 I ask members who are leaving the chamber to do so as quickly and as quietly as possible. The final item of business is a member's business debate on motion 7301, in the name of Emily Carson, on long and short-term improvements that are required on the A75. This debate will be concluded without any questions being put to invite members who wished to participate in the debate, to press the request-as-peak buttons as soon as possible. I call Mr Carson to open the debate for around seven minutes. I am delighted to be in the position to bring this important debate to the chamber, but it is made that, after years and years of SNP promises, we are still having to highlight the failures of the Scottish Government to get shovels on the ground. Even the term A75 conjures a spectrum of emotions for my constituents in Galloway and West Dumfries, and indeed people will cry across the whole of the south of Scotland, including myself living on a few hundred yards from the road for almost every year of my last 55 years. The commuters, the haulage and delivery companies use it every day to our tourists, but most poignantly there are far too many people for which the term A75 brings back memories of tragedies with family and friends killed on what was once term Scotland's killer road. It is undoubtedly, however, the artery feeding the beating heart of my region. To put things into perspective, as the main route from the UK mainland to Belfast and on to Europe, the A75 carries around £17 billion worth of freight every year. Yet, rather bizarrely, it is a single carriageway for the vast majority of the 100 miles between Snorar and Gretna. Despite repeated calls for change, we still have a 40-mile-an-hour speed limit for heavy goods vehicles. This year's route, which runs from Craighaven in Northern Ireland before ending some 1,170 miles later in St Petersburg in Russia, has remarkably, in Dumfries and Galloway, the only two stretches of the road with speed restrictions at Crockett Ford and Springhome villages. Several paces were, during the summer, the road is regularly closed to allow local farmers to transfer cattle and sheep from one field to another. Little wonder has gained undesirable nickname of the goat track. Despite years of promises from the Scottish Government, upgrading the A75 just has not happened, while elsewhere there have been significant investment in such UK port roads. Very grateful. In 2011, the SNP promised to dual the A96. In a recent P&J poll, 93 per cent of respondents demanded that the SNP fulfil that promise, not least because, statistically, dual roads are safer and more environmentally friendly than what is there at the moment. Does the member therefore agree with me that this poll shows its time for this Government to listen to the north-east, finally, and get the A96 dualed? I thank the member for that intervention. I absolutely agree. I think that polls carried out right across Scotland, particularly in our more rural areas, would see a huge support for improvement on our road switch in too many places, like goat tracks. However, the lack of investment has not always been the case, with bypasses built in the A75 to alleviate the suffering experienced by residents in Glenloos, Newton-Stuart, Crasluth, Cretown, Gatys of Fleet, Twinham, Ringford, Tarth, Bridge of D, Castle Douglas, Dumfries, Cullen and Annan. Those were all sanctioned and built by the UK Government under Conservative Scottish Secretaries George Younger, Malcolm Ripken and Ian Lang. However, since devolution, investment has almost been non-existent. We are now regarded as a forgotten or ignored part of Scotland, with the whole of the south-west only attracting 0.05% of recent national infrastructure spend. More recently, however, the desperate need to improve the road was recognised in Sir Peter Hendy's union connectivity review, which recommended that the UK Government should provide cash to upgrade it. The SNP Government, having regrettably failed to get involved in the union connectivity review, unlike its counterparts and other devolved nations, have now seen the light and transport Scotland officials are now engaging with their opposition number at the Department of Transport to drive matters forward. Tomorrow they will meet again for a business case to be worked up, and that is the right and sensible way forward. The UK Government needs that business case to demonstrate good use of taxpayers' money, and the cost of that business case work will come out of the £5 million package that the chancellor announced last year. My understanding is that those talks are progressing well, and I hope that the Transport Minister, Jenny Gilruth and Cabinet Secretary Michael Matheson will stop using the demonus rhetoric, put constitutional grievance to one side and get behind this project, which in the long run could bring tangible benefits not only to the south of Scotland but to the whole of the Scotland and the United Kingdom. After all, 10 years ago, former Transport Minister Keith Brown had no truck in writing in requesting that the UK Government make funding specifically available for a number of A75 priority schemes, including Hard Gove and Kinmont, which, in his words, would improve infrastructure and provide jobs. I thank the member for taking the intervention. Does the member not recognise the substantial improvements that have been committed to the A75 through the STPR2 commitments that are being taken forward by the Scottish Government? I may say that, but we had commitments years ago when there was massive investment in Cairnryne. We have yet to see that. STPR2 has come up very short. We have also had Emma Harper, who was constructively writing to the UK Government asking for more money for the