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Does anyone else want to say anything about the impact on hospital dental services or emergency care?

Good morning, and thank you for coming along. I want to consider the question of the impact that the pandemic has had on access to dental services. I will start with Margaret McKeith, because I know that the ALLIANCE has done quite a lot of work in that area.

I will provide a bit of context. We all recognise that there has always been a section of the population who are reluctant to go to the dentist anyway, but to what extent have there been more access problems since the pandemic? All MSPs will have been contacted by constituents who have raised concerns about the time that it has taken them to get an appointment. That seems to apply especially to NHS patients. Private patients have perhaps found it easier to access services, but NHS patients are struggling to do so. Indeed, in some parts of Scotland, NHS dentistry has disappeared entirely or seems to be disappearing. There does seem to be an issue with access.

What is your experience of the impact that the pandemic restrictions have had on attitudes to accessing a dentist? What needs to be done about that?

One of the questions that I was going to ask you was on the level of public information that was provided about what dental services were available during the pandemic. Your response suggests that people just did not know what was available.

Thank you, convener. I am particularly obliged to you for letting me in as I am not a member of the committee. I want to put a particular point to Mr Barn in this area. The petitioner made what I thought was a powerful comment earlier about the Tomatin to Moy section and the young man from Moray who tragically lost his life at Dalmagarry, just two weeks ago. We can only speculate what might have happened had progress been made on dualling that section instead of it being a single carriageway.

I just noticed that a Government-initiated question was lodged on Monday afternoon, in the name of Jim Fairlie. It reads:

“To ask the Scottish Government when the new procurement for the dualling of the A9 between Tomatin and Moy will commence”.

As you know, convener, a Government-initiated question is lodged when the Government wants to make an announcement to Parliament and it asks a back bencher to lodge a question that enables that to be done. Curiously, however, this question was not answered on Monday, and it has now been withdrawn, which suggests that an announcement might be imminent, but for some reason it is not yet ready to be made. That is a very curious issue, which perhaps we can explore further with Transport Scotland when it appears before the committee. However, as Mr Barn is here, I wanted to ask him whether he is aware of any moves by Government to advance the bidding process on that particular section, given that something appears to be happening in the background.

I have one follow-up question to that. If the intention was to award the contract by the end of this year, what is the reasonable last date at which a contract could have been put out to bid?

We are very tight for time.

It sounds as though there is still a lot of work to be done before you put it out to tender.

Convener, you have been very kind in letting me ask questions, so I will be brief in making final comments. My colleague Jamie Halcro Johnston, who represents the Highlands and Islands, had hoped to be here, but he is in another committee this morning. Clearly, he is interested in this matter, too.

As Kate Forbes said, this affects the Highlands but, elsewhere, it affects my constituents in Perth and Kinross, as part of the Mid Scotland and Fife region, who have very similar concerns not just about the accident rate on the A9 but about the economic impact of the road not being dualled.

It has been very helpful to hear from the petitioners and from Transport Scotland. We wait with interest to hear what will happen on the Tomatin to Moy section. It sounds as though some announcements are imminent on that. We hope so. However, that is only one of the remaining sections of the A9. It sounds as though the preparatory work has been done on all but one section—at Dunkeld—so the only issue that is holding up progress is finance, provided that the contract issues can be dealt with. That is a matter of political will and priorities.

I refer to the petitioner’s comments at the start of the meeting about the number of people who have died. Sadly, as we enter peak tourist season, I dread turning on the news in the morning and hearing about people who have lost their lives on the A9. Some of those are visitors to Scotland who have come on a family holiday but have lost their lives. Sadly, that will continue until the road project is finally completed.

I therefore encourage the committee—if it needs any encouragement—to be like a terrier in pursuing the matter to a conclusion and to continue to press the Scottish Government for the definite timescale that the petitioner is looking for.

That helps with understanding the context, although we knew on Monday, when the question was lodged, that we did not have a transport minister. That is a matter for the Scottish Government; perhaps the committee can pursue that separately.

Thank you, convener, and thank you for bringing me in. I wonder whether you can shed any light on this rather curious issue that I raised with the earlier witnesses. I am just looking for the exact reference.

A Government-initiated question was lodged on Monday afternoon in the name of Jim Fairlie MSP:

“To ask the Scottish Government when the new procurement for the dualling of the A9 between Tomatin and Moy will commence.”

As I am sure you are aware, the purpose of a Government-initiated question is to allow a statement to be made to Parliament, so such questions are lodged only when the statement is ready. Curiously, in this case—I have never come across this before—the question was not answered and it was withdrawn this morning, which is rather extraordinary. Can you shed any light on that?