THE transparency of Scotland??s largest public transport partnership has been called into question after a senior executive was able to hand nearly £5 million worth of contracts to a bus firm where his son worked without having to declare a conflict of interest.

THE transparency of Scotland??s largest public transport partnership has been called into question after a senior executive was able to hand nearly £5 million worth of contracts to a bus firm where his son worked without having to declare a conflict of interest.

Eric Stewart, assistant chief executive in charge of operations at Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT), recommended that the taxpayer-funded contracts be awarded to Hamilton-based Henderson Travel without disclosing publicly that his son, Neil Stewart, was employed as the firm??s transport manager.

Henderson Travel went into administration in October and the majority of its bus contracts were transferred under emergency powers to McGill??s, the bus company run by Rangers directors James and Sandy Easdale.

Neil Stewart was first appointed by Henderson Travel as their transport manager in August 2013.

At an SPT committee meeting held on January 31, his father Eric recommended that Henderson Travel be awarded a package of subsidised bus contracts worth £2.4m over three years to run around 20 bus services across Glasgow, Lanarkshire and East Dunbartonshire. They also won a three-year contract worth £205,000 to run an East Kilbride-Glasgow service.

Six weeks later, Henderson Travel was awarded a five-year contract worth £2.1m to run a service in South Lanarkshire.

At neither of these meetings, nor in the tendering reports submitted to the committee by Eric Stewart, did he declare his family links to Henderson Travel.

Councillors said they were unaware of the relationship but would have expected to be notified.

However, it is understood that under SPT protocol only elected members of the committee are duty-bound to declare such conflicts, while the executives heading up the public body are not.

Instead, Mr Stewart said he lodged his son??s employment status privately in November 2013 in an internal SPT database known as the Register of Conflicts.

This is impossible to verify, however, as SPT have no statutory duty to provide evidence of the log and it is exempt from Freedom of Information requests.

Data protection rules mean that unless someone already knew that Eric Stewart??s son was employed by Henderson Travel, they could not access that entry because it would breach Neil Stewart??s right to privacy.

A number of councillors said they had never heard of the Register.

Susan Aitken, leader of Glasgow City Council SNP group, said: ??It??s not good enough for an organisation that is responsible for so much public money to keep financial information hidden from both elected representatives and the public. SPT must now explain why, yet again, they have failed the transparency test.??

The SPT committee was later notified by Eric Stewart that a number of bus services previously awarded to Henderson Travel were now being run by the Hamilton firm on a more expensive, temporary basis.

Thirteen contracts were re-tendered after Henderson??s reneged on the price they had promised to operate them for but seven were then awarded back to the firm on a short-term basis - meaning the firm was earning more money to operate fewer routes.

Henderson Travel ceased trading in October. The following day McGill??s took over the running of 13 of Henderson??s SPT contracts.

It comes months after SPT were embroiled in an expenses scandal when seven bosses racked up a travel bill of £38,000 on ??fact-finding?? junkets to Europe and Canada.

In 2010, the Labour-run quango was engulfed in a £120,000 expenses scandal which culminated in then chief executive Ron Culley resigning.

Patrick Harvie, Green MSP for Glasgow and founder of the Better Buses campaign, said: ??To have a process for registering conflicts in secret seems baffling. The priority here must be transparency, and I would urge SPT to bring their internal rules into line with this important principle.??

A spokeswoman for SPT said the contracts had been awarded ??on the basis of best price for the public purse??.

She added: ??All SPT employees follow a strict code of conduct outlined in our Governance Manual ?? which every member of staff has access to - to ensure integrity is maintained. That includes the obligation on everyone to register a potential conflict of interest, financial or otherwise, in the Register of Interests. That register is not shared publicly.

??SPT is satisfied that current practises are robust.??