THE SNP is not fit to lead Glasgow Council according to the man they want to replace.

Frank McAveety has criticised the SNP’s conduct in dealing with council business and their plans for the city.

The former Labour government minister said the SNP sat back and did nothing as hundreds of millions of pounds has been cut form the city’s budget instead of standing up to the Scottish Government.

Mr McAveety said: “Not one of the opposition, including the leader, has stood up to say that the £377m levered out of Glasgow in the last ten years is anything other than a disgrace.

“I’ll tell you this, if it was the Tories that were doing that to Glasgow they would be out on the streets complaining about it. But it seems it’s OK when Nicola Sturgeon tells them it’s Alright.

“In a recent interview the leader of the opposition said there was not going to be any extra money and we should just get used to trying to find efficiency savings.”

Mr McAveety said when he was a minister, Labour councillors were continually making representations to get better deals for Glasgow from the Government.

He said in failing to challenge Nicola Sturgeon and Finance Secretary, Derek Mackay, on council cuts the SNP leadership in Glasgow has failed a big test.

He said: “I do worry that people do not see the enormity of the challenge.”

The Labour leader said the SNP record in the council does not look like an administration in waiting, with the capacity to govern.

It is not just inexperience or young candidates, who he said can be capable no mater which party they represent but rather the willingness and ability to act decisively that he questions.

He said the SNP councillors have been silent on too many big issues and voted against a number of potentially transformational policies.

Mr McAveety said: “This city will face consistently big decisions whether it is housing decisions, investment in schools decisions and the tough issues in terms of prioritising your resources.

“It’s alright being a protest party, you’ve also got to deliver real change and in each and every one of those, they opposed the housing stock transfer in this city, they were very critical in terms of our school investment, claiming we would never fulfil the commitment to £250m and most recent glaring example is we have a chance for youngsters in this city to have a transformative opportunity though the use of IT but they sat on their hands and tried to delay it rather than make a brave decision.

“I don’t think people of Glasgow want that. They want you to be stepping up to the plate with an idea for the future.”

The Labour council leader said he thinks people in Glasgow will bear that in mind when they vote on May 4

Susan Aitken, SNP group leader, said her party has learned from losing in 2012 just a year after winning in the city in the Holyrood elections.

Ms Aitken, said: “We learned from failing to demonstrate to the people that we are ready.

“It is a team approach. I’m the group leader and have been since 2014, but the whole group is a team.

“We meet together to sit down to talk about what we want to achieve and the impact we want to have for the people of Glasgow and the people in our own wards.”

She added: “The manifesto is a shared set of ambitions of what the SNP wants to do for Glasgow. Every policy, every idea is for Glasgow.”

Ms Aitken said she is ambitious but won’t promise what can’t be guaranteed to be kept.

She added: “everything in the manifesto is something we have tested and if it’s something we want to explore rather than something we can definitely 100% guarantee delivery we have said this is something we will explore.”

She said she has a team of councillors ready to step into top posts in an SNP administration and names her deputy, David McDonald, and councillors Mhari Hunter on social care, Fergal Dalton on education and Kenny McLean on housing and regeneration.

Ms Aitken said there was great work being done by council officials and she did not intend to start ripping that up just for the sake of it.

She added: “Equally there are things about democracy and the way the council relates to the city and issues around transparency that we do want to change significantly.”

She said: “We are ready.” Adding her team had been meeting people and organisations in the city to find out what they want from the council and what change they want.”

She said those new candidates have a wealth of valuable life and professional experience, from social care to housing, finance to children’s rights.

“If we are lucky enough to be elected and I’m looking at the people who can fill those posts, I’m not short of people with experience, knowledge and understanding.”