SNP must get to grips with Scotland's 'eye-watering' £250 million bill for public inquiries
Public inquiries have an important role to play but their costs must always be taken into consideration
Given the spiralling costs of this particular problem have now gone above £250 million, one might expect calls for a public inquiry. However, given we’re actually talking about inquiries, that would be an irony too far, even for the Scottish Government.
Between 2007 and September of this year, the total cost of all inquiries held in Scotland came in at £258.8 million, with £28.8 million spent since December. Scottish Conservative shadow Finance Secretary Craig Hoy said the “eye-watering figures confirm that too many are ballooning in cost and dragging on for years on end”, adding that SNP ministers “have a duty to rein in the costs and duration”.
He was quite right in this but also in his acceptance of the “essential role” played by some inquiries into ensuring lessons are learned and justice is served.
Given the sudden arrival of the Covid pandemic, the number of deaths and the myriad of effects on society, holding an inquiry was always going to be necessary to ensure we are better prepared when the next one comes, as it will eventually.
‘Growing demand’ for inquiries
However, while the Edinburgh Tram Inquiry may have seemed like a good idea at the time, it ended up taking nine years and, at £13 million, costing more than the Iraq War inquiry. Were its findings as valuable?
The Scottish Parliament’s Finance and Public Administration Committee is currently carrying out an investigation into the cost effectiveness of public inquiries amid a “growing demand” to hold them. An examination of this kind, rather than an inquiry, is overdue.
Sometimes, a public inquiry is little more than a convenient way out for an under-fire politician. Critics are placated and a contentious, problematic issue is kicked into the long grass.
Clearly a balance must be struck. Holding too many inquiries reduces the amount of money available to improve public services, making problems more likely to occur.
If frontline services like the NHS and education continue to struggle, it would be foolishly counterproductive to launch expensive probes on a regular basis. There’s little use in documenting our decline if there’s not enough money left to do much about it.
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