David Mundell who is the Secretary of State for Scotland was at the signing of the City Region Deal. For so long the only Conservative MP in Scotland he was an obvious choice for the role, but he has managed to retain it in this parliament.
We asked about his involvement. He said : “I’ve been involved in all the deals from the initial meeting that we had with the council here in Edinburgh through to all the other partner councils.
“This has been a very complicated deal because it has involved quite a number of council partners as well as universities and business.
“There’s a need firstly to bring people together and there is a need for people to have a realistic expectation of what can be achieved. And then we had to work through the various Treasury and Scottish Government’s own financial rules to be able to get an arrangement that everybody could sign up to.
We asked if the Minister was confident that he had brokered the best deal for the capital and the region. He replied that he was.
He said : “I think this is the best deal that was available to be agreed by the partners because these deals are about agreeing. It is about everybody agreeing. It’s not about us or The Scottish Government or indeed any of the single councils imposing something on others.
“They proceed by the basis of agreement and that’s where we’ve ended up. These are very significant sums which are going to come into Edinburgh and South East Scotland. I think that we have managed also to get a spread of those arrangements through from the Borders to Fife. I think any individual council wouldn’t have signed up if they hadn’t felt there was something for it in this deal.
“I think in the end we have reached what is a very good deal for everybody in Edinburgh and South East Scotland.”
David Mundell who is the Secretary of State for Scotland was at the signing of the City Region Deal. For so long the only Conservative MP in Scotland he was an obvious choice for the role, but he has managed to retain it in this parliament.
We asked about his involvement. He said : “I’ve been involved in all the deals from the initial meeting that we had with the council here in Edinburgh through to all the other partner councils.
“This has been a very complicated deal because it has involved quite a number of council partners as well as universities and business.
“There’s a need firstly to bring people together and there is a need for people to have a realistic expectation of what can be achieved. And then we had to work through the various Treasury and Scottish Government’s own financial rules to be able to get an arrangement that everybody could sign up to.
We asked if the Minister was confident that he had brokered the best deal for the capital and the region. He replied that he was.
He said : “I think this is the best deal that was available to be agreed by the partners because these deals are about agreeing. It is about everybody agreeing. It’s not about us or The Scottish Government or indeed any of the single councils imposing something on others.
“They proceed by the basis of agreement and that’s where we’ve ended up. These are very significant sums which are going to come into Edinburgh and South East Scotland. I think that we have managed also to get a spread of those arrangements through from the Borders to Fife. I think any individual council wouldn’t have signed up if they hadn’t felt there was something for it in this deal.
“I think in the end we have reached what is a very good deal for everybody in Edinburgh and South East Scotland.”
Here's what @DavidMundellDCT had to say to us earlier today about the City Region Deal pic.twitter.com/AiOF90VxvU
— Edinburgh Reporter (@EdinReporter) July 20, 2017
Founding Editor of The Edinburgh Reporter.
Edinburgh-born multimedia journalist and iPhoneographer.
