LOWER EMISSIONS HIRE HYPOCRISY

Councils renting vehicles to meet LEZ standards

- CRAIG MCDONALD

SCOTLAND'S two biggest councils are spending £2000 per day hiring vehicles to replace their own ones which don't comply with their Low Emission Zones (LEZ).

Glasgow City Council accounted for most of the costs, racking up hire fees of more than £138,000 for the first three months of the year, while Edinburgh spent £34,000.

The combined cost works out at over £1900 per day of taxpayers’ cash to meet pollution standards.

The sums were spent on a range of vehicles from cars, people carriers, and minibuses, to trucks and crane trucks, at a time when the local authorities have warned key services face cuts amid ongoing financial pressures.