Late again: the Easdales' and McGill's 'adverse' accounts

Punctuality matters when it comes to buses. A bus is only as good as its ability to be in the right place at the right time. Some of McGill’s buses, Scotland’s largest independent bus company, are really punctual. Their Clyde Flyer service was “highly commended” in the latest Scottish Transport Awards (which McGill’s sponsors). The commendation cited its 93% punctuality figure. 

But “punctual” is not a word anyone could apply to the Easdale’s filing of their company accounts. And when the accounts do come in, the auditors seem none too impressed.

Before we get into that, a recap for those who may have missed our earlier reporting on the bus tycoons. Sandy and James Easdale are rumoured to be some of Scotland’s wealthiest men, with a net worth hovering around £1.4 billion. Those who got on board The Bell bus early doors may remember our interrogation of that figure. We noticed that some valuations of property and businesses were greatly exaggerated, not necessarily by the Easdales themselves, but enough to cast serious doubt on whether or not they can be called billionaires.

Of course, we don’t routinely look at people’s claimed and actual wealth. But the Easdales are important public figures. There’s the buses they run, which cover all of Strathclyde and have expanded east to Tayside. But they’re also regularly wading into the debate about bus franchising — the model where an authority decides the routes and fares and puts contracts to run those services out for tender. Private companies then compete for the contracts and operate the services themselves but under the contract terms. It’s a way for authorities to decide who gets served by public transport and how much it costs and it’s currently used in cities like Manchester and London. 

Earlier in September, Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT) approved its Regional Bus Strategy, which includes implementing franchising, for our buses across the region. SPT bosses say it will improve reliability of services and provide better value for money for the public.

Reacting to the news in typically understated terms, Sandy Easdale declared the decision “utter insanity”, and criticised the “horrendous” yearly budget for the scheme of £400m — a figure shared only with McGill’s based on “detailed expert analysis”. (We’ll briefly point out that the Scottish government’s budget for the last financial year of bus concessions was £370m.)

In fact, in April of this year, Sandy Easdale penned and sponsored an entire article in the political newspaper Holyrood. In it, he asked: “in what democratic country does the state force a viable, successful, privately owned business into insolvency by stripping away its right to trade?”

Of course, the Easdales are entitled to ask questions about the best use of public finances. But we’ve been taking a look at their finances — across a network of bus companies — and have a few questions of our own. They responded to all our questions with the statement: “The McGill’s group companies comply with the Companies Act 2006 and we always give a true and fair view of accounts which are prepared under UK GAAP”. But that isn't the view of their auditors...

Hi, welcome to The Bell. This isn't the first time we've dug deep in to the Easdales' world. We did it first last October and have since published investigations on other matters such as the fires occurring in listed buildings, the chaos at the Charles Rennie Mackintosh Society, and the men behind the saltires going up across north Glasgow.

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