FIFE COUNCIL IS BEING RIPPED OFF TO THE TUNE OF £17 MILLION BY ROTTEN PFI CONTRACTS
Published date : 25 Nov 2021
Fife Council is being ripped off to the tune of £17 million as they continue to pay for wretched PFI contracts – eating in to vital council education spending.
Research from the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe) has found that the amount being forked out by Fife Council is 5% of its education resource funding, meaning millions are being wasted on the contracts.
PFI contracts were introduced by the Tories and adopted by Labour during their time at the helm of the Scottish Government.
Commenting, Jenny Gilruth MSP said:
“The rotten PFI contracts were introduced by the Tories but supercharged by the Labour-led Scottish Government and unnecessarily cost councils across Scotland, including in Fife.
“It is incredible that the lasting legacy of Labour governments continues to be felt as schools’ budgets are eaten up significantly by these wretched contracts.
“The SNP scrapped PFI contracts, meaning that money can be spent on Scotland’s young people and not on absurdly expensive contracts.
“This demonstrates how we still cannot trust Labour with the public purse in Scotland as we continue to pay for their disastrous decisions in government.”
ENDS
Notes
Research from SPICe
Net revenue expenditure on education services and schools PFI unitary charges (£m) in 2019/20
Education Services (£m)
PFI unitary charges (£m)
PFI unitary charges as a % of education expenditure
Aberdeen City*
174
NA
NA
Aberdeenshire
275
13
5%
Angus
104
6
6%
Argyll & Bute*
99
NA
NA
City of Edinburgh
379
42
11%
Clackmannanshire
55
8
15%
Dumfries & Galloway
147
15
10%
Dundee City
136
12
9%
East Ayrshire
128
11
8%
East Dunbartonshire
128
15
12%
East Lothian
97
10
10%
East Renfrewshire
120
13
11%
Falkirk*
161
13
8%
Fife
349
17
5%
Glasgow City
580
57
10%
Highland
241
26
11%
Inverclyde
80
20
25%
Midlothian
92
11
12%
Moray
85
NA
NA
Na h-Eileanan Siar
42
NA
NA
North Ayrshire
136
13
9%
North Lanarkshire
368
24
7%
Orkney Islands
33
NA
NA
Perth & Kinross
150
17
11%
Renfrewshire
167
17
10%
Scottish Borders
113
9
8%
Shetland Islands
43
NA
NA
South Ayrshire
111
11
10%
South Lanarkshire
341
36
11%
Stirling
102
15
15%
West Dunbartonshire
102
12
12%
West Lothian
189
15
8%
TOTAL
5,327
461
9%
Sources:
Scottish Local Government Finance Statistics (SLGFS) 2019-20 – gov.scot (www.gov.scot)
EDUCATION
