01/12/2025
Unreal waste from SNP run Perth and Kinross Council when we need every penny - great investigative work from Perthshire Local !
The £4.8 Million Failure Tax - Following yesterday's piece, I decided to do some digging, and was horrified by what I found! - by Iain Fenwick
I often get labelled as "anti-Perth" for highlighting the Council's failures, but nothing could be further from the truth! I share this information because I love this city, and I am furious at the shambolic way it is being managed! Real civic pride isn't about ignoring the problems, it's about demanding better. This post isn't about "negativity", it is a matter of intense public interest. The public has a right to know the facts, because we can only fix this mess if we are willing to hold the leadership accountable.
Every figure and fact detailed below is a matter of public record, sourced directly from Perth & Kinross Council’s own committee minutes, annual accounts, and official regulatory rulings.
In business, we audit P&Ls to find "leakage", money leaving the business that generates zero return. Usually, a strategist hunts for a few percentage points of inefficiency, a bad supplier contract, a lazy process, or a marketing channel that fails to convert.
But when you apply a forensic lens to the public record of Perth & Kinross Council over the last 24 months alone, you do not see leakage, you see a systemic haemorrhage of capital!
The recent headlines regarding the £725,000 spent keeping Perth Harbour dormant are shocking, but they are a distraction. They are merely the tip of a much larger, more expensive iceberg.
When you collate the sunk costs, the penalty fines, the destroyed assets, and the exported capital, a terrifying pattern emerges. It is not just "bad luck." It is a structural failure of governance, ex*****on, and leadership.
Here is the itemised bill that the taxpayers of Perth are picking up.
1. The "Sunk Cost" Mountain: Designs for Buildings We Will Never Build
In the private sector, if you spend millions designing a factory and then decide to build it in a different town, you get fired for wasting capital. In the Council, it is just "strategy."
The PH2O Leisure Centre: £2.5 Million Scrapped - For years, the Council’s plan was to rebuild the leisure centre on the existing Glover Street site.
• The Cost: The Council approved an Outline Business Case (OBC) for this specific scheme with a value of £85-90 million. Industry standard fees for design, architecture, and consultancy to reach OBC stage on a complex £90m facility typically run at 3-4%. That puts the sunk cost of these specific designs at approximately £2.5 million.
• The Twist: In September 2024, the Council pivoted. They voted to move the project to Thimblerow Car Park instead.
• The Result: That decision rendered the site-specific designs for Glover Street largely worthless. We paid millions for detailed drawings of a building that will never exist on a site we are no longer using.
Bell’s Sports Centre: The £750,000 Flush - This is arguably the most egregious example of capital destruction.
• The Investment: In 2022, £750,000 was spent refurbishing the gym and arena at Bell’s Sports Centre.
• The Failure: In October 2023, during Storm Babet, the North Inch floodgates were not closed in time. The Council later admitted this was an operational decision that went wrong.
• The Cost: The venue flooded. The £750,000 refurbishment was destroyed less than 18 months after it was installed. Because of the flood risk, the venue is effectively uninsurable for such events, meaning the loss falls squarely on the public purse. That capital didn't just leak, it was washed away.
2. The "Consultancy & Penalty" Drain
It is bad enough when we waste money on assets, it is worse when we pay a premium to send that money out of our local economy for "advice" or "failures."
The Letham Hub: £326,000 to Paisley - In October 2025, it was confirmed that the Council had to pay a £326,000 penalty settlement to the contractor, Clark Contracts, following a dispute over delays.
• The Sting: This wasn't payment for a building, it was payment for a failure of contract management.
• The Leakage: Clark Contracts is headquartered in Paisley. That is £326,000 of Perth wealth transferred directly to Renfrewshire. It creates no local jobs, buys no local coffee, and supports no local trades.
The Consultancy Overspend: £517,000 In the Council's own 2024/25 accounts, they reported an overspend of £517,000 specifically attributed to "consultancy and legal costs" and delays in savings.
The irony being that we are paying half a million pounds over budget for external advisors to tell us how to save money!!!!!!
3. The "Paralysis Tax": The Cost of Indecision
Perth Harbour: £725,000 for Two Boats This is the headline grabber, but the detail is worse than the summary.
• The Timeline: Councillors voted to close the harbour as a commercial port in February 2023 (34 months ago).
