Fraser turns on officials for 'hiding' true cost of Holyrood

• Lord Fraser demanded to know why civil servants withheld official estimates

• Suggestion MSPs were aware building was 89 million not at 62 million

• Senior figures to be criticised for not revealing costs in Lord Fraser’s report

Key Quote: "It looks rather as though those who were involved in this were determined to keep the figure down as low as possible, even to the point of concealing it from the parliament in the hope that the project would go ahead," -Lord Fraser

Story in full: SENIOR civil servants conspired to hide the rising cost of the Holyrood building from MSPs to ensure the project’s survival, Lord Fraser declared yesterday.

The Tory peer, who is heading the inquiry into the parliament building fiasco, launched his extraordinary attack during an evidence session yesterday morning.

He demanded to know why civil servants had deliberately withheld from ministers and MSPs official estimates which showed the cost of the project was "spiralling out of control" just before the parliament voted on the issue in June 1999.

"It looks rather as though those who were involved in this were determined to keep the figure down as low as possible, even to the point of concealing it from the parliament in the hope that the project would go ahead," he declared.

Lord Fraser added that the project had been approved by the parliament by "a very narrow margin" in that crucial vote. And he suggested that had the MSPs been aware that the building was currently at 89 million, rather than 62 million, they would have voted to halt it.

Lord Fraser said: "I cannot speculate but if they had been told it was 89 million, I think I can take a guess on what their reaction would have been."

It was an unprecedented outburst by the inquiry chief and suggests he believes civil servants influenced the democratic process by withholding vital information from MSPs.

John Gibbons, the Scottish Executive's chief architect, was giving evidence yesterday, and Lord Fraser’s anger was largely directed at him because he was involved in the decision.

But Dr Gibbons insisted: "There was no attempt by anybody to hide the cost."

The inquiry has also heard how other senior figures, including Sir Muir Russell, the former permanent secretary at the Scottish Executive, Barbara Doig, the former project sponsor, and Paul Grice, the current chief executive of the parliament, were involved in the decision not to tell ministers of the cost consultants’ warnings.

Each of them can now expect to be singled out for criticism when Lord Fraser’s report is published in the autumn.