DEMANDS for a public inquiry into the handling of “failing” manufacturing yards in Fife and Lewis were backed by former prime minister Gordon Brown yesterday.

The Labour ex-leader and former Fife MP has said an urgent investigation must take place into the Scottish government’s handling of a multimillion-pound plan that left BiFab yards without work. 

The government has recently withdrawn a guarantee that would have sustained 450 jobs at the yards, underwriting a bid to build wind-turbine jackets in the Firth of Forth.  

The firm faces liquidation and the Daily Record has now published a letter from Mr Brown to the Commons business select committee which calls for an inquiry into the circumstances that have led to Scotland missing out on the offshore wind-farm revolution. 

He wrote: “It is becoming clearer by the day that the chances of 450 vital Scottish jobs are being destroyed by basic mistakes by the Scottish government.”