Come clean Honest John!
Swinney urged to clarify role in calamitous ferries contract
THE shambolic ferries contract was signed off despite ministers being warned of the risk of a high-impact legal challenge, it has been revealed.
unredacted documents accidentally released by the Scottish Government show officials made it clear that awarding the contract to build two CalMac ferries to the Ferguson shipyard could trigger a legal challenge ‘at any time’.
They said this was because the terms of the deal were not being made public.
It comes as deputy First Minister john Swinney yesterday confirmed he gave ‘budget approval’ for the deal after he was asked to assess whether there were any ‘banana skins’. It also emerged he was not even informed of concerns raised by a ferries quango about the risk of not having a financial guarantee in place.
nicola Sturgeon has insisted it was shamed former transport minister derek Mackay, and not Mr Swinney, who was responsible for signing off the deal.
The risk of a legal challenge was initially redacted from Scottish Government documents, only for it to emerge that the blacked-out sections could be revealed if they were copied and pasted onto another file.
officials warned ‘the impact of a successful legal challenge could be high’ and the worst-case scenario was that the contract could be declared ‘ineffective’.
Taxpayers are now facing an estimated £240million bill for a contract initially valued at £97million due to a major dispute which led to the operator of the shipyard plunging into administration and the site being nationalised.
Scottish Conservative leader douglas ross said: ‘This contract had more banana skins than the monkey house at Edinburgh Zoo – but john Swinney couldn’t see any
of them. Honest john’s hands are all over this dodgy deal. If he didn’t clear this contract, it wouldn’t have gone ahead.
‘But the most crucial document in this affair is still missing – the one that explains why john Swinney charged ahead against expert advice. Another blunder has revealed that the SnP Government also ignored a stern warning that this disastrous contract could be challenged in court and declared “ineffective”.’
Mr ross continued: ‘Ferry experts warned the SnP Government about the risks. Their own legal advice was that the contract was high risk. But john Swinney pressed ahead, and now taxpayers and islanders are paying the price.
‘There is a stench of a cover-up and corruption running through this whole sorry episode. If the First Minister won’t come clean, john Swinney must urgently appear before parliament to face scrutiny and tell the public what on earth he was thinking.’
Miss Sturgeon was grilled about the ferries fiasco yesterday at First Minister’s Questions, one day after a ‘missing’ document was published showing Mr Mackay approved the decision. But the document also showed Mr Swinney was consulted before the contract was formally awarded to ‘ensure there are no financial/procurement issues that he might want further reassurance on’ and to ‘confirm the absence of banana skins’.
Miss Sturgeon claimed that ‘the deputy First Minister did not take the decision’ and he was ‘simply briefed on the decision after it was taken, not even on his request but on the initiative of an official’.
Mr ross insisted it was ‘very clear’ officials escalated the issue to Mr Swinney to await his approval and raised questions about whether the deal was lawful. Miss Sturgeon said: ‘It didn’t come to pass, of course, that the contract was legally challenged. So ministers weigh up all of these issues and they come to decisions. The minister who took that decision was derek Mackay, and that is now clear from the email chain.’
Mocking the error which allowed redacted lines to be revealed, Mr ross said: ‘The SnP’s secret Scotland – foiled by copy and paste. You can’t even redact documents properly. It is little wonder the ferries aren’t on time and on budget.’
Mr Swinney told journalists at Holyrood yesterday: ‘As finance secretary at the time, I’m responsible for providing the budget for the meeting of any contracts. What officials were doing was briefing me that there was no need to change the budget arrangements based on the contract that had been agreed and approved by the transport portfolio, and which of course is confirmed by the email trail you got yesterday.’ Asked if he gave the contract final approval, Mr Swinney said: ‘I didn’t give it the final nod. I was given assurance that the budget provision that I had put in place in August was adequate for the contractual arrangements.’ Later, a spokesman for the First Minister confirmed that Mr Swinney had not been briefed on the concerns raised by the Caledonian Maritime Assets Limited quango about the risk of awarding the contract to Ferguson without a full refund guarantee. He said: ‘The submission was, as we know, to derek Mackay.’
THE SNP’s addiction to secrecy is not merely a political problem. It goes to the heart of how this country is run, of integrity in public life and in whether those in power owe the rest of us the truth.
Nicola Sturgeon’s refusal even to confirm the existence of bullying investigations into her ministers is symptomatic of the rank arrogance with which she rules. Hiding behind data protection laws is pure cynicism. No one is asking her to disclose anyone’s personal details, as she knows.
The same culture of cover-up marks her Government’s increasingly implausible responses to the ferry scandal. Not only did missing emails about the Ferguson Marine contracts suddenly show up, the First Minister’s Government attempted – unsuccessfully – to redact a reference to the risk of legal challenge.
She dodged a call to put John Swinney up before MSPs to answer questions. In acting as they did, ministers made taxpayers liable to the tune of £250million. We have a right to know why.