, you know, even for me, trying to find. So, you know, who's the, who's the person in charge of EV charging works like you said earlier, actually in a lot of cases they've just got so many other things that they're doing. It's just like a little slice. It's like having a loaf, isn't it, that you're slicing up.

Liz Allan  [00:33:31]:
It's just a part of it.

Gemma Robinson [00:33:35]:
Yeah, definitely. I think one of the nice things about working for HITRANS is that we're quite a small organisation, there are about 25 of us, so there isn't a huge number of departments. But I always think that we pack quite a punch for a small organisation. We're quite far-reaching, but it is nice to be part of a smaller organisation that doesn't have quite such an extensive range of departments.

Liz Allan  [00:34:06]:
And you're very proactive in what you're doing, and actually, I know that the councils recognise how proactive you're being in, you know, across, across your, your projects, even if it has got a little different stream to it. That makes a massive difference in the way that you think. And I said to you before. I know you probably don't like me saying this to you, but everybody who I speak to that when I mentioned Gemma Robinson, they all go, oh, she's lovely, you know, because, because of the fact that you are proactive, you're positive. You just, you just got, you know, you just get on with it, don't you?

Gemma Robinson [00:34:48]:
I'm quite a hopeful person and I, I, I like to make things better. That's part of my motivation. So, yeah, I think I am quite a positive person.

Liz Allan  [00:34:59]:
Your glass is half full, definitely, as I would say, as I would like to, I'd like to think. Well, I am mostly, mostly glass half full. But so if you kind of look at, so you, like you said, the charge place, Scotland is, is kind of migrating or going to be migrating. And if we, but if we kind of look at the, and this, this is a kind of a, a big, a big question. And I did mention, I was going to say this to you before. If we look at this as kind of like a, in, in five years' time, what would you like to look back on this project being, you know, what would your legacy, what would you like your legacy to be for this.

Gemma Robinson [00:35:43]:
From my project in HITRANS or from the maintenance work that we do?

Liz Allan  [00:35:47]:
Well, no, no, you know, what if we look at it, because it all, it all feeds into it, doesn't it?

Gemma Robinson [00:35:52]:
Yeah, I, I would like, I guess I would like a, a bigger voice for some of the rural and remote communities and a recognition that they need to do things differently for it to work in their communities. Transport Scotland has been very supportive of this programme. They've actually been very flexible with us, which has been brilliant. But it is a process, and it does take time as well. I would like there to be tangible improvements to the service. I would like it to be more reliable. I would like it to be cheaper from an energy point of view and fairer for those people in those places. I spent a lot of time trying to get to live somewhere that I love, and I love it partly because of the nature that's around me, and I would like to have the opportunity to make the choices that protect that nature for the future.

Gemma Robinson [00:37:05]:
So that's, personally, that's my drive, and I'd like to give other people that choice. So that's, yeah, I guess that's my ultimate motivation.

Liz Allan  [00:37:16]:
I love that. And do you know what's funny when you put it that way? That's a lovely way of thinking about it. You know, think you're, you're, you're thinking about it in order to be able to give back and actually, that I'm only just going to put this in as a little side, side tangent. My husband and I went to see the film The Salt Path last week. I don't know whether anybody's actually seen it. Who are watching and listening? Have you seen it, Gemma?

Gemma Robinson [00:37:46]:
I've not seen it. I've read the book, though.

Liz Allan  [00:37:48]:
Yeah. So Rich. My husband had read the book. But oh my God. It said. It really set me off thinking. I mean, it was some of it quite, quite hard, you know, some of the things that they had to put up with. But I was just kind of, you know, it makes you think about your place in the world and, you know, what are you doing? Do we really need to be getting stressed? Because it started off by this couple being really, really stressed about a situation that was happening but then kind of changed, didn't it, over, over time.

Liz Allan  [00:38:18]:
And it's, and it's a lovely story, and in fact, my husband didn't even recognise that it was Gillian Anderson to start off with. So Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs, so very, very, very good film. So if you've not seen it, guys, please just try it, honestly. But just, you know, that, that kind of thing and thinking about having a. I, I wrote a post, well and a newsletter a few weeks back about what the future of kind of like an ev charging hubs could be like, for example, you know, and, and, and actually thinking about nature and trying to do it so that, that we're not all trying to just keep doing the same thing we've always done, which is we all go. Motorway service station. We all go there, you know, actually looking at things, and we've kind of lost our. I don't know about you up in Scotland, but it feels like we've kind of lost our town centres.

Liz Allan  [00:39:15]:
But in a way I don't want to go there because it's all a bit the, you know, I'd like somewhere a bit more in nature. I mean, you know, people who are watching this will be able to see. I can see you've got sunshine and trees outside your window. I love that I've kind of, you know. No, I'm looking out of my window. It's not sunny, I can tell you that one. But it, you know, these things we're just so busy pushing ourselves all the time, aren't we?

Gemma Robinson [00:39:45]:
There's a phrase that stayed with me that I saw Sarah Sloman write recently that was about charging as a pleasure, and I think that's a really nice way to sum it up. And you know, as a sort of fact, there's, I think, 95% of communities that live on. On the coast in the Western Isles, and they are some of the first places that will feel the effects of climate change. So it's. Yeah, it's something that they live with, sort of day to day. So I think it is a big drive to be able to make choices that would.

Gemma Robinson [00:40:20]:
That will change that.

