So far, a feasibility study for the Strathclyde Police HQ relocation has cost £1m – paid for by Clyde Gateway – but if the current plan is not given the go-ahead, it is expected to cost at least an additional £6.5m to move to an alternative site.
However, members of Strathclyde Police Authority (SPA) have raised concerns about the plan, insisting that a decision on a new force headquarters is problematic when the country's eight forces are likely to be amalgamated into one and no decision has yet been taken on the location of the headquarters.
A decision on the relocation from Pitt Street in central Glasgow to Dalmarnock, close to the epicentre of the 2014 Commonwealth Games, is due to be taken in January but members of the authority have raised serious doubts about their jurisdiction to agree the sign-off.
A visit to the new site for the authority members was due to take place on January 10.
Earlier this year Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill wrote to the chairman of Strathclyde Police's governing body saying public money should not be spent on major projects – making specific reference to a plan to move the city centre HQ to Glasgow's east end – while the debate on potentially reducing the number of police forces was ongoing.
At the time, he was accused by senior force insiders of interfering in operational policing matters, insisting it should be down to Chief Constable Steve House and his authority to decide on whether a new HQ is right for the west of Scotland.
Since then, the decision has been made to move to a single force for the whole country, and members of the police board say they can not now make a decision on a project to be built once they are obsolete.
LibDem councillor Christopher Mason said: "There is a fundamental constitutional difficulty about the Strathclyde Police Authority being asked to take responsibility for a major building project in Dalmarnock for the use of the proposed Scottish Police Service.
"I accordingly do not understand how we can be asked, when we hold our special meeting on January 26, to approve the award of building contracts for this project, or how we could accept such advice with propriety, unless we are requested specifically to do so by Scottish Ministers and Scottish Ministers take full responsibility for this decision.
"To put it bluntly, the Chief Constable of Strathclyde does not have the authority acting on his own to give advice to the Strathclyde Police Authority on the future needs of the Scottish Police Service; and the SPA does not have the right to take such a decision."
Mr Mason added: "In addition to the constitutional difficulty, I think there may be a political risk in taking the action which is being urged so strongly on us by the project team."
A Scottish Government spokesman said: "The Government has begun preparations for transition to the new police service, working with the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland and other partners.
"Ministers believe that decisions on long-term investment would be best dealt with by the new authority once it is established, in conjunction with the new chief constable, whoever he or she may be."
