Crown Estate Scotland

The calls come in the wake of a new report from Audit Scotland assessing how the Scott Wind offshore leasing round and the cash it raised have been managed.

Scott Wind is money that energy companies paid to Crown Estate Scotland for the right to build and operate offshore wind farms in parts of the Scottish coastal seabed.

The project generated £755 million and Audit Scotland's recent report said the Scottish Government must tell the public how it will use the money.

Ministers have already taken £96 million of ScotWind funds.

There was talk of a Scotland Wealth Fund, some listeners will remember back in 2022.

This comes in the same week that the Herald revealed Crown Estate Scotland, who facilitated the original auction all those years ago, did so without producing a single business case prior to the auction to demonstrate value for money.

So two stories.

One, Crown Estate Scotland not having a business case of any kind in 2022, or 2021 rather.

And the second story, the Auditor General calling for more transparency.

So this story really does continue to unravel.

Speaking of squandered, though, I mean, you know, there's a lot kind of like, you know, and, you know, there's a lot of politeness.

And, you know, to a certain extent, I think, you know, there's a lot of goodwill yet about, you know, the Scotland licensing process run by the Crown Estate Scotland.

And this is like, you know, let's talk about what it is, is it's giving developers access to Seabed in order to develop essentially what is, you know, six, you know, power stations, you know, the size of Sizewell Sea being built in Suffolk in Scottish waters.

That's kind of what it is.