Labour says SNP trams delay ‘costing millions’
SNP delays and dithering on Edinburgh’s trams and airport rail link are costing taxpayers millions of pounds a month, shadow finance secretary Wendy Alexander claimed today.
And she promised Labour would keep up the pressure on the new government to allow the two projects, approved by the previous parliament, to go ahead.
She told the Nationalists: “We will come back week after week until you are forced to recognise the will of parliament, accept the need for these projects and deliver for the nation.”
The SNP election manifesto included a pledge to scrap the projects. And earlier this week Finance Secretary John Swinney announced the Auditor General will review the cost forecasts and report back before the summer recess.
But in a debate in the Scottish Parliament today, Ms Alexander said the delay was costing around 3.5m a month on trams and 1.5m a month on the Edinburgh Airport Rail Link.
And she claimed there was an internal power struggle in the SNP between Alex Salmond and the leadership on one side and public transport specialist and backbencher Chris Harvie “and his allies who dare not speak out in this chamber”.
Edinburgh West Liberal Democrat MSP Margaret Smith insisted the SNP had no mandate to scrap the projects. And she told MSPs: “This is about taking funding away from Edinburgh. Why are trams the right thing for Strasbourg, Dublin, Paris and Manchester but not Scotland’s Capital? Is it because it is not in the North East?”
She also quoted concerns voiced during the last parliament by Auditor General Robert Black about investigating transport projects while they were still ongoing.
He said at the time: “I’m reluctant to get into real time evaluation - we are not resourced to do so and doing so would confuse accountability.”
But the Tories, who had backed a cross-party move to back the trams last week, welcomed the Auditor General’s review.
Tory business manager and Edinburgh Pentlands MSP David McLetchie said: “Labour and the Lib Dems want us to sign a blank cheque for trams and EARL, which is the height of financial irresponsibility on their part. If I am asked whether we are in favour of these projects, I can do no better than echo the words of that great Scottish philosopher Kenny Dalgleish: maybe aye or maybe no. But any decision we make will be better informed by the Auditor General’s report and I think it’s worth a short delay to see what he says.”
Lothians Labour MSP George Foulkes, making his maiden speech at Holyrood, accused the Nationalists of having an anti-Edinburgh agenda and launched an attack on “Kamikaze Kenny”.
He said: “It’s a real pity the Executive has got off to such an anti-Edinburgh agenda on transport, led by Kenny MacAskill, the SNP MSP for Edinburgh East and Musselburgh.”
But transport minister Stewart Stevenson insisted it was “normal, natural and necessary” for governments to review projects at key stages, especially when they first took office.
“Who wouldn’t want to make sure they were still getting the benefits they expected at the price they had been promised?” he said.
The cost of the Stirling-Alloa-Kincardine railway had been estimated at 65 million to 70 million - yet SNP ministers were told “within days of taking office” that this had now gone up to 83 million, he said.
“It is precisely to bring the necessary objectivity to these projects that we invited Audit Scotland to look at the projects.”
He said ministers would consider the report swiftly and allow time for a debate in parliament before the summer recess.
