A96 accidents and assessment work spend: EIR release

Information requested

The following:

• In the last five financial years, how many accidents have occurred on the A96 between Inverness and Aberdeen?
• How many of these have been (i) Fatal (ii) Serious (iii) Slight?
• How many of these occurred on (I) dualled parts of the road or (ii) non-dualled parts of the road?
• In the current financial year (2024-25) how many accidents have occurred on the A96 between Inverness and Aberdeen?
• How many of these were (I) Fatal (ii) Serious (iii) Slight?
• In the last five financial years, how much has been spent on the A96 between Inverness and Aberdeen?
• How much is earmarked to be spent on the A96 in the next five financial years?

Response

As the information you have requested is 'environmental information' for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.

This exemption is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.

Accident Data

Please see Annex A to this response for details of the accident data requested.

In the last five financial years, how much has been spent on the A96 between Inverness and Aberdeen?

Please see the following table for the management and maintenance costs for the A96 trunk road for financial years 2019/20 - 2023/24. While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance Transport Scotland does not have the information you have requested. Therefore we are refusing your request under the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs. This is because the 2024/25 spend is not available as of yet.

This exception is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exception. While we recognise that there may be some public interest in information about spend on the A96 trunk road, clearly we cannot provide information which we do not hold.

Financial Year	Spend
2019/20	£5,244,010
2020/21	£7,711,004
2021/22	£13,408,285
2022/23	£11,635,776
2023/24	£14,631,896

In the last five financial years, £42,916,373.98 has also been spent in taking forward the development and assessment work on the A96, including that associated with undertaking the A96 Corridor Review, along with design work on A96 Dualling Inverness to Nairn (including Nairn Bypass), Hardmuir to Fochabers and East of Huntly to Aberdeen, from 01 April 2019 to 25 November 2024, the date of the request.

How much is earmarked to be spent on the A96 in the next five financial years?

We are refusing your request under the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs. Under the terms of the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs (information not held), Transport Scotland is not required to provide information which it does not have. We do not have the information you have requested because we do not hold details of expenditure “earmarked to be spent on the A96 in the next five financial years”. Spend on each individual project is managed within relevant budget lines identified through the annual budget setting processes. The draft Scottish Budget 2025-26 was laid before the Scottish Parliament on 4 December 2024 for approval, a copy of which is available from the Scottish Parliament website at Scottish Budget 2025 to 2026 - gov.scot. The Scottish Government aims to have the Scottish Budget Bill passed by Parliament by the end of February each year.

This exception is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exception. While we recognise that there may be some public interest in the requested information, clearly, we cannot provide information which we do not hold.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

EIR 202400442318 - Information Released - Annex

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