First Minister promises to look again at Ninewells parking contract

The First Minister is promising to look again at parking charges at Ninewells hospital.

Speaking on Scotland’s Talk In on Tay 2, Nicola Sturgeon was challenged on the rising cost of a space at the Tayside hospital.

She said:

"We looked very closely at this when we looked at abolishing car parking charges and, to be blunt about it, to buy out those PFI contracts, or modify them in a way that would have allowed us to take away car parking charges - I can't remember the exact figure - but I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say it would have been tens of millions of pounds that we would have to take out of patient care.

"I'm happy to go away and look at that and see if there are representations we can make about the level the charges have got to.

"We don't have the power to just get rid of them without spending large amounts of money that in our judgement, wouldn't be the right thing to do in terms of the expenditure of that money. But I'll have a fresh look to see whether we can make new representations to the companies concerned to see if we can get any movement there."

The car parks there are run by private company Indigo Infra Dundee Ltd, which runs the facilities on behalf of NHS Tayside.

It’s an issue in the spotlight recently after the firm raised prices.