Edinburgh Council: Don’t fall for political propaganda from SNP-Labour coalition – John McLellan

No need for algorithmic moderation, this week the SNP-Labour administration duly gave itself an A pass for meeting its 52 coalition commitments.

The only one they won’t meet is No. 49, to keep council tax increases below three per cent, and given their penchant for fleecing the public they were not too troubled by the 4.8 increase they voted through before the pandemic.

If you are looking for an objective measurement of what was always political propaganda then don’t waste your time. Its conclusions have only a passing acquaintance with reality, a product of Edinburgh’s own Brothers Grimm, Councillors McVey and Day.

Each commitment is graded 1-4, with 4 for “will not be achieved”, so let’s look at the No. 1 commitment to build 10,000 new affordable homes by May 2022. A report in October estimated around 1,300 new affordable homes would be completed this year, but of course that was before the pandemic.

It is expected that by the end of the year around 3,400 new affordable homes will have been built since 2017, leaving just over a year to build over 5,000 to meet the commitment.

A further report in January identified a £71.8m funding gap in the delivery of affordable housing over the next five years, since when public finances have gone off a cliff.

The SNP-Labour housing promises were unrealistic in 2017, undeliverable at the start of the year and now they are the stuff of fantasy. Not that they can admit it.

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