Scottish Conservative politician Murdo Fraser has accused SNP MSPs of betraying constituents by voting against A9 dualling.
Speaking following a recent debate at Holyrood earlier this week on the £3 billion dualling programme, Mr Fraser hit out at the fact there were no SNP MSPs (except Fergus Ewing) from the areas that are impacted by the scheme who voted to treat the long-delayed dualling project as an urgent priority.
Commenting, Murdo Fraser MSP said: “It is striking that not a single SNP MSP representing either the Highlands and Islands or Perth and Kinross was prepared to come to the chamber to defend their Government’s record on the A9. And yet they all, with the exception of Fergus Ewing, voted down our Motion calling on the SNP Government to provide a specific date for when a revised timescale of works and costs will be published, and also the Scottish Labour addition which called for urgent progress on the dualling project.
“We know that constituents in the Highlands and Islands and Perthshire are rightly furious on hearing the pathetic excuses trotted out from the Transport Minister for lack of progress on dualling the A9, and this has now been made even worse by all the Highlands and Islands and Perthshire MSPs betraying their constituents by voting against A9 dualling.
“I am afraid that there will be more deaths this year, next year and every year after until the dual carriageway is completed. Those deaths will be deaths of our constituents. They might be deaths of our friends, members of our families or—perish the thought—even one of us. I asked SNP members to stand with us, ditch the Greens, and put their country and their constituents before their party interests, push ahead with the project and save lives but sadly this did not happen.”
Mr Fraser added: “In 18 years, the Conservative UK Government delivered more than 60 miles of dual carriageway and two major firth crossings. By contrast, this SNP Government, which has been in power for nearly the same length of time— 16 years—has delivered just 11 miles of dual carriageway. I hope that a parliamentary inquiry will be carried out—maybe that could be looked at by the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee or the Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee.
“It is sometimes said that there are no bad roads, just bad drivers, but we know that the reality is— as all the statistics tell us—that single-carriageway roads are many times more dangerous, and many times more likely than dual carriageways are, to cause fatal and serious accidents. On a single carriageway, it simply takes a vehicle drifting across the centre for the result to be a horrible head-on crash that will, with both vehicles doing 70mph, almost certainly lead to a most serious, if not fatal, accident. That is why a dual carriageway is so important.”
Mr Fraser was speaking from personal experience of the A9, having been involved in a head-on collision in 1990 on a single carriageway stretch on the road near Carrbridge. He suffered multiple fractures and spent weeks in hospital but fortunately survived.
*The Scottish Conservative Motion was: That the Parliament believes that the Scottish Government’s failure to deliver on its promise to dual the A9 between Perth and Inverness by 2025 is a betrayal; recognises the vital importance of this route to the economic and social wellbeing of the communities it serves; notes the serious safety implications of failing to meet the commitment to dual, with lives lost and serious accidents having occurred since the commitment was made, and calls on the Scottish Government to provide a specific date for when a revised timescale of works and costs will be published, and to ensure that Transport Scotland publishes a quarterly update setting out progress against published targets.
