No apology from Transport Secretary after three-month wait for A96 Corridor Review publication
The lack of apology from the Transport Secretary after it was revealed she was handed a report on the A96 dualling scheme is an ‘insult’ to people in the North East, according to a Conservative MSP.
During a Holyrood session earlier today Scottish Conservative North East MSP Liam Kerr urged Fiona Hyslop to apologise for keeping the A96 Corridor Review from the public eye for three months.
He said: “It's plainly not acceptable to keep the outcomes of a £6 million, taxpayer-funded report secret, so will the cabinet secretary apologise to the people of the north east for the delay? How much will the new consultation cost?
“And will a cabinet secretary promise to publish it as soon as the ink is dry regardless of whether it's good news for the government or not?”
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Ms Hyslop - who had precedently explained the steps taken since receiving the report after a question asked by Inverness and Nairn MSP Fergus Ewing - replied: “I set out the orderly way that collective cabinet and responsibility precedes that.
“I would point out that members of his party attacked me for actually publishing the review and the content of the review, and is now saying that I was keeping it secret. How could I have been keeping it secret, as I actually published it?”
Ms Hyslop also said the timeline represented “the government taking an appropriate time to consider a report” brought before presenting it to Parliament.
“A failure to properly consider a report of this significant would not serve the Parliament, nor the people of the Northeast of Scotland well,” she added.
Following the debate, Mr Kerr said the refusal to apologise was “insulting” to the people of the North East.
He said: “Her shameful response sends the wrong message to families whose loved ones have tragically died or been injured on the A96.
“This is another scandal to add to the long list of attempts to cover up their failures for not dualling the A96, while costing taxpayers more money on a further consultation.
“How many more expensive stalling tactics will it take before the SNP finally come clean on this vital infrastructure project?”
The discussion started as Mr Ewing asked about the Scottish Government’s position on whether it considered the reported delay in the publication of the A96 Corridor Review document as acceptable.
He went on to ask for the publication of a detailed statement “setting out precisely when each remaining stage of the procurement of the section between Inverness and Auldearn will be completed”, and when the road will be constructed, within the next three months.
After Ms Hyslop stated that looking at procurement options is “a complex exercise” and that that timeframe would not be possible to attain, the Inverness and Nairn MSP replied: “We're nearly in the fourth year of this session of Parliament, very little progress has been made.
“I'm afraid my constituents will be deeply depressed by the failure for you today - and I know you take this very seriously which makes it even more serious - to give the people of Nairn and the northeast the truth.
“If we don't have it, then I, for one, will find it unacceptable. And it is a red line for me. I cannot betray my constituents - that's what my party and the government I used to be part of are demanding that I do. I'm not prepared to do it.”
Ms Hyslop said: “I can and feel understand the frustration.
“The statutory process for the scheme was completed earlier this year, and work has commenced to determine the most suitable procurement option - either design or build, or mutual investment model for delivering the a96 Inverness to Nairn, including Nairn bypass, dualling scheme and only thereafter.a timetable for progress can be set out in line with available budgets.
“Unfortunately Fergus Ewing’s own timetable for my timetable, I think does not allow us to provide that orderly considered position which Parliament might expect.”
During her statement at the end of November, Ms Hyslop announced that the commitment to dual the A96 between Inverness to Aberdeen by 2030 had been abandoned.
