Ferries fiasco must be open to scrutiny

Ministers must be held to account for scandal after accusation that ‘everything was about the optics’

To great fanfare, in November 2017 First Minister Nicola Sturgeon triumphantly “launched” the Glen Sannox ferry, the first of two Clyde-built vessels that were to serve Scotland’s island communities.

Yet all was not as it seemed. It has since emerged, for example, that painted boards had been strategically placed to look, from a distance, like windows.

In fact, the vessel was so far from complete she and her sister remain unbuilt and are £150 million over budget and climbing. They will not enter service until 2023, although there must be some doubt over whether they will ever set sail at all.

At Holyrood last week, following a damning Audit Scotland report, MSPS were invited to belie ve the First Minister had known very little about the ferry she “launched” in 2017 or how, in 2015, the contract for her construction came to be awarded to Ferguson Marine – against the advice of harbours and ferries infrastructure group Caledonian Maritime Assets Ltd (CMAL).

Instead Ms Sturgeon blamed disgraced former Finance Secretary Derek Mackay. She said it was “a matter of public record” that the goahead was given by the hapless Mr Mackay, who was Transport Secretary at the time.

Former Ferguson Marine owner Jim Mccoll gives a very different account. Mr Mccoll has said he stepped in to buy the then failing shipyard at the behest of former First Minister Alex Salmond in the run-up to the 2014 referendum.

Mr Mccoll said the order for the vessels was rushed through in 2015 without proper safeguards in order to maximise favourable publicity ahead of Ms Sturgeon's first SNP conference as party leader. He said the contracts were given “for political purposes ” and “everything was about the optics and timing the announcements for political gain”.

These are serious allegations that merit serious investigation. It is clear senior ministers, including Ms Sturgeon, have questions to answer.

The blame cannot be laid solely at the door of Mr Mackay, who has not set foot in Parliament since leaving government amid a scandal over his social media messages to a schoolboy.

It seems this sorry saga really was, like the windows on the Glen Sannox as Ms Sturgeon sent her down the slipway, all about the optics.