A75, so it makes a complete mockery of the stands taken by the current cabinet secretary and minister. It is in everybody's interest that we forge ahead and put politics aside to improve the vital route. We have heard about STPR2, and now we have got it. It was not worth waiting for. A coalition of Stena line, P&O, Ferries and Belfast harbour have been calling for major improvements on the A75 in 77 for decades. For the past few years, they have been engaged in private discussions with the Scottish Government about specific and targeted improvements, culminating in a fully researched proposal—safer, greener, better—for 20 targeted improvements. Sadly, STPR2 pledges to make only three of those 20 improvements in full, and a joint statement that the coalition stated, and I quote, we are deeply dismayed at the Scottish Government's proposal, we have engaged in what we felt were very productive discussions over three years, and they go on to say, we felt that we had a mutual understanding of what was required and a mutual commitment to making the necessary improvements. We carry about 1.75 million passengers, 500,000 cars and 400,000 freight vehicles every year on our 26 daily crossing. Each one of them has been let down. Worryingly, I insist that they cannot avoid the inevitability that STPR2 poses a material risk to future investment. One major road hauler, AM Logistics, who has already confirmed its reduced amount of freight being shipped by the A75, said that they currently use several shipping routes because of their geographical location in Larn. It has always chosen Cairnryne. However, over the past few years, they have slowly migrated to use in Hesham, Liverpool and Belfast routes, one of the reasons being the issues with the A75. The condition of the road is not good enough for HGV or regular road users. The speed limit is reduced to 40mph in many areas, and that makes it frustrating for other road users. Critically, Sarah, the spokeswoman, suggested that this frustration leads to rather aggressive and dangerous driving to get around the HGVs, making the road dangerous. A solution here would be to increase the speed limit to 56mph, where it is applicable. When gummery distribution in the midst, it has had numerous accidents in the A75, and they stress that the road is dangerous at parts because heavy, good vehicle, traffic and tices are dangerous overtaking manoeuvres from cars and water cycles. Nick McCulloch, managing director of Manfreight, employs more than 80 drivers at Cairnryne. He wants to double the number of employees, but will not do so while the road is in its current condition. He says that the road for a long time has not been fit for purpose. A majority single-rain route with speed restrictions is a very dangerous road. Indeed, there is a casualty every three days on the A75 and A77. More recently, two HGVs crashed in Crockitford with one of them narrowly missing a house, which could have had catastrophic impacts. The local communities of Crockitford and Spring Home have genuine fears over their safety every time they step out of their homes. More than 70 people attended a recent public meeting that I organised to voice their concerns. Both villages desperately need a bypass, and in the meantime, they are seeking average speed cameras to be installed as an interim measure. Presiding Officer, rarely a week goes past when the A75 is not closed to traffic in order to clear up after another traffic accident, a situation that cannot be tolerated any longer. I ask the minister to once again look into the possibility of the route having average speed cameras for the whole route in the short term. I call on the Scottish Government to give an absolute commitment to working with the UK Government to deliver the upgrades that we need in the face of health and safety concerns and to avoid the looming economic disaster clearly set out by businesses. Be innovative, be forward-thinking and transform the A75 into a green, clean route to a sustainable economic growth in the south-west of Scotland. We now move to the open debate. I call first Emma Harper to be followed by Oliver Mundell for around four minutes. I thank Finlay Carson on securing this debate, and I start by agreeing with him that it is time that we see much-needed upgrades on the A75 and the A77 that we have both campaigned for for years. I agree with so much of what Mr Carson says. We have spoken about the A75 and the A77 many times in this chamber through questions and debates previously. The upgrades are needed to improve the main arterial routes and should be done on the grounds of safety and efficiency. My condolences go to the families of the people who have lost their lives on those roads. It shows the absolute need for safety to be a primary concern for improvements to be made. I also pay tribute to both the A75 and the A77 action groups. Their continued campaign and efforts are absolutely welcome. We now have the publication of the Scottish Government's strategic transport review STPR2, as well as the UK Government's commitment to providing additional funding specifically to the A75. Mr Carson has mentioned that I wrote to the UK Government. Part of that rationale was that the infrastructure investment, the cost of widening the roads, dualling the roads, whatever we need to do at the roads, costs a phenomenal amount of money. Scotland can be borrowed under the current fiscal term, so I would be asking for that as an option. Yes, I will. Oliver Mundell, I am grateful to the member for giving way, but how does she explain why it has been possible to dual and improve roads in other parts of Scotland but it has not been possible for her party and government in 15 years to find the money to do anything