A final bid to halt Perth’s Cross Tay Link Road has failed as councillors approved £32.5m in extra spending on the project.
Councillors debated pausing or cancelling the road and bridge on Wednesday afternoon even as contractors stand poised to start stage two of the multi-million-pound project.
Officials recently published the first update on project costs since 2016. The costs have risen £32.5m to more than £150m.
That’s around £1,000 for every person in Perth and Kinross, councillors noted.
Labour councillor Alasdair Bailey moved to defer the spending decision for a fuller report into pausing or cancelling the project.
He argued backing the extra £32.5m of spending made a mockery of the SNP administration’s climate pledges.
He said: “This road will see the climate emergency escalated to a climate catastrophe for our area.
“Failing to back this amendment is tantamount to reneging on our declaration of a climate emergency in 2019.
“And the icing on the cake here is that this £32.5m is actually coming from the additional borrowing headroom we created in February of this year for tackling the climate emergency.”
Cuts to pay for Cross Tay Link Road will ‘hit poorest hardest’
Councillor Bailey said the latest increase in budget could be better spent elsewhere – on schools, supporting bus passengers or on council housing.
In an unusual move, Perth and Kinross Provost, Independent Xander McDade, voted against the administration. He also seconded councillor Bailey’s motion.
He said: “The CTLR will negatively impact all residents of Perth and Kinross as it makes the climate and biodiversity crises we are facing even worse.”
He said the decision would “significantly reduce” the financial resources available to the council for the next 50 years.
“Meaning frontline services will have to be cut, hitting out poorest residents hardest,” he added.
It emerged in the meeting that borrowing to support the road and other infrastructure projects would create an “issue” with the council’s “long term financial position” from 2046.
Officials confirmed a blackhole would emerge in the council’s capital budget from that date.
Dr Jill Belch from Scone Community Council is a long term opponent of the CTLR.
She gave a deputation before councillors voted on the spending increase. She branded the report recommending councillors approving the extra money as “one-sided”.
“The questions are not ‘what are the risks of not approving the overspend?’, but ‘what are the risks if we don’t have the money for other things?'”
Stopping Cross Tay Link Road would ‘wreck’ council’s finances
Work on stage one of the Cross Tay Link Road is almost complete with forestry cleared and earthworks prepared along the route.
PKC have already sunk £23.5m into the project. That includes £5.57m in compulsory purchase orders to buy land linking the A9 to the A93 and A94 over the Tay.
Senior PKC officials moved to defend their recommendation to approve the additional spending.
Stewart MacKenzie is PKC head of finance.
He said not approving the extra money would mean moving spending from the council’s capital budget and placing it in the revenue budget.
That could wipe out the council’s £14m financial reserves, he argued, and could have huge and immediate implications for spending on services.
PKC chief executive Thomas Glen said his officials were “not comfortable” in presenting a paper to councillors with such a large rise.
But the recommendation to approve the spending was their “best advice”.
Council leader Grant Laing, SNP, said: “I cannot in all conscience wreck the revenue budget next year. It’s going to be difficult enough already.”
His SNP colleague councillor John Rebbeck said he spoke with “some level of discomfort” on the project.
“But the time for changing our minds on the CTLR is well past.”
Councillors also agreed on quarterly financial updates on key infrastructure projects in the future after a motion from Independent councillor Colin Stewart.
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