AHEAD of yet another meeting when focus will be turned on the rebuilding of Stanford-le-Hope's rail station, a call has been made for more openness and honesty from Thurrock Council about where the many millions spent on the project have gone.

Cllr Martin Kerin, Labour's shadow portfolio holder for regeneration, has spoken of his concern about the cost of the new project ahead of tomorrow (Tuesday, 8 December) evening's planning transport regeneration overview and scrutiny committee.

He said: "We need clarity and openness on the spiralling costs of this project and some idea when the new station will be complete.

"In early 2019 the old station was demolished. The Tories then spent £590,000 in consultants and since then nothing.

"At October's full council the regeneration portfolio holder Cllr Mark Coxshall said the latest costs would be around £20 million which is wildly over the original budget. Now the latest report on this project contains no figures at all!

"Decision makers like Cllr Coxshall have a responsibility to explain their spending decisions and account for the way public money is spent on major projects infrastructure projects like this, where the council takes the lead.

"The council's complete lack of openness and accountability is frustrating and what we've seen and heard from the portfolio holder so far is not good enough.

"This is yet another Thurrock Council project chronically overdue and massively overspent. And the people of Stanford still don't know the new station will be complete.

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"I'm asking for a detailed breakdowns of spending, an explanation for the delay and for an end to the Thurrock Council's systemic secrecy over the spending of public funds."

The station project - and the massively overspent A13 widening project - were discussed at last month's meeting of the council's standards and audit committee when councillors were told the actual station rebuild was expected to be completed by late next year, both other works on the associated 'transport hub' could be much longer.

And the assistant director for transport infrastructure Anna Eastgate brushed over the costs of the project - though she was not particularly quizzed by councillors which included the Labour chair of the meeting, Cllr Gerard Rice.