In an address to the Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce’s Annual General Meeting this morning, Labour's leader in the Scottish Parliament, Iain Gray said the capital had suffered triple-whammy with an SNP government at Holyrood, an SNP Lib Dem council running the city as well as the Tory/LibDem coalition at Westminster.

Iain Gray said:

“We currently face the threat of UK government cuts in the public sector which threaten economic recovery. What George Osborne proposes is too soon and too savage.

“But in Scotland we are more vulnerable as we are already suffering under the Salmond Slump in the good times.

“Over £2bn has been lost to the Scottish economy in infrastructure projects in the last three years along with 30,000 jobs in the construction industry.

“Edinburgh, in particular, has been hit as among the first public projects the SNP cancelled was the Edinburgh Airport Rail Link, a project which I had signed off as former Labour transport minister.

“The SNP then cancelled a similar project in Glasgow last year. But these are exactly the sort of projects we need to stimulate the economy at a time like this. 

”But not only has Edinburgh lost EARL due to the SNP we now have a SNP Lib Dem council which has made terrible mess of the trams project.

“We cannot afford to have the capital drifting like this. The city prospered while there was a Labour executive at Holyrood and Donald Anderson’s Labour administration was running the city. 

“The banking crisis has changed everything but this only makes it even more important that the Scottish government gives a lead and recognises the importance of infrastructure projects.

“But in these tough times Edinburgh has been ill-served by the Nationalists. Alex Salmond’s approach to rates re-evaluation is another classic example. I recently met a group of West End business and they are being hammered by the revaluation. 

“Yet the SNP refuse to budge or perhaps just don’t know what to do. It wouldn’t be the first time.
“Labour would have stopped it as they did in Northern Ireland. Commons sense dictated such an approach as the revaluation was conducted in 2008 at the height property boom before the financial crash. To introduce it now is a huge mistake and only undermines business at a time like this.

“A Labour government back at Holyrood would commit itself to making sure Edinburgh is an economic powerhouse. We would support skills development and invest in infrastructure. We would be open to all means of public funding and have no ideological opposition to PPP like the SNP. We would commit to the renewable energy industry and ensure its long term continuity.  A Scottish government has to stimulate economic growth and Labour is ready to do so when we win the Scottish Parliament elections next year.”

1 September 2010