A regional daily has issued a front page warning that more people will die without urgent action to upgrade a major road.

Aberdeen’s Press & Journal has warned the Scottish Government to “act now” before more people “pay with their lives” on the A9.

The demand comes after plans to dual the road between Inverness and Perth were shelved by the Scottish National Party-led administration to allow fresh input from new Transport Minister Fiona Hyslop

A total of 335 have died as a result of crashes on the A9 since 1979.

In a ‘Voice of the North’ editorial accompanying Friday’s front page, the Press & Journal said: “How many more people have to die on the A9 before the SNP finally lives up to its pledge to dual Scotland’s most notorious road?

“How many more families have to go through the anguish of picking up the pieces of shattered lives before the Holyrood government keeps a promise it made a full 16 years ago?

“Today, on behalf of the communities we serve across the north, we pose these questions directly to newly installed transport minister Fiona Hyslop – and urge her to put the long-awaited dualling project at the top of her ‘to do’ list.”

“Ms Hyslop, First Minister Humza Yousaf and the rest of the SNP administration in Edinburgh must at last live up to the commitments made by their party and dual the A9. And we pledge to continue to hold all of them to account until they deliver.

“The state of the road has for years been a national scandal – it is now a national tragedy.”

Speaking in Holyrood on Thursday, Mr Yousaf said: “It is only right, of course, that I have asked that transport team to look at the detail of the dualling of the A9.”