Friday, 20 November 2009

Labour to take food from children


Well, if Stephen Purcell gets his way, anyway. He called today for free school meals to be abolished to pay for the Glasgow Airport Rail Link. What is it with these big kids and their train sets? Here's a thing, though - GARL, like the Edinburgh Tram, appears to be aimed primarily at improving the profitability of the airports, especially when you consider the supporting documents from the legislative process. Why isn't BAA picking up the tab? In the Promoter's Statement there is a vague allusion to BAA paying some of the cost but when it was cancelled it was revealed that compensation payments were to be made to BAA as well as us paying for the airport to have a new nursery, car rental facilities, multi-storey car park and fuel farm.

Why should the public purse be subsidising a very profitable private business so heavily?

Something else - have a look at the route from Paisley out to the airport and you'll find it crosses an industrial estate when it could easily have avoided built-up areas. Why would anyone want to build where you were having to pay out additional compensation? Why would anyone want to disrupt businesses?

Most of all, though, why would anyone want to take food from the mouths of children to fund a rail line? Where is Charles Dickens when you need him?
Stephen Purcell

Wednesday, 18 November 2009

The Manuscript of Monte Cassino

It's being reported that The Manuscript of Monte Cassino, the Eduardo Paolozzi sculpture, is to return to its current place if the tramworks are ever finished (it will only be moved if the tramworks ever get going, right enough). This is a good decision - as is the decision not to split it up (some folk had wanted it spread down Leith Walk) - the sculpture reflects on the battle of Monte Cassino and those who died there and has resonance for the Scottish-Italian links, including the sculptor's father, grandfather and uncle who were interned and sent to Canada at the outbreak of war and who died when the Arandora Star was sunk in the Atlantic en route (the teenage Eduardo Paolozzi was interned in Saughton at the time).

The sculpture is, therefore, something of a war memorial - it should stay where it is and most certainly should not be broken up - just like the Hearts memorial should go back in its place as soon as possible.

Sunday, 15 November 2009

How did they spend that?

I nearly forgot - all that money that went to TIE - all getting spent on building half a tramline from Gogar to St Andrew's Square, yes? Erm, no ...

Go to the Edinburgh Trams website to see what you're getting for Christmas. Nope, sorry, not the removal of roadworks and barriers on Leith Walk, but a most generous offer to spend some more of our money, this time on Edinburgh Sparkles which it describes as

a UK-wide campaign, designed to promote the city's unique winter offer more effectively than ever before

I'm not sure I can stand the suspense. I do love this bit:
The event which has been made possible with additional funding from Essential Edinburgh and tie Limited will allow people to share the Princes Street space that will be created as the tram works conclude and before buses return to Princes Street at 5 am on Sunday 29 November

They will allow us to use the street we own - I can hardly hold back the glee.

Edinburgh Sparkles? What is there left to say?

Trams - the figures

I was in the supermarket in the late afternoon, enjoying myself reading labels and snorting at prices when a shopping trolley hove into view containing a small child who was complaining about his imprisonment. Arms aloft, he was repeating one word "Free! Free!" An inspirational wee fella, I thought.

Anyway, while everyone's attention was focused on some small electoral contest somewhere over in the west, here in the nation's capital there was a meeting - don't tell anyone - that happened to have a report or two in front of it about that chaos theory experiment that's going on in Edinburgh, the one that's got that that funny codename; Tram.


Ready? Good...

The Audit Committee of the Council had a look at the audited accounts wherein they will have read (if, indeed, they were so brave) the foreword from the Director of Finance who, strangely, didn't do a Private Frazer, but did say:

Capital Expenditure for the year totalled £391.900m, as shown on page 37 of the Statement of Accounts. Of this amount ... £241.953m was spent on tram works, roads and other infrastructure.

Page 37 actually tells you very little about trams (although it does point out that professional fees for capital projects totalled £24million ....)

