Scotland’s transport secretary Màiri McAllan is promising to ‘urgently work on Transport Scotland’s contract terms’ to make them more favourable for future procurements on the dualling of the A9.
She made the commitment at The Inverness Courier newspaper’s A9 Crisis Summit eent, after it was claimed that the terms and conditions of Transport Scotland’s contracts were commercially unfavourable, and that is why there was just one bid on the Tomatin to Moy section of the road. The bid was rejected by Scottish ministers in February as it was seen to be too high in cost.
Ms McAllan said she was going to see what she can do on the risk profile to make this a more attractive offer, so that more companies can bid for work in order to make progress on the A9 dualling project.
During the debate, Ms McAllan safety fears when driving on the A9, saying she felt “her heart was in her hands” on the road.
“I want to make that very clear. It’s important to know that some of these points have been considered by officials who have been working on this for a long time, but for my part, I want to take all of this and do anything that I can to improve the situation.”
(Picture – Google Streetview)
