Last month those in the chamber of the Scottish Parliament were treated to the truly bizarre spectacle of SNP MSPs warmly applauding John Swinney, former Deputy First Minister, after he made a statement.
You would imagine, from their reaction, that he had was announcing some government triumph. What he was actually doing, though, was delivering yet more bad news about the ferries fiasco.
In a crowded field, this sorry saga must count as one of the most dismal failures of the SNP/Green Government.
The two ferries are now set to cost at least £338million - more than three times the original budget - with construction dragged out even further.
The only appropriate response to his statement would have been embarrassed silence, and heads hung in shame. Instead, the SNP clapped like seals at the news that Hull 801 - the Glen Sannox - will not now, after all, be delivered in May, but in the autumn.
Still, it's earlier than the other ferry, Hull 802, which has now been pushed back from next March to autumn of 2024.
As a kicker, Mr Swinney confirmed that the additional cost to the Scottish taxpayer for this year, which he'd just approved, was going up from £15m extra to £21m extra.
This, in a week where Audit Scotland issued a special report, reserved for matters of grave concern, that damned Ferguson Marine, the nationalised shipyard handling the order, for having awarded its directors unapproved bonuses of £87,000.
It's impossible to see what these bonuses were for unless they're now handed out for abject failure. Mr Swinney admitted he was "disappointed", as if he and his colleagues had nothing to do with this appalling mess.
Indeed, he got positively shirty at the notion that any of this was his government's responsibility, boasting of the huge sums the Nationalists had "invested".
But spending public money like a drunken sailor and having nothing to show for it isn't investment. It's incompetence - and on a colossal scale.
This project is a national scandal, and it will go down in history as one of the most disgraceful and shameful elements of Nicola Sturgeon's legacy.
