If ever an illustration was needed about the warped priorities of the SNP Scottish administration, it came with Wednesday’s vote to give asylum seekers free bus travel while pensioners are being denied their winter fuel allowances.
It gave me no pleasure to argue that the SNP and Greens had lost the plot, but in my new role as shadow cabinet secretary for transport I doubt it will be the last time I’ll need to call out the sheer lack of common sense behind so many of their policies and decisions.
As a councillor, I had plenty of practice leading the Conservative opposition to the many madcap transport plans the SNP-Labour administration foisted on Edinburgh, most of which still scar the city to this day.
Edinburgh people have become lab rats for so many hare-brained schemes ─ costly, unpopular and often downright dangerous ideas which no-one voted for, imposed under the guise of progress.
Cycle lanes with floating parking bays, designed by London consultants, were imposed with no regard to local opinion or topography, and those running between the kerb and bus stops were only changed after visually impaired people pointed out what should have been an obvious risk from the start. The Leith Walk cycleway is so crazy it has become a tourist attraction, or maybe that was the plan?
Suburban bus services take an age to reach town because of interminable roadworks and road narrowing which makes bus lanes redundant, and there is no better example of local wishes and knowledge being ignored than the imposition of low traffic neighbourhoods which increase congestion and pollution.
As for the £207 million tram line to Newhaven, hours spent poring over the business case to expose the reality of how blithe some politicians can be with public money was a salutary experience.
Since leaving the Council I’ve continued to work on local transport issues as an MSP, and I’m very proud of my part in the campaign to deliver a new railway station for Winchburgh, vital to give the growing town fast access to the whole central belt and prevent further strain on already over-capacity roads into Edinburgh.
And then there is the 'Almond Chord' the short stretch of railway needed to put the underused Edinburgh Gateway station on the route to Glasgow, again essential as housing in west Edinburgh booms.
There are many other issues affecting communities across Scotland, most notoriously the failure to upgrade the killer A9 to Inverness, and only this week it was confirmed the improvements to the stretch between Tomatin and Moy have been delayed until 2028.
In the west, the Strathclyde Partnership for Transport is determined to press ahead with its bus franchising plan, at an estimated cost of nearly £500m which will do nothing to address the bigger problem of a crumbling road network. Last week the Glen Sannox ferry, already six years late, lost power in its sea trials, making Arran people wonder if it will ever carry a passenger.
We’ve also been waiting six years for the Sheriffhall Roundabout improvements, despite the funding being included in the City Region Deal, an upgrade vital for East and Midlothian as well as the Borders. As Scottish Conservative leader Russell Findlay might say, it just takes common sense to fix these problems.
