Levelling up bids where funding was “snatched away at the last minute” were “a complete waste of energy, skills and knowledge”, an MP has blasted.
Anne McLaughlin said £500,000 of community officers and counsellors’ time in her constituency alone went into “preparing these bids to give our communities the best possible chance of securing funding”.
But the SNP MP said the Government "waved the carrot of levelling up funding in front of our noses only to snatch it away at the last minute".
In a blistering attack on Rishi Sunak, Ms McLaughlin said: “And then we look at who did get the funding… the Prime Minister's wealthy constituency.
“While my constituency and Glasgow constituency has got nothing, his was awarded £19million and that just simply exposes the lie of levelling up for what it is - just another way for the Conservatives to funnel public money to their own pet projects.”
The MP for Glasgow North East, who triggered the Westminster Hall debate, said her constituency did not get funding because the Government “changed the rules at the 11th hour.”
She said ministers intervened at the last minute to say that if a local authority had been awarded funding in the first round “of any amount”, no bids could be awarded funding in this round.
“This sudden and inexplicable shifting of the goalposts ruled all of Glasgow's bids ineligible for funding,” she slammed.
And in a punchy remark, Ms McLaughlin said: “I don't agree with the way this funding is awarded.
“Forcing councils to compete against one another is in itself a terrible way to distribute finance, which should by rights just be given to local authorities to address local problems.”
She added: “The idea that spreading this funding evenly around the UK is somehow a fair way to do it is just total nonsense.
“To properly address inequality and deprivation you have to do more than just throw a few pounds at communities every once in a while.”
Levelling Up minister Dehenna Davison said: “The levelling up fund really is one of the centrepiece interventions that the Government’s put in place to really try and tackle levelling up, to breathe new life into some of these areas, that really need… against a backdrop of a whole range of other interventions.”
She thanked MPs as well as local communities who “have put an awful lot of time and effort into the bids that have been submitted to the levelling up funding”.
Ms Davison said: “Each bid is assessed by government officials both in my department and in the Department of Transport against published assessment criteria with the highest scoring bids being shortlisted.”
She added it is then checked “that there's a fair spread of bids across the UK”.
“Sadly, we were never going to be able to fund projects in every area, but that said, the funders have a very clear and transparent process for determining how bids are selected,” she said.
The decisions made in the government's levelling-up mess caused a massive outcry.
A massive £2.1 billion was distributed between 111 places but the Tories were accused of overlooking bids from deprived areas in favour of wealthier places.
Damning evidence by research group the Centre for Inequality and Levelling Up found that in the two funding rounds so far, a quarter of England's 100 most deprived areas have received no cash at all.
There was fury in Rochdale, the 17th most deprived area in the country, after a £40 million funding bid was scrapped - sparking allegations that Tory areas were prioritised.
To pile further pressure on the PM, a bid in his own Richmond constituency in North Yorkshire - which is in the 251st most deprived area out of 317 in the country - was awarded £19 million.
Other affluent areas also awarded cash included Rutland, the 15th least deprived, which was given nearly £22 million.
Even Mr Sunak's own party are far from happy, with insiders branding it a "f**k up of epic proportions" .
