Chamber and committees

I have lost count of the number of questions, statements and debates on the A9 that we have had in the chamber over many years. Mr Simpson gave us a rather amusing potted ministerial history at the beginning of the debate. I respect the fact that the Scottish Government remains committed to seeing the A9 dualling project through to the end, but the reality is that there are challenges and pressures on priorities and budgets, and they are growing and will not go away any time soon.

I do not have the time.

The action group has also talked about the need for the speed limit to be reduced to 50mph between Birnam and Dunkeld and for there to be better lighting at junctions, monitoring cameras and a roundabout at Dunkeld. I urge the minister, in her closing speech, to double down on those suggestions from my Perthshire constituents and to continue the investment in the A9 but to invest wisely based on where we are now and what the future looks like.

I am surprised, given that Labour accepts the huge environmental benefits of a deposit return scheme, that members of the party signed a letter during recess claiming that there will not be any environmental benefits from the scheme. Which one is it: are there environmental benefits, from Labour’s perspective, or not?

If Mr Golden was that interested in the DRS, he would have turned up to the committee sessions in 2019 when we took extensive evidence on all the issues. He would have experienced great delight in looking at all the evidence, which showed that there would be substantial reductions in carbon emissions. Look at the facts, Mr Golden.

So much can change in a week in politics. Today, the Tories have flipped again and now claim that the DRS will actually be good for the environment, but just not yet—not with this scheme; now is not the time. We have heard it all before.

We are told to wait for the UK Government to decide on an English scheme, which will not even include glass, despite glass having the biggest carbon impact and causing injuries to people, pets and wildlife as litter. The English scheme has been kicked down the road to October 2025 at the earliest. The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has now publicly undermined that launch date, which in effect hands big business the veto on any further progress.

Right now, it is the big business polluters that are not paying. The Scottish DRS ensures that they, instead of consumers, will pay. At the moment, consumers have to pay twice—once at the shop for the drink and again through tax to pay for councils to collect bottles and cans, while the cost of littering, again, falls on the taxpayer.

The DRS will cut costs for councils. All councils will benefit from reduced collection costs. I recently visited a plastic film recycling enterprise in Fife, which, if scaled up, could take most of Scotland’s film. However, councils’ kerbside collections are full to the brim with plastic bottles and cans, many of which cannot be easily recycled back to food-grade material.

I am running short on time.

The DRS will create space in our bins for councils to innovate and expand the range and volume of materials that are recycled, which will increase recycling rates.

Any scheme that is as ambitious as Scotland’s DRS will have issues that need to be ironed out at the beginning. The concerns of small independent retailers and producers are being addressed. Yesterday’s announcement by Circularity Scotland has addressed the cash-flow issues and provided a simple labelling solution for producers of fewer than 25,000 units a year. Registration fees are being waived for some, producer fees are being reduced and handling fees are being increased for retailers. I am sure that other tweaks will come, such as online take-back requirements and exemptions from glass returns for some businesses.

It is time to reject the Tories’ scaremongering and join dozens of countries around the world that are helping to save their environment through deposit return schemes. I am proud that it will be Greens in government who deliver Scotland’s first DRS.

I just want to understand at what point the Tory Party dropped its commitment to include glass in the DRS. Was it before or after the member’s party accepted a donation from the Wine and Spirit Trade Association?

Well, well, well—first, the Tories backed a delay to Scotland’s deposit return scheme; then they wanted it sped up; now, they are calling for it to be stopped. What a reckless anti-business message that sends out to the hundreds of businesses that have quietly invested millions of pounds in the scheme. Reverse vending machines are being ordered; product packaging is being reconfigured; staff training programmes are being rolled out; and new jobs are being created.

The Tory flip-flopping and scaremongering on the DRS does not stop here. In the February recess, the dream team of Fergus Ewing and Maurice Golden hatched a letter that claimed that the DRS would actually be bad for the environment. How will the scheme be bad for the environment when it has been shown that it will reduce carbon emissions by 4 million tonnes over 25 years and will reduce litter by a third, Mr Golden?

I would simply say to Mr Bibby that he needs to read the Bute house agreement, which is clear about the commitments on the A9 and the A96.

The latest estimate has every single mile of the A9 dualling project costing between £19 million and £23 million just for construction, so that does not include management of the project or even buying the land. It is an eye-watering amount of money. Therefore, the biggest challenge to dualling every single last inch of the A9 does not come from Green arguments; it is about the financial reality that the Government faces.

Some Governments—I point out to Mr Bibby that most notable among them is the Labour Welsh Government—are starting to make difficult choices. The Welsh Government is listening to its Future Generations Commissioner and the National Infrastructure Commission for Wales, and it is abandoning vast road-building programmes and investing in other transport priorities that benefit people and the climate.

When I think of the transport challenges in the Highlands and Islands and the very real need for investment, I think of ferries, harbour infrastructure and fixed links. I think of the need to keep lifeline roads open, such as the Rest and Be Thankful. I think of the desperate need to dual the Highland main line and the investment that is needed in rail freight to get timber lorries off the roads. I think of the safety issues that we have on roads such as the A85, which can never be dualled. I think of all that, and I wonder what a further £1,400 million would deliver for all those communities.

For the A9, we absolutely need improvements—the status quo will not do—but safety improvements must come first. The recent spate of tragic fatal accidents on the A9 has happened for a range of reasons, and although dualling might have helped to prevent some of those accidents, we have also seen fatalities on recently dualled sections of the road. Dualling the A9 was never primarily a road safety project but, if we want to maximise the number of lives saved and accidents avoided across Scotland's road network, including the A9, we need to invest carefully in the right measures. Sections of the A9 dualling will still need to be completed, but investment should not stop there.

That is why I am saddened to see Liam Kerr campaigning against speed cameras on the A96, because they are a cost-effective way of saving lives. However, I credit his colleague Finlay Carson for campaigning for the introduction of speed cameras on the A75.

I have met a number of constituents to discuss A9 improvements. For example, I have met the Birnam and Dunkeld junctions action group, whose calls for safety improvements are important. Progress must be made before the next surge in visitor numbers at the start of the new season. I warmly welcome the fact that our minister, Jenny Gilruth, has acted quickly and decisively on a package that will improve driver safety, focusing first on the Birnam to Dalguise section.

Will the member give way?

Will the member take an intervention?