Labour deal damaging blow to SNP legislation

Published on Wednesday 18 June 2008 22:04

THE SNP government lost its first piece of legislation last night when a bill setting up a new arts quango, Creative Scotland, was thrown out by MSPs.

Opposition MSPs had expressed concerns, both about funding for the body and excessive bureaucracy.

But by yesterday it seemed as if ministers had secured opposition agreement to allow the bill to pass, on the condition that they worked on the financial parts of the legislation before returning to the parliament again next week. But Labour MSPs decided there was still too much confusion in the legislation and voted against the financial memorandum attached to the bill, which effectively killed off the bill itself.

Ministers will try to resurrect the legislation, but it will take at least six months to do so and it may have to go through all its parliamentary stages again.

A spokesman for Alex Salmond, the First Minister, blamed the bill's demise on "reckless opposition" from the Labour Party.

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