in the south of Scotland and on the A75 in particular? Nothing, zero. There has been infrastructure investments made in the south-west of Scotland. I never said that it was impossible, Presiding Officer. One of the things that I wanted to do with the motion was to table an amendment to the motion, not because I disagree with Mr Carson's motion, but because I believe that it would benefit from additional detail. The motion that I submitted us an amendment, so, while his motion rightly cites the urgent need to improve the A75 and points to recent road accidents, including that he talked about the most recent in the village of Croquetford, it does not acknowledge the commitments that the Scottish Government has made for the A75 in the STP R2. The motion does not call for timescales, but for those improvements to be carried out. The STP R2 includes many hugely important recommendations for the A75 and the A77 improvements that many include in the A75 and the A77 action groups have been calling for for many years. I am no disagreeing with the Opposition across there. I get mailbag info for those as well, so I think that we need to work together to look at how we can help to make improvements and lobby for improvements on the roads. We know that STP R2 has looked at improving junctions and enhancing overtaken opportunities. I do not think that I will at this moment, but I am just looking at the time here. We need to look at the widening of the carriageways and the re-alignments and the alleviating pinch points and things like that. The STP R2 includes bypassing the villages of Springham and Croquetford and improving Cuckoo Beach roundabout in Dumfries as well, which is a wee bit further east compared to Mr Carson's constituency. It is worth mentioning that the villages are only the two villages in the UK that have a major euro class route going directly through them, so the villages bypass recommendations are extremely important. Instead of focusing on negativity around the time that those recommendations have or have not taken to come forward, I wanted to focus on getting those recommendations implemented. I am conscious of the time, and all transports devolved and in the absence of borrowing powers for this Parliament, funding from the UK Government could further enhance the commitments that are made in the STP R2, and I would therefore be grateful for an update from the minister on the timescales for investment in the A75 and the A77. I think that my time is up. I am pleased to see this important debate taking place in this first week of the parliamentary new year. It should not have to take place at all. Those improvements should have already been made, but given where we are and some of the other issues that have been debated in recent days, my constituents will at least be reassured that, thanks to the member for Galloway and West Dumfries securing the member's business slot, we are seeing something of importance for our region on the agenda in this Parliament. Improving connectivity rather than erecting barriers is the positive and constructive way to take things forward, and it will certainly deliver more jobs than erecting border posts. Indeed, the importance of the A75 to the whole of Dumfries and Galloway cannot be overstated, and the failure to properly upgrade the route has compounded our status as Scotland's forgotten region. Delivering that vital upgrade would significantly boost the region's economy and help to reverse the trend of large-scale employment moving towards the motorway network and out of our region altogether. Anyone who has driven the A75 at the wrong time of day or often at any time of day will understand the problem. In a small region, journey times between our communities can be a joke, particularly given the fact that many services, leisure pursuits and employment opportunities are concentrated in Dumfries or Carlyle. After 15 years of SNP Government, many individuals and businesses have given up hope. There have been so many false promises. What happened to the SNP manifesto promise to link Dumfries with the motorway network? Are some manifesto promises more important than others? What progress has there been on any transport? A couple of years ago, I proposed that Dumfries was made to be a city, and part of that commitment would be better infrastructure investment to connect cities to regional roads. Oliver Mundell opposed that. Do you not think that that would have been something that we could have looked at working together on to improve infrastructure investment in our main town in Dumfries and Galloway? Oliver Mundell shows how poorly Emma Harper knows her own region. As far as I was away, Ayr is not a city, and it has significantly better transport links through the A77, which is not great, but heading north for a town of its size, comparable to Dumfries, it has seen a much better deal. The same is true of other towns across Scotland that are not cities. Dumfries has been left behind by the SNP, and we have seen zero progress since the transport summit that was much heralded in 2016. It did not even manage to happen within the 100 days of the election, as promised, but it was a waste of time anyway. That was predicted by local residents at the time. What is all the more galling for those living and working in Dumfries and Galloway is that, before the SNP was in government, they used to claim locally at least that upgrading the A75 was their top priority. In fact, they claimed that they were the only party committed to doing so. However, the truth is today that they are the only party in government who has failed to deliver anything at all when it comes to this vital route. I have sympathy for Emma Harper because I do not know how she explains