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THERE is no denying that the debacle surrounding Darlington's new Eastern Transport Corridor road link is a serious matter.

The long-awaited project is running £1.9m over budget. When complete it will also stand 7ft too high because builders mistakenly laid it on a two-metre high embankment.

Councillors refused to halt the work because doing so would add another £1.5m to the already inflated bill.

Large capital projects often exceed their original budget. But a near £2m overspend on a £12.5m relief road is simply unacceptable.

Had the scheme gone ahead in 2000, when it was first included in the town's transport blueprint, it would have cost just £5.5m.

By the time the Government approved funding, the cost of the 1.8-mile project had soared to £12.5m.

Now it will cost a further £1.9m.

If this had happened in the private sector, heads would have rolled. Yet no disciplinary action can be taken against the senior officers involved in this fiasco because they have all apparently left the council.

So what did the council do? It paid £22,000 for an independent report on what went wrong - and that blamed "management errors".

Council chiefs say an internal restructure means the same thing could not happen again. This sounds a lot like locking the stable door after the horse has well and truly bolted, particularly in view of a £2.2m overspend on the town's "pedestrian heart" scheme.

The people of Darlington have a right to expect that lessons have been learned - and errors on such a scale will not be repeated.

10:01am Thursday 1st May 2008

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