Scotland is no stranger to wasteful public projects. In the devolution era, it has become almost expected that major infrastructure schemes will not be completed on time, will not be completed within budget, or – most commonly – both.
The tone was well set by the Scottish Parliament itself, which cost a whopping 10 times its initial estimate. The project ultimately left taxpayers with a bill of more than £400 million and a building delivered five years behind schedule.
Other projects quickly followed suit. The Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route is now expected to cost more than £1 billion, with delays and cost overruns on the works even helping to bring down construction giant Carillion.
Someone born on the day the SNP announced plans to dual the A9 could now be leaving secondary school, with just 10 miles of dual carriageway actually completed.
Yet even in an era of unrelenting public waste, the SNP’s ferry fiasco surely takes top prize.
In this case, the project began in 2015 when two ferries were ordered for delivery three years later – in 2018 – at an estimated cost of £97 million.
Numerous questions have since abounded about the nature of the contract and the agreement that was made. Meanwhile the ferries themselves have been beset with delays from the outset.
Matters took a particularly farcical turn in 2017 when then First Minister Nicola Sturgeon presided over a “launch” event for one of the vessels, which had painted-on windows, fake funnels, replica engines and an improper bow.
There was, it would seem, more seaworthiness on the set of Titanic.
SNP can find funds for ferries, but at what cost to the rest of us?
Fast forward to 2023 and neither ship is ready yet, while the costs have ballooned to more than £240 million and rising.
The defining image of SNP Scotland.
In 2017, before an uncritical media, Nicola Sturgeon presides over the fake “launch” of a still unfinished ferry with tromp-l’oeil painted windows.
Lots of schoolchildren waving flags though. pic.twitter.com/EMRJcpPX0C— Roger Hutchinson (@RogerMiles) August 30, 2021
A recent report suggested the total bill could now approach half a billion pounds.
The situation is so severe that it would be cheaper, in the case of one ferry at least, to scrap the entire thing and begin the procurement process again.
Poor Neil Gray. The latest in a long line of SNP ministers tasked with dealing with the fallout from the debacle has now been forced to overrule civil service advice in order to get the project over the line, apparently having no idea what the final cost to taxpayers will ultimately be.
Such profligacy would be bad enough if the Scottish Government had money to burn, but it does not.
As we are persistently told, public finances are so tight we face “tough choices” and “difficult decisions” about how it is to be spent.
We apparently lack the money for proper pay rises for nurses and teachers, for instance. But when it comes to covering up the SNP’s mistakes the government can find, quite literally, a blank cheque.
That is a reality that should shame even the most ardent Nationalist.
Taxpayers left to foot bill for SNP failings on ferries
Meanwhile, it is taxpayers who are left to foot the bill for the SNP’s wastefulness.
Humza Yousaf is said to be contemplating a new tax band on higher earners, which it is estimated could raise around £257 million a year.
While it would be wrong to draw a direct link between the two, it is certainly the case that, if the Scottish Government managed what money it already has better, it would not need to raise so much from new sources.
Yet it is not just the monetary cost that makes this particular SNP debacle the mother of all SNP debacles.
There is the human cost too.
Vulnerable communities face isolation and uncertainty
Delays and budget overspends for the Scottish Parliament building might be frustrating and annoying, particularly for local residents, but they are no more than that.
In the case of the ferry fiasco, we have communities left facing isolation and uncertainty, with lifeline services increasingly under strain amid the failure to deliver the new floating stock.
This scandal has had a genuine impact on the lives of people in some of Scotland’s most remote and, in many senses, vulnerable communities. That too should shame even the most ardent Nationalist.
Perhaps the most troubling thing about this particular scandal, however, is that it is not yet over.
Despite years of delays, reports, promises, fixes, launches, inquiries, speeches and recriminations, we are really no closer to knowing what the final cost will be or – more importantly – when the ferries will actually be finished.
It is seemingly never ending and, on its current trajectory, it may well outlast the SNP government that instigated it.
For that alone – but for all the other reasons as well – the SNP’s ferry fiasco must go down as the costliest debacle of the devolution era.
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