Page 34, though, shows that the payments of capital funding to TIE in the year to April 2009 totalled £87.086 million and the year before £68.333 million (2007-08).

That's very interesting because the money claimed from the Scottish Government for the Tram project totalled £69.919 million in the year 2007-08 (all paid in the one month) and £82.231 million for part of the later year. So what? Well, the agreement between the Scottish Government and Edinburgh Council is for parallel funding (it's referred to in that answer to the Parliamentary Question). The Government's funding is capped at £500 million but pays only 91.7% of each bill - in other words, if TIE has a bill for £100 the Government should pay £91.70 and the Council should cough up £8.30.

If the Council had been paying its share of the bills, the capital investment should have been £76.248 million and £89.674 million. Where's that £10.503 million gone? Come to think of it, why was more claimed than paid in one of those years? The agreement has quite clearly been breached. What happens now?

There's more, though, if you go to page 46 of the Council's accounts you'll find TIE's turnover - £58.673 million in the year that £69.919 million was claimed from the Scottish Government and £68.333 million was handed over to TIE - there's more than £11 million missing somewhere, someone had better check down the back of the sofa.

Ah, but in the year just gone TIE had a turnover of £127.201 million and it only got £87.086 million in tram payments. Its website suggests it's only got the tram project on the go just now - did someone find £40 million down the back of the sofa?

On page 16 of the Auditor's report it's stated that £138 million was spent on the tram in the year, £120 million from the Scottish Government. Those figures don't appear in the Council's accounts - when are we going to get some honesty about the state of the tram project? Page 29 of that report indicates that the tram project now poses enough of a threat to the running of Edinburgh Council to appear on the Corporate Risk Register.

No wonder the Greens think a single tramline is a waste of money.

Some other wee details, though - the Council is now £1.1bn in debt and its PPP commitments now total £1.147 bn.

Nothing there to worry about, is there?

Mind how you go!

Polls bad for Labour

I see Political Betting is reporting two polls showing Labour is still tanking in UK-wide polls - 14% behind the Conservatives. Interesting from my point of view is that the figures for 'others' are sitting quite high - that's where you find the SNP vote in UK polls, I look forward to the details!

Friday, 13 November 2009

Cheer up

After a result like that, might I recommend a little magic to lift your spirits courtesy of the great Solomon Burke?



Now that's got your pulse going, have a wee laugh:




Here's the spiel that goes with it:

This video was made by Michael Marra & Mick McCluskey to complement the re-release of the brilliant Saint Andrew album, The Word on the Pavey.For more information visit Saint Andrew's Websicht at http://www.saintandrew.biz - The Saint Andrew Websicht is hosted by http://www.musical1.com
Mind how you boogie!

Thursday, 12 November 2009

Radio star

I'll be on the radio later, addressing an audience of millions. Oh yes, Radio 5 at 02.30! Where's my coffee?

Tramfinder General

Who said:

we want:
...
- improvement of existing public transport, rather than spending millions on a tramway

The Green Party.

If it's a waste of money in Liverpool why would it not be a waste of money in Edinburgh?

Mind how you go!

Tuesday, 10 November 2009

What do you want from the liquor store?

This is an awfy time of night to still be working, so here's a musical interlude from Ted Hawkins -


Of course, when he asks "What do you want from the liquor store?", he's actually saying "I intend to visit a purveyor of fine wines and elegant spirits who disdains deep discounting and encourages responsible drinking, would you care for a light refreshment?" and when he says "I'll buy you all that your belly can hold" he's actually saying "I'll pick up a curry on the way over as well."

Monday, 9 November 2009

Stand up Green!

There's a rumour that the Green Party will be standing a candidate in Edinburgh North and Leith. If confirmed, this is excellent news, democracy is better served the better range of opinions on offer, and there is an added bonus from the Greens - in this time of big environmental promises the presence of a Green candidate will keep the rest of us honest on the environment. Surely that's a good thing?

Mind how you mow!