SUPERMARKET giant Tesco has been accused of "sneaky behaviour" after it demolished a historic Glasgow rail station at 7am on a Sunday.

Two MSPs have called for separate inquiries into how the company was able to have the former Partick Central building knocked down without anyone seeming to know about it.

The 110-year-old building was part of a site Tesco wants to develop as a supermarket, student flats and private houses.

The plan has been met massive opposition - with campaigners now even more furious because of the loss of the station.

Yesterday it emerged that, even though a building warrant authorising demolition was granted to Tesco last June, the local councillor had been kept in the dark about it.

Councillor Aileen Colleran, a fierce opponent of the Tesco plan, knew nothing of the warrant until late on Friday.

She said: "Needless to say I am absolutely furious about this. I will be having strong words.

"It is outrageous no-one informed me when it was granted. But because it is a building warrant, not a planning application, no-one is required to tell me. That should change.

"Tesco has scored a massive own goal here. If it wanted to reinforce people's negative attitude of the chain in Partick then it has succeeded."

Gordon Bickerton of Stop Tesco Owning Partick (STOP) pressure group said: "There was no need for this building to be demolished, it was in unusually good condition.

"Tesco makes all these statements about consultations with local people then it does this at seven in the morning. It's such a sneaky way to do it."

Glasgow MSP Sandra White said the council's handling of the situation should be investigated.

She said: "The worst thing is the warrant has been in existence since last June and nobody informed anybody.

"The local councillor has been bombarded with e-mails, there are 900 objectors and there have been public meetings taking place about this planned development.

"Red alerts should have been flashing. There has to be an investigation to see how carefully this application was trawled through.

"Another piece of Glasgow's heritage has gone down the tubes."

Fellow MSP Pauline McNeill said they should investigate tightening up on planning legislation "We were denied the chance to have the debate about whether this building should have been preserved. Historic Scotland said that, in their expert view, it should have been retained.

"It was not done in an open, transparent way.

"And it is an absolute no-no that we allow an applicant whose application still has to be scrutinised by the planning committee to demolish a building on the site.

"It is contrary to the whole philosophy of the planning process." Building had been a target for vandals'

TESCO today defended the demolition, saying it had been done after persistent vandalism to the building.

And Sunday morning was the "preferable time" for the work as it caused the least traffic disruption.

Tesco's Nick Gellatly said: "The ticket office had suffered from a spate of vandalism; no sooner had we secured it than we received calls to say it had been broken into again.

"We took the decision to demolish it very seriously and consulted with relevant parties."

The firm also said it had scaled down the development proposals with the number of student flats being cut from 1300 to around 690, houses from 300 to 220 and parking spaces from 600 to 501.