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Okay. The answer is no, then—you are not giving that assurance, cabinet secretary, I am afraid.

Surely, if we assume a capital budget of £4 billion to £6 billion for the years ahead—that is what it has been historically—there is more than enough money to fund the project from existing capital. Cabinet secretary, are you not able to say that, if the consultation concludes that public finance is not the right option, you will nonetheless be able to provide the assurance that the funding can come from the existing capital budget, which is plainly more than sufficient to do the work, provided that the Highlands are treated as a priority?

The figure of £100 million comes from adding the compulsory purchase costs, which you have estimated and mentioned, to Transport Scotland’s figure of £90 million that applies to the whole A96 project and was valid last summer. However, that is a detail.

Has there not been, sadly, a delay in the processing of the various milestones of that project? I refer you to the Transport Scotland document of February 2016, which I have here. It states that the draft road orders and compulsory purchase orders were to have been issued in 2016. However, those were not finalised until 2024. The process took eight years, which in itself must be a record.

Has not the Scottish Government deliberately delayed the completion of the necessary statutory processes? It seems, even now, to be unwilling to give a categorical, unambiguous assurance that the promises that we have made collectively, as individuals and politicians, for the past 14 years will in fact be funded by the Scottish Government. Meanwhile, projects in other parts of Scotland are going ahead. Has that delay not been quite deliberate, cabinet secretary?

Can I just address that?

Gillian Martin has taken a close interest in the petition and, from statements in and outside the chamber, I know that she has a keen interest in pursuing that work.

I am aware of a number of dynamic developments that are taking place at the moment. For example, the Republic of Ireland now mandates community benefit at a rate, in effect, of €8,000 per megawatt. That is compulsory. Here, the £5,000 per megawatt rate is not mandatory because there are no legal powers to mandate it, as has been noted by the Scottish Government.

However, there is movement. Just yesterday, a senior official at Highlands and Islands Enterprise informed me that SSEN Transmission is to set up a model of community benefit for upgrades to pylons and infrastructure. That is a new development, and I am keen to find out more about it.

In addition, at least one offshore wind developer—BlueFloat Energy, together with Nadara—is considering and promoting community ownership for offshore wind. That is an example that many other projects may wish to follow, so it could have enormous importance.

Finally, coupled with that, I understand that the UK Government is not unsympathetic to some kind of scheme for community ownership, and one wonders whether that might be one of the most practical purposes for funding from Great British Energy, possibly alongside the Scottish National Investment Bank.

HIE has a close interest in taking all of that forward, because much of the activity is in the Highlands and Islands.

Although I appreciate that we are moving towards the end of this session of Parliament, all of those developments—and probably others of which I am unaware—mean that I am keen to write again to the Acting Minister for Climate Action to ask for further information as to when the energy strategy and just transition plan will be published and whether, specifically, it will contain proposals for community ownership, and to ask for some detail of the work that is being done with the UK Government and for a ministerial statement at some point, perhaps in the autumn.

Community ownership is an idea for which the time has come—interest in it is growing throughout the country, and concern is growing about some aspects, including visual impacts, of renewable energy in Aberdeenshire, the Highlands and many other places south of Scotland.

If we do not get on with it now, Scotland and Britain will be missing a trick. I am sorry to go on about it for so long, but I think that there are compelling reasons to keep the petition open and to allow the petitioners the full opportunity to benefit from what seems to be a congenial political environment.

My instinct is that you are probably right, and in saying that I am mindful of the huge pressures on the transport budget in all respects. Having said that, the petition is a new one, so I wonder whether we could write to Transport Scotland and ScotRail to ask whether the proposal to reopen the Alloa to Dunfermline line for passenger services will be reviewed in light of what the petitioner has described at some length in his response to the minister as the very significant housing development in the west Fife area, and general development in that area around Rosyth and so on. We could also ask what consideration has been given to using connections to provide rail services linking Dunfermline with Glasgow and Stirling without the need to go via Edinburgh.

That would at least get on the record from Transport Scotland and ScotRail what exactly they are saying about that. I strongly suspect that, once we get the responses within a few weeks, we may conclude that, with the elections next year, the issue is really a matter for debate at that time and of each party setting out its priorities for what improvements it would support in the next session of Parliament. That would be part of the process. However, because the petition is a new one, we owe it to the petitioner to try to get that further information, at the very least.

