SCOTTISH ministers were forced to abandon their opposition to a public inquiry into suicides in Dundee today.

SNP Health Secretary Shona Robison has faced calls to resign over the deaths of men in Dundee who were failed by NHS Tayside’s Carseview centre.

David Ramsay, who was 50, killed himself in 2016 after being twice turned away by the mental health unit. His case was raised by Scottish Labour leader Richard Leonard at First Minister’s Questions last week.

After Labour tabled a motion in the Scottish Parliament backing calls for a public inquiry, the SNP government conceded it would convert the probe into the deaths into a public inquiry if it was not delivering justice.

Mr Ramsay’s niece Gillian Murray, a former SNP member, has received a torrent of vile abuse on social media from nationalists since she spoke out and called for Ms Robison’s resignation last week.

Labour health spokesman Anas Sarwar said: “The tragic case of David Ramsay was not an isolated incident. There are clear problems with mental health services across the region. It is not confined to one unit in one hospital.

“The exceptional campaigning of the families of Dundee has pushed this to the top of the agenda in Scotland.”

Ms Robison, a Tayside MSP, had already faced criticism for her handling of a separate financial crisis at her local NHS board.

After the Labour motion calling for a public inquiry was backed by Tories and Lib Dems, the SNP tabled an amendment conceding ground.

It said that the current inquiry commissioned by NHS Tayside could be converted to a public probe if it is “hindered in its undertaking by either non-co-operation by providers or by lacking appropriate independence.”

Speaking in the debate, Ms Robison said families could be “reassured that the Scottish government will convert it to an inquiry” if it failed to deliver justice.

Tory MSP Miles Briggs said there were “many unanswered questions” and that “from the outset it was clear a wider independent inquiry” would be needed than that commissioned by NHS Tayside.

Labour’s Jenny Marra said she had been deeply unimpressed by Carseview’s attitudes to criticism when she visited the unit. “The presentation I received was possibly one of the most defensive accounts of public services I have ever heard,” she said.

The Samaritans can be contacted on 116-123 or at samaritans.org.