Road salt plea to Scottish Government
06/01/2010
Council leader urges minister to tell the truth about supplies
A council boss has urged the Scottish Government to “come clean” over a lack of salt supplies were to treat the country’s frozen roads.Councillor Ivor Hyslop, Conservative leader of Dumfries and Galloway Council, spoke out as his local authority ran out of grit to make the area safe during one of the coldest winters in a century. He said he had raised concerns with Holyrood over shortages more than two weeks ago.
Earlier this week, Finance Secretary John Swinney said Scotland had a “very substantial” supply of salt in place.
Mr Hyslop said: “We have been alerting the Government to the situation for at least two weeks and there has been no improvement. It’s time they came clean. We need the Government to put its emergency plan into operation and to give priority to rural areas now.”
With salt supplies down to 300 tonnes, emergency deliveries are expected over the next couple of days. The Scottish Government said that an added 500 tonnes was due to be delivered to Dumfries and Galloway today.
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