By Steve Bargeton, political editor

AS MUCH as a quarter of the £431 million cost of the new home for the Scottish Parliament could be “wasted money.”

That was the conclusion of counsel to the Fraser Inquiry John Campbell QC as he quizzed the senior manager for the controversial project, Paul Curran, yesterday.

Mr Campbell speculated that delays and disruption may have cost the taxpayer “the wrong end of £100 million” for which the public had seen nothing in return.

“The public put out without the public getting anything back,” he said. “There’s no brick or toilet bowl, or flooring or carpet or desk. This is wasted money.

“I’m just puzzled as to how the programmers and construction managers can get it apparently so seriously wrong.

“That’s my judgment and may not be how it is viewed at the end of the day. Over time you are looking at the wrong end of £100 million in the cost of prolongation, disruption and effectively wasted time.”

Mr Curran told Lord Fraser that “delay, disruption and acceleration” had cost £67,000 a month per trade contractor between January 2003 and July 2004, assuming that 40 firms were working on site.

“Maybe with hindsight we could say that we should have taken a step back and agreed that we should not have been embarking on a particular package,” he said.

“Maybe these were let out too early.”

The project manager said two packages of work, one for the assembly frame contract and another for the metal windows, had increased the cost by £40 million. The bomb blast-proofing added between £20 million and £30 million.

Mr Curran also said that the July 2000 estimate of £195 million had increased to £431 million because of several costs, including fees at £42 million, VAT at £27 million and the collapse of the Flour City contractor, which added £5 million.

The project manager also indicated that it was by no means certain that the project would be completed in time for the planned move over the summer.

Asked if he was “comfortable” with the latest programme which includes a completion date of this summer, he laughed slightly and replied, “I think there’s a lot of challenges within the programme. It’s going to be extremely tight.”

Mr Curran told Lord Fraser that in an effort to cut costs he had imposed a design freeze in April last year. He also imposed other cost-cutting measures which, he said, were resisted by the architects.

Mr Curran also vetoed a Zen garden next to the Canongate which was not part of the original plan but was pushed forward by the architects.

The inquiry also heard yesterday that the chief architectural adviser on the project has cancelled his appearance at the inquiry because of ill health.

Dr John Gibbons, who has appeared before Lord Fraser twice already, was due to appear today but is unwell and will not turn up to face questioning.