Glasgow Airport Rail Link

Speech delivered on Wed 4th Nov 2009

This must be the first members' business debate in which the two most senior cabinet ministers in the Government have stayed behind to reply to the debate.

The decision by the SNP Government to cancel the Glasgow airport rail link has no redeeming features. It is wrong in principle, wrong in practice, wrong politically and commercially and flawed in method. Indeed, it is unnecessary.

There must be something about airport rail links that casts a red film over the eyes of SNP ministers, but I must confess that it is still unclear to me why they have cancelled the GARL project. It is to Bill Butler's credit that he has expressed himself in moderate terms in tonight's debate, in the motion and in his speech. I hope that such an approach will produce a positive response from Mr Swinney and his colleagues as the days and weeks go by.

Margaret Curran (Glasgow Baillieston) (Lab): Robert Brown commented on the presence of two cabinet ministers. I ask him to comment on the absence of the Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change-as I wish to reflect on the minister's role in the matter-and on the absence of a number of SNP Glasgow back benchers.

Robert Brown: I will leave the facts to speak for themselves, as that is the best way to deal with them.

There is a plaintive cry from ministers and their back benchers that their opponents must say what they would cut, but that will simply not work: GARL was in the 2009-10 and 2010-11 capital budgets and it was deleted by the SNP. That signifies two things. First, the SNP Government has, with no process of review or appraisal, unilaterally decided that the outstanding economic case that was accepted by the Parliament when it approved the project was wrong. Secondly, the employment benefits in the current financial and economic crisis of a major infrastructure development such as GARL are to be cast aside, along with the 1,300 jobs and the £3 million of investment that go with it.

It is the way in which the SNP Government has gone about the cancellation that bothers me most. We can leave aside the fact that there was no proper reappraisal process and that the transport minister did not see fit to tell other stakeholders of the cancellation until 20 minutes before the announcement-perhaps he himself had not been told; the real gripe that people in Glasgow have about the cancellation is that there was no attempt to sit down with other stakeholders and ascertain whether, against the future pressures that Bill Aitken mentioned, which we all accept, the project could be progressed, perhaps in a more satisfactory fashion. Perhaps the timescales could be recalibrated, or the costs reduced. Perhaps other stakeholders would contribute, or other ways could be found to fund the project.

The transport minister-whose absence from today's debate has been mentioned-is in the process of finalising a private-sector-funded design, build, finance and maintain funding model for the Borders rail link, the cost of which is not dissimilar to the £175.7 million cost of the abandoned GARL branch link. In broad terms, a privately funded DBFM model might have a revenue cost to the public purse of around £10 million or £15 million per year, some of which should be offset by the passenger revenues that the line would create when it opened. Why was that option not examined? Why were alternative funding models not considered? I do not accept Mr Swinney's dismissal of that idea at the Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change Committee. What was needed was political will but, unfortunately for Glasgow and for Scotland, the Government has not got what it takes. The abandonment of manifesto pledges has entered into the very iron of its soul and affected much of its actions. The cancellation of GARL lacks transparency, justification and common sense.

In the words of Glasgow airport's managing director, the Government has created "a gaping hole" in Glasgow's and Scotland's transport infrastructure. No Government worth its salt should have done that; no Government with even the glimmerings of a commitment to a coherent transport strategy would have failed to consult and to examine options. The SNP Government has failed the basic test of competence, and in doing so it has badly let down Glasgow and Scotland. I hope that it has the common sense to think again.

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Related Link:

Glasgow Airport Rail Link.