THE islanders waiting for the two boats at the heart of the CalMac ferries scandal have been “disregarded”, the country’s spending watchdog has said.
Stephen Boyle, the Auditor General for Scotland, also said the Scottish Government needed to be “more and transparent” about its finances.
In an interview with Holyrood magazine, Mr Boyle said ministers were not being clear with the public about support for private businesses and their exit strategies for them.
He also predicted the Scottish Government was likely to lose taxpayers’ money on its deal with in the Fife-based fabrication yard BiFab.
He said the Government had a right to enter into commercial transactions, such as acting as a loan guarantor, but should also operate in an open and consistent manner.
In March, Mr Boyle’s Audit Scotland report into the ferries fiasco concluded “multiple failings” has led delays and cost overruns on the two CalMac boats being built at the Ferguson Marine yard on the Clyde.
The boats, due to service Arran and the Skye triangle, are now £150million over their original £97m budget and five years late, while Ferguson’s went broke and had to be nationalised mid-contract.
Mr Boyle told Holyrood magazine: “From a people perspective, there are people who live, work and socialise on those islands who were disregarded. Taxpayers’ money has financed projects that are many times over budget and many years late.
“There are really polarised views on why those contracts weren’t delivered and there’s no consensus about what went wrong […] We’ve said there were multiple failings in terms of the management of the contracts, the delivery of the contracts, the quality of what was delivered and transparency as well as the quality of the decision making.
"All those factors will have to be reflected on. There will be many large infrastructure projects to come that the public sector will take a lead on. There’s an opportunity, like you see in other industries, to see where matters have gone wrong and learn from these examples.”
Other recent Scottish Government controversies include tens of millions going into BiFab and loss-making Prestwick Airport, and a £586m loan guarantee to Sanjeev Gupta’s troubled GFG Alliance for the Lochaber aluminium smelter,
Mr Boyle said: ““BiFab, Prestwick and Lochaber are examples of the Scottish Government taking a more direct interest in investing in private companies as opposed to the other enterprise agencies and we’ve been calling on the government to have more of a framework for how it does this.
“It needs to be transparent on what the risk strategy was, what the exit strategy is. No one thought they set out to own a shipyard or have a significant stake in a fabrication yard. How they manage that [is important] – we’re talking about tens of millions of public money.
“Ultimately that’s a call for government, but the investment [in BiFab] is unlikely to deliver value for money and it’s for government to make clear why it chose company X and not company Y. There were other companies it chose not to invest in, like Michelin tyres [in Dundee]. There’s a place for them to make commercial decisions but it’s about having that transparency. We think the framework will help.”
Scottish Liberal Democrat MSP Willie Rennie said: "Stephen Boyle has delivered a dose of cold water and common sense.
"The Scottish Government frequently gets itself in too deep with projects that it cannot handle and business partners that it comes to regret. They need to be more careful about who they do business with.
"Islanders waiting on ferries and workers in Fife and Lochaber have come to understand that the government is much better at big promises than it is at competent execution.
"Scotland needs a comprehensive economic strategy that sets out how the government will determine which projects represent value for money."
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