to local voters why her Government has done nothing. She comes to the chamber and makes the case here, but I do not know what behind closed doors she is doing to influence ministers because they seem to be prioritising projects for her colleagues elsewhere in the country. It is not too late for things to change, but despite the continued interest and the offer of support from the UK Government remaining on the table, the Scottish Government has been very slow to get there and even have a conversation. Yes, as Finlay Carson sets out, some modest progress has been made, but it really is not consistent with the level of support or effort local people rightly expect. Will the minister commit today to give that project a green light and turbocharge those talks? Will she get personally involved in those talks and make it happen? I will be keen to hear specific plans and a timetable from the minister this evening, but I doubt that we will get that, so maybe instead she might be willing to explain in straightforward terms to those living and working in Dumfries and Galloway why they deserve a second-class roads network and why they should watch investment elsewhere in the country as our region falls further behind. I suspect that the truth is that under the SNP, we are not going to see anything that even remotely comes close to meeting the needs of people in Dumfries and Galloway, because the truth is that the SNP just does not care about Dumfries and Galloway, and they do not care about the south of Scotland. That is why we see nothing. Thank you to Finlay Carson for tabling his motion. It is impossible to understate the growing anger that there is over what is frankly the utter contempt of the Government towards improving transport infrastructure in the south-west, and the utter neglect that this means for the local economy. That contempt, that neglect is now enshrined as this Government's policy for the next two decades as a result of a wholly inadequate strategic transport review. Even after years of delay and deliver in that review, the vague minor commitments to it to realign the road around Springfield and Crockettford in the A75 and improve the A77 from Turnbury to Gervin and Ballantry to Smyrton come with no detail of exactly what they are or even when they will happen. In fact, it is not even clear if they are firm commitments at all, given the fact that the report says that they are simply examples of possible improvements. However, we do know that they will not lead to the meaningful improvement in journey times that we all want to see, especially if the Government are as shortsighted as they were when it developed a Mabel bypass and failed to drill parts of it to provide adequate passing places. Bypassing Crockettford and Springhome will be a positive step for those communities who badly need that investment. However, by the time you build roundabouts, you reroute the road around those villages, it will make no difference to the time that it takes to travel 100 miles from Gretna to Cairnryan, and it will make no difference to the safety on the vast majority of the road. The volume of HGVs who use the A75 means that this is a 40-mile-an-hour road at best. It will still take twice the time to travel the same distance on the A75 as it would on the M74. The SNP Green Government argued that building new roads increases traffic. It takes people away from using other more environmentally friendly forms of transport to say. However, there is no railway to use between Gretna and Stranraer. The Government has just ruled one out as part of the very strategic transport review that we are debating today. Even the Greens who claim to want new railways fail to support the reopening of this line and the long list of rail for all policy commitments that they make. Both the SNP and Greens also fail to recognise the potential to make this a green transport corridor. Lockrind in Northern Ireland is the shortest crossing of the Irish Sea, so it has the lowest emissions from ferries. We know that many businesses choose to send their goods on longer road journeys to ports in England and Wales because their road infrastructure there makes the journey quicker, but certainly not more environmentally friendly. For far too long, the south-west has been Scotland's forgotten region when it comes to investment in our transport infrastructure. The Government is committed to investing in what might be over £4 billion in dual in the A9, which will be welcomed by communities there. There is not even a fraction of that investment promised for the A75 or A77. Of the £10.5 billion of investment in road infrastructure between 2008 and 2020, just 0.4 per cent went on the A75 and A77. It seems that that neglect is going to continue. No wonder that the south-west continues to have the lowest wages, the lowest level of business-led, inclusive jobs growth and the lowest gross value added in Scotland. When Stena invested more than £80 million in her new terminal in 2011, it was promised by the Government investment in the three hours rail regeneration in roads. We have seen cuts in what rail services there are between Glasgow and Stranraer. There has been no investment in the regeneration of Stranraer and no meaningful investment in improving the A75 and A77. That is not a case of the three hours. It is three Fs—fail, fail, fail. On a debate about who should fund this, my constituents do not care whether the funding comes from the Scottish Government or a UK connectivity report. They just want to see that funding take place. They want to see the improvements of those key roads and they want to see it null. I thank my colleague Fin Carson for securing time in this chamber to once again highlight the huge inequality