Airport chief used taxpayers’ funds to buy his £1,200 bed
THe boss of loss-making Prestwick Airport spent more than £1,200 of taxpayers’ money on a new bed.
newly appointed chief executive Ron Smith received a relocation package when he accepted the job – despite a salary of £100,000-£120,000.
He was also given £658 plus VAT for a dining suite and £197.16 plus VAT for a carpet, a Freedom of Information response shows.
Details of the package come weeks after it was disclosed that public spending on the airport has soared in the past financial year.
Latest accounts for TS Prestwick Holdco, the company that runs the airport, show a loss of more than £9million in 2015-16, an increase of £500,000 on the previous year.
The Scottish Government bought the Ayrshire site in 2013 for only £1 to save it from closure.
But since then it has spent millions of taxpayers’ money on the loss-making investment. Budget documents show £40million of public funds could be tied up in the airport by 2018.
now spending watchdog Audit Scotland is to begin a probe into the struggling airport, the second such investigation in only three years.
Mr Smith’s relocation package includes legal fees of £3,570 plus VAT for his new home after he moved from Aberdeen – where he had been general operations manager (Western north Sea) at air services firm cHc Helicopter – to the Prestwick position last May.
Scottish Labour finance spokesman Jackie Baillie said: ‘This is a scandalous use of public money. People will be astounded to discover that thousands of pounds of public money has been spent this way. He should repay the money claimed for the furniture.
‘I am pleased that Audit Scotland will revisit the funding of Prestwick Airport. With taxpayers’ money being spent on beds and tables, it is clear that the SnP’s Government priorities are completely wrong.’
A spokesman for Audit Scotland said it intends to carry out further audit work on the airport’s financial performance as part of Transport Scotland’s annual audit.
He added: ‘The auditors will assess how Transport Scotland has addressed the recommendations in the 2015 report [on ] and assess the potential impact of the revised business plan on funding requirements for the airport and monitor the level and potential for repayment of loan funding support provided by Transport Scotland.’
Accounts for TS Prestwick Holdco published last month show a loss of £9.21million for the airport in the last financial year.
Passenger numbers declined in the period, from 827,000 to 624,000, a significant drop from ten years ago when the airport attracted more than 2.4million passengers.
Turnover fell from £12.4million in the previous financial year to £11.5million, while freight tonnage dropped from 12,379 to 11,409.
A Prestwick Airport spokesman said it was ‘standard practice to pay relocation costs if a candidate has to move to take up their post’.
He added: ‘The search for a chief executive officer extended across the Uk and beyond to ensure we got the right person for the job.
‘As a commercial organisation run at arm’s length from the Scottish Government, this relocation package was agreed as part of the appointment process.’