Gambling with £2bn of our money.. it’s a disgrace

Before being forced to resign in disgrace, Derek Mackay said the creation of a Scottish National Investment Bank had the potential to “transform Scotland’s society”.

It’s not as if the SNP has a great record when it comes to doling out public money

Well yes, but it also has the potential to backfire spectacularly and leave taxpayers to pick up a multi-billion pound bill.

The importance of selecting the right people to run an institution that will be handed £2billion of public money cannot be overstated. It is utterly extraordinary, therefore, that the former finance secretary effectively sidelined an Ombudsman whose job is to monitor appointments to public bodies when it came to selecting a chairman.

By approving an“unregulated appointment ”, Mac kay left the Commissioner for Ethical Standards in Public Life with no choice but to withdraw from oversight of the process.

This was already an appointment made with a minimum of parliamentary scrutiny – a stark contrast to how a similar role would be handled at Westminster. As finance journalist Ian Fraser rightly points out, this was presented as a fait accompli without any scope for public scrutiny.

So, who did get to choose who would be entrusted with billions of pounds of our money?

Step up Benny Higgins, the five-times married banker who ran up £18,000 on taxis at Tesco while the supermarket was sacking staff. He chaired the panel that appointed Willie Watt, a fellow banker whose previous firm was hit with record fine sin an international conflict of interest case.

This is an incredibly concerning state of affairs at which opposition politicians are dismayed. It is not as if the SNP has a great track record when it comes to doling public money into the hands of private companies.

Take the Ferguson Marine scandal where over £100million was handed to a firm run by billionaire Jim McColl to provide two ferries. Years later, taxpayers are severely out of pocket and still waiting for the ships.

Or take the Scottish Government’s disastrous attempt to deliver a sick children’s hospital in Edinburgh through a complex PFI funding model.

We are now paying £1.4million a month to a private consortium for a facility that can’t be used because of safety fears.

Without being absolutely sure that every precaution has been taken to appoint the right people to lead the SNIB, it should be unthinkable to hand over a penny of public, money let alone a couple of billion.