Liz Allan  [00:40:21]:
Yeah, I just. I think that's a charming thought. Thank you for sharing that. Seriously, Gemma, I appreciate that. I want to ask you now, as we come to the end, I have one more question. We're still working through the process and the project at the moment. What have you personally learned through this specific process and project that we're currently working on? Either about the kind of. The infrastructure itself, the leadership, or you. 

Liz Allan  [00:40:56]:
What's come out of it for you?

Gemma Robinson [00:41:00]:
I think so much of it, actually. There's probably an awful lot if I give it some time to think about. But I think partly it's just understanding people's different perspectives on things. I think the importance of communication is that we all do it differently. Like, we. Some of us talk a lot, some of us don't talk a lot. Being able to stand up for what you're aiming for while still considering other people's points of view, I think, yeah, just. I think every team you work with is different.

Gemma Robinson [00:41:50]:
They've got different communicators, different skills, and just learning how to work with different people, I think, is a really important one. And I think that so many people do want to come together and make things better. Like most people, they are in the job to do the best they can or to improve things for people or to. Yeah. Get to a goal. So sometimes you just have to speak up for yourself and highlight that that's not happening or not working. And it's. It's having the courage to do that and see.

Gemma Robinson [00:42:38]:
See through the changes that are needed.

Liz Allan  [00:42:41]:
I think that's very true. I think some of it is just about. Lots of people just put up with things. You know, it's about. It's about being, being strong enough and feeling that, you know, I'd say speaking your truth, but, you know, but you, but you've actually got to be. Be able to recognise that, you know, who will listen and, and actually, even me and you working, working together, you know, we've kind of. There. Yeah, I guess I probably talk.

Liz Allan  [00:43:12]:
I do talk a lot more than you. I know. Sorry. But, you know, even we, we all have our different ways of working, and sometimes the way that we adapt might not necessarily be the way that somebody wants us to adapt. So you end up adapting, thinking, Oh, that person wants me to be like this. This is part of a kind of masking in some ways. You know, that person, you know, wants me to be like that, so I'll be like this. But, no, what you want is this.

Liz Allan  [00:43:42]:
So it's, it's, it is, it's just coming to that kind of agreement and understanding and communicating, isn't it?

Gemma Robinson [00:43:49]:
It is. And it's the same within a business. You have people adapting to make workarounds, and it's understanding what those are and why they were put in place and why they're not working and where they could work better. So, yeah, so much of it is communication.

Liz Allan  [00:44:06]:
It is, it's massive. And that's why I always stand up for. So, one last question. What advice would you give to a local authority or local authorities who are either starting their journey, or they've started looking at things and thinking, not quite sure what's going on here? There's something that I actually might need to just pull up. What would you, what would you suggest to them?

Gemma Robinson [00:44:37]:
I think following, following your gut instinct is a good, a good one and looking into that, like we did with the diagnostic and the maintenance deep dive. So, yeah, they should definitely speak to you. I think also, you know, talking to other councils is invaluable. Just people that are in a similar region or setup to you, but even those that aren't, there's always, there's always something to learn from other people that you said, like you talked about transferable skills earlier. There's always something you can learn from talking to other people. And I'd say you're not on your own and just see, have that, have that conversation and see where it goes.

Liz Allan  [00:45:24]:
I think it's, it is about don't be scared, don't be scared to look, but be prepared that you might, it might be bigger than you think, you know, or it might not, you know, actually, like you say, go, go with your gut feeling, but. And you don't have to, you don't have to use me for a Full Circle CI. It would be wonderful if you did. But, you know, just utilise somebody if you haven't got the time to do stuff. Bring somebody in who, from the outside who can just see in as a. As an independent pair of eyes. Because that's what I tried to do with you guys, wasn't it? And I'm quite. I think I'm quite good at challenging, you know, if I think, if I think there's something that needs calling out, as long as I feel it's a safe enough space to do it, and people are happy, then I will call it out.

Gemma Robinson [00:46:18]:
Yeah, yeah, you will, you will, which is a real asset to you. 

Gemma Robinson [00:47:34]:
What I was going to say, actually, is that you don't have to do it all like in EV. You can't possibly know everything there is to know about every aspect of EV. There's just too much happening and too much changing, too much evolving. So talk to the experts, get specialists in, and I guess just keep, keep focused on what, what you're trying to achieve and the best way to do it. But I think, I think a lot of people will already be doing that. I don't think I'm necessarily giving them anything new there. But, yeah, that would be how I'd approach.

Liz Allan  [00:48:15]:
Nice. Brilliant. And listen, it's been lovely to have you here, even if Gary had you on his podcast before mine. But, hey, I'm not bothered. No, no, seriously. No, it's been, it's been lovely. We just, we hit it off straight away, didn't we, and hopefully when you're listening and watching this, listening to and watching this, you'll realise that she's an absolutely lovely person and just wants to do the best and just brilliant work up in HITRANS. But so thank you, Gemma, thank you ever so much for joining me.

Liz Allan  [00:48:54]:
It's been lovely to talk to you.

Gemma Robinson [00:48:57]:
You too. Thanks for having me, Liz.

Liz Allan  [00:48:59]:
To everybody else, I'd like to say thank you for listening and watching. But all the same, as I usually say, please watch, you know, listen, share, you know, like, subscribe all at Malarkey and take a Look at our LinkedIn podcast page for Electric Evolution. Just share the words. And again, thank you very much. I'll see you next time.

Gemma Robinson [00:49:22]:
Bye bye.