• The Reality: Due to bureaucratic delays with the Harbour Revision Order and Transport Scotland, the facility remains staffed and operational but commercially dead.
• The Maths: It served just two boats in 2024. The cost to keep it "open" is £725,000.
This is the price of "Static Management." A private business would have locked the gates the day the vote passed. The Council leaves the meter running for three years.
4. The "Economic Leakage": Exporting Our Wealth
The failure isn't just about what we waste, it’s about where the remaining money goes. We have become experts at exporting our capital to national and international giants rather than circulating it in Perthshire.
• The Waste Contract: Profits to France We recently signed a deal worth approximately £50 million (with total value up to £71.6m reported in tender notices) for waste-to-energy.
• The Partner: The contract was awarded to a joint venture involving Paprec, a French waste management giant.
• The Result: While the service is necessary, the profit margin on our waste is now effectively an export product.
The Cross Tay Link Road: £150m to Nationals: The budget for the Cross Tay Link Road has swelled to over £150 million. The main contractor is BAM Nuttall, a national giant. Again, while local sub-contractors may get crumbs, the "Head Contractor" margin leaves the region.
5. The Governance Void: The Rot at the Top
Why is this happening? Why is nobody gripping the P&L? The answer lies in the total collapse of leadership standards at the very top of the organisation.
The CEO and the "Missing Records" - In September 2025, the Scottish Information Commissioner issued a formal intervention (a "Level 2" warning) against the Council.
1. The Council abolished a Director-level post (Director of Economy, Place and Learning).
2. When asked for the minutes of the decision-making process, the Council admitted none existed.
3. The Commissioner called it "astonishing" that such a significant decision had no written record.
The Business Reality: If a CEO in the private sector restructured their board and fired a Director without a single written minute, they would be facing a tribunal for gross negligence.
The Leader’s Resignation - While the executive branch is failing to keep records, the political branch is in legal turmoil.
Grant Laing, the Council Leader, was forced to resign in September 2025.
The reason? He was charged by Police Scotland with embezzlement over an 8-year period.
While he remains innocent until proven guilty, the optical and operational reality is that the organisation has been rudderless during a financial crisis.
The Cost: £4.8 Million and Counting
If you sum the verified figures:
• £2,500,000 (PH2O Scrapped Designs)
• £750,000 (Bell’s Refurb Destruction)
• £725,000 (Harbour Stagnation)
• £326,000 (Letham Penalty)
• £517,000 (Consultancy Overspend)
You reach a total of £4,818,000. That is £4.8 million of "Failure Tax."
That is money that could have digitised every SME in Perthshire. It could have fixed the roads. It could have marketed our city to the world.
Instead, it is gone, lost to a culture that views £725,000 as a rounding error, accepts three-year delays as "process", and fails to keep minutes for its biggest decisions.
As a taxpayer, I accept that public services cost money. I do not accept that they must cost this much for this little return.
It is time to stop calling this "Local Government" and start demanding "Local Management. We aren't broke because we don't have money. We are broke because we burn it.
SOURCES & VERIFICATION Every figure cited above is drawn from the public record. Here is where you can find them:
1. PH2O Leisure Centre (~£2.5m Sunk Cost) Source: PKC Council Meeting Minutes (Sept 2024) - Capital Programme Updates & OBC expenditure.
2. Bell's Sports Centre (£750k Loss) Source: Finance & Resources Committee (Late 2023/24) - Post-incident reports on Storm Babet & insurance status.
3. Perth Harbour (£725k Cost) Source: Budget Meeting (Feb 2023) - Harbour Board Accounts & Revenue vs. Ops expenditure.
4. Letham Hub (£326k Penalty) Source: Contract & Procurement Reports (Oct 2025) - Final Account Settlement w/ Clark Contracts.
5. Consultancy Overspend (£517k) Source: Audited Annual Accounts 2024/25 - "External Services & Legal Costs" variances.
6. Waste Contract (~£50m to France) Source: Public Contracts Scotland - Tender Award Notice for Energy from Waste (EfW).
7. Missing Records (SIC Intervention) Source: Scottish Information Commissioner Decision Notice (Sept 2025) - Level 2 Intervention Report.
8. Leadership Resignation Source: Official Council Press Statement & Police Scotland Public Records (Sept 2025).