and transport infrastructure investment between the central belt and the south-west of Scotland. Depressingly, Mr Carson, Mr Mendell and I, along with others from across the chamber, have been here many times before, trying to highlight to the Government the plight of the south-west, the ignored part of Scotland by the SNP-Green coalition. Time and again, transport minister after transport minister has said they were listening. All the way back to 2010, when the then First Minister, Alex Salmond, and opening the new port of Cairnryan promised significant investment to improve the transport infrastructure tune from the port, the A77, the gateway between Ireland and the central Scotland and beyond, and the A75, the gateway between Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom. Several transport secretaries later, and we have General Guruth inheriting the keep talking while kicking it into the long grass brief. STPR2 has cost a taxpayer hundreds of thousands of pounds and has delivered the square root of nothing for the south-west. It is as if we are all long feared that apply to withhold the crucial investment in the south-west. Heads south of air and you enter the land that the SNP and the Greens forgot. I want to look at the consequence of a transport policy developed by urban MSPs. Those very same MSPs who advocate the 20-minute communities, which of course would speak to our drive towards net zero. The areas of the south-west, as Colin Smith has just highlighted, have some of the lowest average incomes. Businesses are difficult to attract because of the difficulty of getting goods in and out of the area, coupled with the difficulty in attracting a workforce. That workforce, especially the young, is migrating away from this area to chase a career. Recently, it has been predominantly to the central belt. However, where are the most polluted areas in Scotland? It is the cities. The solution, of course, from the SNP and the Greens is to create low-emission zones in the cities where only low-emission vehicles can access. However, they fail to recognise that people will still need to access the city and move around the city, so they do nothing to enable that. They have cut the train timetables and taxi numbers are reducing because taxi drivers cannot afford electric cabs. The result is increasingly difficult to access the cities, meaning that the city economy and businesses are dying. The night-time economy is crashing, and I have dismayed the deterioration of Glasgow over the past few years. I will walk through it and see the number of two-let signs in view. Now our young workforce needs to look even further afield for jobs and careers, and it is little wonder that there are some 750,000 Scots living and working in England. What we are witnessing here is a hotspot of transport policies that are not even remotely connected, driven by a green ideology that seems to work in the premise of preventing people to go anywhere, leading to the demise of our economy across Scotland. I am convinced that this green ideological-led Government will not be happy until we have no economy and everybody lives up a tree in the trosucks and forages for nuts and berries. There is an alternative approach that could supercharge and drive our net-zero economy and really develop that green economy for the whole of the country, including outside the central belt. Yes, cabinet secretary, life exists outside the central belt. We need to develop a transport infrastructure that promotes green travel. Bypass the towns and villages on the A77 and A75 to develop the hundreds of 44-ton vehicles that trundle through towns and villages every day, create electric and hydrogen superhighways along those routes. While we are going to have to do the same for other routes like the A96, as Liam Kerr said, that would reduce emissions because there is no longer a line of heavy goods vehicles doing the stop-start routine. While we are at it, develop the single-track rail line and have passing points so more than one train can go on the route at one time. For goodness sake, build a spur into care lines so that goods can also be transported by rail. In turn, this was encouraged businesses to develop along the routes, creating a whole new economy. That is how you get to 20-minute communities. That is how we develop the economy across the whole of Scotland. Stop procrastinating and delaying. I say to the Scottish Government, we see you. It is time to develop a transport policy that actually works for the whole of Scotland, Deputy Presiding Officer. I now call Daniel Roos to respond to the debate minister for around about seven minutes. I congratulate Willie Carson on securing this evening's member's debate. I know that he has a particular constituency interest in the A75, as we have discussed in recent weeks. I want to respond to some of the points in this afternoon's debate in turn. I am also aware that Mr Carson organised a public meeting last month, which I was unable to attend, but I am more than happy to meet with the member, as I mentioned to him in correspondence before the end of last year. I have listened carefully to the discussion today, and I fully appreciate the passion that members have to see future improvements on the A75. I heard Mr Whittle talking about central beltism and the Scottish Parliament. I represent a constituency that I would not consider to be in the central belt, and parts of my constituency are extremely rural. Part of my constituency also has a trunk road A92, which runs all the way through it. He may recall that, as a backbencher, I spent much of my time in engagements with Mr Eustaf, who is the transport minister, to bring about the improvements that we now have on the A92 in my