When we listened to the cabinet secretary talk about the A9 project, it was made clear that several sections would happen at once—that the work would not be done just one section at a time—otherwise they would never meet the 2035 deadline. Is there a contractor that is big enough to do all that work, or do you see it involving multiple contractors? Would that approach put off the bigger ones, because they would not see a long-term project going into the future for them?

Is one large managing contractor with all those other people working underneath it a joint venture by another name?

Will subcontractors have confidence that their risk will be minimised under such an arrangement? One of my big fears is that they will not.

Most people’s perception is that if there is a budget in a Government department, it will be spent. Looking back, did you have the budget for the A9 improvements? If so, what was the hold-up in spending it?

Will you clarify that for me? You had the money to do the prep, but you did not have the money to do the work and actually build it—is that right?

To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to take any action on any concerns that it may have regarding the 2018 GP contract in relation to rural practices. (S6O-03003)

I, too, thank Ariane Burgess for bringing this very important subject to the Parliament.

I will be a little bit boring and mention some of the things that I have done in my life. In 1996, I started a project with a landowner that I was working for to replace 600 acres of Caledonian pine in the Cairngorms. It was a big project. We collected seed and grafted trees on to roots that had been specially prepared for them, and we spent £20,000 of consultants’ time to try to get the scheme through the local bodies that needed to be consulted.

One would think that it would be an easy thing in the Cairngorms to plant more Caledonian pine trees, replacing the forest, but it was not. It took nearly 10 years of my life, and I probably still bear the scars of trying to achieve that. Therefore, I absolutely believe that, if we are going to take this project on and do it properly, we need to make the process easier.

People might be surprised about my doing this, but I congratulate Fergus Ewing on something that he did in the previous session of Parliament, which was to try to speed up the process of getting consent. He went to Jim Mackinnon, who produced a report. I am not sure that it speeded up the process, but we jolly well ought to speed it up, because we need these woodlands now—not tomorrow, next year or in 10 years’ time. We need to start building them now and regenerating the stock that we have.

I say to the Government that it will have to do better at meeting its planting targets. Since 2016, I think that it has managed to achieve the targets that it has set itself in only two years, even though it has adjusted them downwards. We have lost 17,000 hectares of trees that should have been planted, and those could have been the Caledonian pines that we need to replace.

Therefore, I urge the Government and all the organisations that are involved in the project to set about more targeted zoning and planting of those trees. They need to work out where we want them and how we will get them. After doing that, they need to work out how we will get people to invest in them, because, as Colin Smyth has said, there are people who want to do so. Also, as Craig Hoy mentioned, the issue of planting grants is a real issue. Reducing the planting grants by 41 per cent—a £30 million reduction in the budget—does not really help. That will not get us more of those forests or protect the forests that we need to protect.

I agree with Colin Smyth, and probably with Ariane Burgess, about deer control. We need to do a more significant job on deer control. When the minister came in and produced a plan to kill more male deer, I spoke against that. It is not male deer that propagate the population but female deer, and we need to get on top of their numbers. I have asked the minister whether she is happy to come to the hill with me and some stalkers to see what the real problems are with deer control. I hope that she will respond to that in her summing-up speech. I have offered you an open invitation, on any date that suits you, to come to talk about the issue. I hope that you will find time to do that, minister.

It is clear that the 2018 contract has not worked for rural practices. That issue is now being compounded by NHS Highland withdrawing funding for GP-enhanced services. Will the Scottish Government address that with NHS Highland, as it clearly further impacts GPs’ ability to provide services for conditions such as diabetes and alcohol misuse, to mention only two?

I thank the member for giving way. I agree with you that hydrogen is a real opportunity for us, partly because it also means that we do not have to have pylons all the way across Scotland—we can have pipes instead. However, given that the Government has drawn back from its commitment to invest £100 million in hydrogen, how do you think we will achieve that?

I apologise, Presiding Officer. I hope that the minister will do that.

The other thing that I will mention on deer control is the importance of working together. Deer migrate from one estate to another. My view and understanding is that we can get deer numbers down one year, but they sure as hell pop up the next year if we do not make sure that we have controlled them.

It would be remiss of me if I did not mention one of the things that I have found most difficult, which is the introduction of beavers into the Cairngorms national park. I have found that difficult because they will eat the very trees that I have spent a huge amount of my life trying to propagate and move into the Cairngorms. I am happy to admit that, by signing off stalkers to kill deer, I have consigned to death probably about 25,000 to 30,000 red deer in Scotland. Then, having done that to protect the trees, we have introduced a species that lives on trees, eats them, fells them and uses them for their advantage. I find that really difficult.

In closing, I would say that, although I respect the huge amount of work that has been done by all the organisations that Ms Burgess has mentioned, there are other people—private landowners—who are doing a huge amount of work as well. We should encourage them, and we should make sure that they have the facilities to do the very job that we are asking everyone to do, which is to ensure that our Caledonian pinewoods expand and do not contract.