For clarity—I think that Liam Kerr has asked about this before—the issue is that national insurance does not have to be paid, which means that the Government employs people without paying national insurance. I think that that is the issue that you are being asked to justify, minister.

Chris Wilcock is trying to catch your eye—you might not want him to.

The committee will therefore report the outcome of the instrument in due course. I invite members to delegate the authority to me as convener to finalise the report for publication. Are members happy to do that?

Members indicated agreement.

Welcome back. Our next agenda item is an evidence session as part of our inquiry into a modern and sustainable ferry service for Scotland. I refer members to the papers for this item, which is the 11th evidence session in our inquiry into Scotland’s ferry services.

Our first panel today is made up of representatives from Caledonian Maritime Assets Ltd, which is a company owned by the Scottish Government and is the asset owner of some of Scotland’s ports and vessels. On behalf of the committee, I am pleased to welcome from CMAL: Morag McNeill, chair; Kevin Hobbs, the chief executive officer; Jim Anderson, director of vessels; and Ramsay Muirhead, director of port infrastructure and planning. I thank them for accepting our invitation. We are very pleased to have them here.

I believe Kevin Hobbs would like to make a brief opening statement.

Thinking about what you have just said, I am told that the yard that is building 801 and 802 has questioned whether it was sensible to commission liquefied natural gas vessels. It has been instructed to provide such vessels, because that was the commitment. Was LNG a mistake? Is it a fuel that we should be using in future for our ferries, given that it is difficult to get, comes in a lorry from Kent, I think, and needs special storage? Is it going to be a fuel of the past rather than a fuel of the future?

That was quite spooky, but I am now back on track.

Of course, I always like to focus on the issues, but the issue is that personalities have not dealt with the problem. They have had long enough to deal with it, and we are all sick and tired of it in the Highlands.

Sixteen years this Government has had—16 years of doing nothing. I say to the Government the simple words that most Highlanders would say: shame on you. Get on with the job and give us the A9 that you promised us in 2007.

Let us get down to the real facts and let us talk about the journey times from Perth to Inverness. On a good day, someone travelling by car will take two hours and 30 minutes, and, on a really good day, someone travelling by train will take two hours and 10 minutes. Those times have not changed since 1986. I know from driving the road late on a Thursday night and late on a Monday night nearly every week of the year just how dangerous that road is. It should have been upgraded.

We should not forget that, in 2007, at the same time as the SNP promised to upgrade the road, it promised to upgrade the rail. It had an aspiration to shave 35 minutes off the train travel time from Inverness to Edinburgh. That has not been delivered. The aspiration to shave 10 minutes off the two-hour-plus journey time from Inverness to Perth has not been delivered either. What has been delivered? The shaving of 10 minutes off the journey time between Glasgow and Edinburgh. That journey time is now 40 minutes. Highlanders feel ignored, and rightly so.

Let us turn to the A9. I think that The Inverness Courier’s headline is very appropriate:

“R.I.P. SNP promise of dualling A9 by 2025
Born: 2007 Died: February 8, 2023”.

That is what we feel like in the Highlands—we are left with a tombstone on which the SNP’s promise is written.

Graham Simpson mentioned the roll of dishonour for transport ministers. He mentioned Stewart Stevenson. He mentioned Keith Brown. He mentioned Derek Mackay, Humza Yousaf, Paul Wheelhouse and Graeme Dey, and finally Jenny Gilruth, who I feel sorry for because she has been left carrying the can. They are looked on in the Highlands as the modern-day Dick Turpins—the highway robbers who have denied us the access route that we deserve. The problem is that, when we describe them as that, it maligns Dick Turpin, because his words were, “Stand and deliver,” and not one of those ministers has delivered anything for the Highlands when it comes to connections.

A lot of noise is being made on the SNP back benches by one of its Highland MSPs: Fergus Ewing. He is a man who has been in government since 2007. He is a Highlander. He has been a Government minister, he has been a cabinet secretary and, for the past 14 years, he has been missing in action. It is only now that he is showing what I would describe as barrack room bravery, having shown absolutely no battlefield bravery when he stood to lose his extra pay and pension and his ministerial car.

I am sorry that he is not here today, but I hope—

No, I will not. I think that now is the time to listen. I am sad that Fergus Ewing is not here today, and I know that he has good reasons for not being here today. I hope that, at decision time, his technology will not fail him, as it seems to do when he has to make a hard decision.

We desperately need to stop the accidents on the A9. We need to connect the Highlands, and this Government—

Does the member agree that the lack of support from Highlands and Islands SNP MSPs will not be forgotten by their constituents, whom they have let down?

Will the member give way?