constituency, which is welcome. Clearly, the A75 plays a vital role in connecting the ports in Cairnain and with the wider trunk road network. It is also crucial in relation to Northern Ireland connections, but also from Scotland to England and beyond. One of my first engagements, when I was appointed last January, was to open the Mabel bypass, which is called Smith Reference. I fondly remember talking with members of the local action group about the benefits of that new stretch of road, which really brought home the very clear impacts that the new bypass is going to have for local people and already has had. Roads such as everything that is done in the transport portfolio are fundamentally about people and they are about connecting the people that we represent. I have noted today the discussion about working with the UK Government and the youth of the UK Government funding to help to accelerate the design development for projects in the A75. I think that members' debates are usually marked out for their consensual approach. That was not always the tone adopted today, but that is the tone that I will take. I think that we can resist the comments from a secondary position. If you want to make an intervention, I am sure that the minister would be a sympathetic minister. Very sympathetic to anything that Mr Carson would like to say. To that end, I will set out the engagement that Mr Carson has alluded to with my officials and UK Government officials, but I think that the context of that engagement is important, noting, of course, the devolved competencies that are involved. There was an announcement from the UK Government for transport back in March 21 on the A75. Then we had the March 21 UK Government announcement on a design for the union connectivity development fund. That was for an advanced design development on a select number of transport corridors that included the A75. It took us a wee while to get to the end of October of last year. Mr Carson might want to reflect on why that might have been the case for the UK Government to provide clearer details on what information was needed to enable a bid to go forward. That re-offer of funding that we had from the Chancellor in his autumn statement is something of a moot point, given that officials have been in on-going dialogue for almost a year now. It is worth pointing out that there have been no direct discussions with UK ministers on the A75. I think that Mr Mundell asked for me to become personally involved, but I was struck not to receive a letter following the Chancellor's autumn statement from the responsible minister. I very much hope, as Scotland's transport minister, that I will receive that courtesy soon. Will the minister agree that there are constructive talks between UK Government officials and Transport Scotland to build that business case that would enable significant levels of funding from the UK Government to address the issue that the people in the south-west of Scotland do not care where their money comes from? Is it a positive atmosphere that they are negotiating in and do you have any idea of the timetables when those discussions might conclude? Mr Carson spoke to significant levels of funding. I have to be very honest with the member. I do not know how much funding we are talking about here, because I have not had any written correspondence from the UK Government on that matter. However, he is right that there is on-going dialogue between officials, and that is to be welcomed. I spoke to my officials yesterday about that point, and they will be meeting with their UK counterparts tomorrow. The Scottish Government, as I think that Mr Carson outlined, is now required to submit a business case to the Secretary of State for Transport. That will then be presented to HM Treasury for approval. It is quite important to say that funding from the UK Government is not guaranteed, because it has to go through the process that has been introduced. As Mr Carson knows, given that transport is resolved—devolved rather—the Scottish ministers remain responsible for the whole of the motorway and the trunk load network in Scotland. That is not a point of grievance. That is just one second. It is not a point of grievance, but I think that it is important to reflect the constitutional reality that we live in. I have a solution, if Mr Carson would like to hear it, but I will first take the intervention. I thank the minister for giving way. I just wondered, while she is setting things out, if she could explain to my constituents why, after 15 years of SNP government, we do not have a business case, we do not have a detailed plan for any improvements on the route. We have a couple of vague promises about, in the case of Cuckoo Bridge, what I understand to be relatively minor improvements in Mr Carson's constituency. The tone that Mr Mundell is adopting is not particularly helpful. The Scottish Government has invested £133 million in the A75 since 2007. We are investing in this financial year alone £6.8 million in road maintenance. There are recommendations from SEPR2 on the route additionally. However, let us try to move forward in the spirit of collegiate working, because there are ways in which this could be done, working together, which will also respect the devolution settlement. I think that that is important, given that we are all members of the Scottish Parliament. For example, when I was culture minister, we had an agreed ministerial level memorandum of understanding on the Unboxed Festival. That supported funding to cultural organisations across the UK. That meant that each devolved Government had control of funding allocated to each strategic delivery body, and we also had responsibility for commissioning that through