SNP's 'cover-up and lies' over £2billion Monklands hospital which NHS said was too expensive

Published: 19:41, 1 August 2026 | Updated: 19:41, 1 August 2026 SNP ministers have been accused of cover-up and lies over Scotland’s scrapped £2.1billion Monklands replacement project. NHS experts told the SNP government the project was too expensive and should be abandoned two months before the Holyrood election in May. However, ministers failed to tell voters about the bombshell decision - and continued to boast about the project’s success during the election campaign. The public were only told about the decision to scrap the project when Health secretary Angela Constance made an announcement on June 25 - 20 minutes before parliament closed for the summer. Last night interim Scottish Labour leader Jackie Baillie said: ‘It is now crystal clear that the SNP knew about the cost of the new Monklands hospital and was advised to scrap the project well before the election but decided to lie to local voters. ‘Former Health Secretary Neil Gray promised his own constituents his government would deliver the new hospital they needed knowing full well that it wasn’t going to happen. ‘Neil Gray has been caught in a lie and he should resign from government.’ Bombshell documents obtained by the Scottish Mail on Sunday show former health secretary Neil Gray, drugs minister Maree Todd and public health minister Jenni Minto were told in March that NHS experts ‘would not recommend progressing to construction’ of the Monklands Replacement Project. John Swinney and Neil Gray at the site of the replacement hospital during the election campaign An aerial view of what the new hospital was supposed to look like before it was abandoned But ministers failed to tell the public before going to the polls, with Mr Gray even boasting about the project’s success during the Holyrood campaign. We can also reveal the now halted project has cost £225million so far - four times the estimated £48million it would take to fix all the problems at the existing Monklands hospital. In early March the Scottish Government was informed that costs had spiralled out of control, with every month delayed adding £4m to the bill, and there were ‘key issues’ with the proposal that had to be resolved before construction could start. Current Health secretary Angela Constance stunned MSPs and the public on June 25th when she announced 20 minutes before parliament closed for the summer that the current proposal was too expensive and it would have to be revised, prompting a raft of criticism. But an MoS investigation has found that both Ms Todd and Mr Gray received documents months earlier, and weeks before parliament broke up for the election, about the prospects for the project. Emails obtained by this newspaper show Mr Gray, who had recused himself from the project as it sits within his Airdrie constituency, was receiving updates in January, February and March although he asked that Ms Todd was sent them as well as he could not ‘comment or intervene’. And a review commissioned by the government advised against going ahead with the build, which was sent to them in March. Ms Baillie added: ‘Neil Gray has been caught in a lie and he should resign from government. ‘While SNP Ministers have been peddling the fiction they were going to deliver the new hospital, existing services in Monklands have been left to decline. ‘Scotland deserves better than the cynical and dishonest tactics of this SNP government. ‘The SNP must come clean about exactly who knew what and when, and apologise to voters for making election promises they had no intention of keeping.’ An investigation by the MoS found that NHS Assure – a body which supports major NHS construction projects – was asked by the Scottish Government to do a ‘cost review’ of the Monklands replacement in January. The body reported its initial findings in early March, advising that it would cost at least £2.1billion, and had a number of unresolved issues. The report stated: ‘ Our review has identified several key programme issues, including that no agreed programme exists, and every additional month of delay adds up to a further £4m in inflationary costs. ‘On current evidence reviewed, NHS Scotland Assure would not recommend immediate progression to construction.’ Ms Todd and Mr Gray were sent a ‘high level assessment’ of the update by a senior civil servant in the health department on March 5th, with the final version of NHS Assure’s findings formally submitted to government on March 20th. Public health minister Jenni Minto was also briefed by officials before parliament ended on March 26th. Angela Constance stunned MSPs and the public when she said the project was too expensive...20 minutes before parliament closed for the summer Despite the advice to scrap the proposals, Mr Gray used the plans for Monklands, which the public still believed were going ahead, as a prominent feature of his Holyrood election campaign. His leaflets stated: ‘ If you want to see…Continued development of the new Monklands hospital…. It has to be both votes SNP’. He also visited the site of the proposed new hospital with John Swinney, boasting about the project in an Instagram video. Meghan Gallacher, Scottish Tory MSP for Central Scotland, said: ‘These bombshell revelations will be met with fury from patients across Lanarkshire. ‘This is concrete proof that John Swinney and Neil Gray disgracefully lied to voters and hid the truth from them in a shameful attempt to keep voters on side with their party during an election period.’ The Scottish Government said it was still ‘fully committed’ to building a replacement for Monklands hospital. Asked about the timings of the announcement, and ministers’ knowledge of the advice before the election, she said: ‘It is always the case that projects of this scale take time to fully consider and take through the appropriate internal governance assurance processes, as the public would expect when such significant amounts of public money are involved. ‘In March, the project was still going through various internal assessments and the business case was not ready to proceed for decision before the Scottish Government entered the pre-election period. 'On formation of the new government, Scottish Ministers assessed the full business case and informed the Scottish Parliament of the decision to reset the project so that an affordable and credible pathway to deliver the new Monklands Hospital could be achieved’