More than £10m has been paid to the private operator of the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh (RIE) to keep parking at the hospital free, new figures show.

Parking charges ended at most of Scotland's hospitals in 2008 but remained in place at three facilities which were part of Private Finance Initiative (PFI) contracts.

Deals worth £35m to buy out the car parks at Ninewells Hospital in Dundee and Glasgow Royal Infirmary were announced in 2021 and SNP ministers said they would keep the RIE free until a deal was in place there.

New figures show PFI operator Consort will have been paid more than £12m to keep parking free at the RIE by the time its deal to run the facility ends next year.

The first SNP Scottish government scrapped hospital parking charges for staff, patients and visitors at 14 hospitals in 2008.

In 2021, the then health secretary Humza Yousaf said talks about a deal for the car park at the RIE were "progressing well" and that the car park at the hospital would be free to use while the final agreement was being reached.

But these talks then got wrapped into a protracted row about maintenance standards at the RIE.

The RIE was built in 2002 using the PFI model which saw operator Consort Healthcare receive around £1bn to build and then maintain the hospital over 25 years before handing it back to the NHS.

BBC Scotland last month revealed tens of millions of pounds of taxpayers' cash will be needed to bring the RIE up to scratch when it transfers to public ownership, with large swathes of the facility needing revamped.

Figures released by NHS Lothian under freedom of information laws show the cost of the keeping the car park free of charge, including operational costs, is £400,000 a quarter.

This means it has cost the public purse £10.4m since the policy change - with a further £2m due to be paid out before the PFI deal with Consort ends.

The ending of parking charges has been popular with staff and visitors alike but increased demand to the point where a controversial staff parking permit system was introduced.

A spokesperson for NHS trade union Unison said: "Staff, patients and visitors should not have to pay for parking at hospital, and taxpayers shouldn't be paying millions to subsidise an outdated PFI contract.

"With the contract now approaching its end, the focus must be on bringing the service back into public hands, where it belongs, and ending reliance on costly PFI contracts."

NHS Lothian said the parking costs, which also cover staffing, were met by the Scottish government and would end with the PFI deal next year.