the funding that was allocated. There are ways in which the UK Government can work with Scottish ministers, as we have shown in the past. However, that does not need to come at the expense of the devolution settlement. I suppose that that is my concern, and I hope that Conservative members understand that. My officials will continue to work with their UK Government counterparts to better understand the requirements of the business case request. Again, that has not actually been made clear to my officials in Transport Scotland. I very much look forward to further feedback on that later in the week, tomorrow when they are scheduled to meet mewn. Indeed, for the A75, both Governments agree that that investment is needed. It is not in dispute, I do not think that we have heard today. On that point, we appreciate transport as devolved. However, in the south west of Scotland, we have had 15 years of waiting and had promises that money that has been devolved has not been spent down on that. However, that is a specific situation where the UK Government, through the Peter Hindi report, has absolutely identified the importance of the A75 to the whole of the United Kingdom, not solely to Scotland. I believe that it is quite right that the UK Government is stepping in. Why are not you welcoming that investment with open arms rather than going back and repeating over and over again that transport issues are devolved? Mr Carson, I reiterate that I do not know how much money the UK Government is offering. It has not written to me and I am Scotland's transport minister. At the very least, it is discourteous, but to Mr Carson's point about the responsibilities here, I do not want to have a debate with Mr Carson about the additional funding that apparently exists. I would like to see the colour of the money, please. I would like to make some progress. Recommendation 6 of the union connectivity review, as Mr Carson has alluded to, was published back in November 2021. That states that the UK Government needs to make a commitment to support a significant upgrade of the A75, given that the majority of the strategic benefits fall outside of Scotland. In our own SEPR 2, which has been alluded to by other members today, which was published back in December, we recognise the strategic importance of the road. SEPR 2 recommendation 40, access to Stranraer, Cain Rhine, highlights the need for improvements to both the A75 and the A77. I think that the Scottish Government's commitment here is clear, but we now need the UK Government to give that clarity and consider its approach to funding. I very much hope that we get that to more afternoon. Absolutely. Colin Smyth. I have a lot of sympathy over the argument about the clarity from the UK Government on what investment it is proposing to make in improving those roads. My constituency would also quite like to know what investment the Scottish Government plans to make in those roads, because we have waited years for the strategic transport review to publish, and we still do not know what is the level of planned investment that will be made in the A75 and the A77 to improve those roads by the Scottish Government. I do not think that it is fair to say that there has not been investment that Mr Smyth has outlined. As I mentioned in response to Mr Mundell, we have invested £133 million since 2007, and, additionally, there are key recommendations coming forward from SDPR2. The delivery plan will come forward in spring, and we will set out some of that detail in greater clarity. I would like to move on to talk briefly about road safety, if I may. I think that it is important that we touch on that as part of our commitment to casualty reduction. I think that Mr Carson touched on that, additionally. There has been significant investment in the A75 over recent years to manage traffic speeds and to consider reducing the risk of accidents, which is important, particularly given that, in the past year alone, across the country there has been a worrying increase in accidents, not just on the A75. There will be a further route study carried out in 2023, which will look at collision and risk reduction measures. For Croquetford, specifically, which I know was mentioned this afternoon in 2020, a new signal-controlled pedestrian crossing was introduced to help pedestrians crossing the trunk road, and, in terms of traffic speeds through Croquetford, the operating company Amy has been instructed by Transport Scotland officials to carry out a review of speeds through the village. One of the key technologies that we have for helping with road safety is, of course, that of safety cameras. That is an issue that Mr Carson has raised with me recently in a parliamentary question, and again today. There is already a mobile safety camera site at Croquetford on the A75. Over the past 12-month period, additional camera resources have regularly been deployed by the west safety camera unit. Further, I would like to make some progress. A further safety camera site selection process is under way, which will look at all routes across Scotland. That includes the A75, and should those locations be identified as a stretch of road that meets the minimum requirements, then a further camera deployment will be looked at. To conclude by noting the time, both the Scottish Government and UK Government are agreed that investment is needed on the A75 to improve road safety, ensuring that the main route between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK is fit for purpose. I would urge the UK Government to make a firm commitment to funding further investment in the A75, while recognising that responsibility for that, as well as all parts of the trunk road network, is that of Scottish ministers.