On the face of it, this is a matter for local authorities, but on the other hand, when the petition was considered before, I think that it was your good self, convener, who suggested that we write to the Minister for Local Government, Empowerment and Planning to seek his reflections on the UK-wide survey by the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives and Senior Managers that found that 44 per cent of council chief executives and senior managers had identified adult social care as a service at risk of cuts due to very large gaps in local government budgets. I am not prepared to sweep the issues under the carpet until we have heard from the minister.

We have heard subsequently from the cabinet secretary, but the reply, which I am looking at, does not seem to me to answer the specific question that you raised. I am not quite sure whether that is the case, as it is quite a long reply, and I have just reread it briefly. However, if I am correct, the question remains unanswered and we should at least pursue it, as well as writing to COSLA, which could no doubt be asked to comment on that particular survey, too.

You could say that all local services are subject to the risk of cuts, and that, therefore, 44 per cent might not be a particularly remarkable statistic. However, it is nearly half, and we all know that this is a pretty serious issue when it comes to care for the elderly population. It is going to become an even more serious and more difficult issue in years to come as the proportion of elderly people and the number of people requiring care increase.

It could be brought back in some form quite easily, if, after the review—

The petitioner argues that the current system is not working, but that is disputed. If the current system is still not working after the review, the option is open for the petitioner to bring the issue back, perhaps in the next parliamentary session.

A great deal of material has been provided since we last met, and it is only fair to allude to some of it. I was astonished to see that NatureScot is arguing that it does not have enough information about the extent to which there is predation of hares. Of course we have that information. It actually has the temerity to say that

“several more years’ worth of data are needed before this survey can provide a clearer picture of the distribution and numbers of mountain hares. ”

Unfortunately, that seems to be an argument for doing little. However, we have had two submissions from Barry Blyther very recently—on 4 and 14 March—and I gather that he might have further information for the committee that he has not yet had the opportunity to convey to us. Therefore, I suggest that we give him the opportunity to provide that additional information, which I believe might be quite positive, indicating some supportive action from the minister and, to be fair, from NatureScot.

A copious submission from Barry and Roxanne Blyther, explains the pretty sad situation that, because of the inability to allow their male eagle, Stanley, to practise its natural activities in flying, it has been unable to mate with the female. That is pretty sad and “heart wrenching”, as Barry puts it. In the interests of encouraging avian amour but also to make a serious point, I say that it is pretty sad when NatureScot prevents nature from taking its natural course. It is a bit perverse, if you come to think of it, because that should be exactly what it encourages.

Having said all that, we should debate the matter in the chamber on the basis of the principle that Barry Blyther and his colleagues were not provided with the opportunity to be heard when the mountain hare ban was introduced. The current minister has gone further than previous ministers in admitting that that was entirely wrong and indefensible. It has taken far too long to get to that stage, and we should have a debate, but we do not need to do that if the minister will take sufficient action. I do not think that sufficient action can be taken through guidance—primary legislation is almost certainly required—and I do not see why that action cannot be taken through one of the bills that is progressing through Parliament, such as the Natural Environment (Scotland) Bill. If there is a will, there is a way. It is a very simple thing to do, so why does the Government not just do it?

We should write to the Acting Cabinet Secretary for Net Zero and Energy to seek an update on the Scottish Government’s work on the guidance and to clarify how we can rectify the mischief that plainly occurred.

Excuse me if I am repeating a matter that is on the record, but I believe that the committee also agreed to write to the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee to raise the point of principle, to indicate that we are minded to have a debate and to ask for its views on the matter, because I think that it arose in connection with another amendment that was sought to be lodged at stage 3 without the opportunity for proper consideration.

We should say that we are minded to have a debate, unless, of course, action can be taken to sort out the issue without one, thereby avoiding the embarrassment that that would cause to the Government for not admitting that it got this wrong. Why can the Government not just admit that it got it wrong? There is no defence whatsoever—it is a slam dunk, politically speaking.

I hope that my candour will be noted by my friend Jim Fairlie, the minister, and that he will resort to the Churchillian “Action this day”.