Local councils are on the front line delivering public services many Scots depend on. But local authorities have been cut to the bone due to stingy settlements by the SNP Government and so scrutiny of spending is paramount.
When people are being asked to tighten their belts, transparency around big pay offs is also essential. But there are concerns that the standards regime for upholding ethical behaviour in councillors is being abused.
Abuse of the standards system
Rival politicians, officials and even colleagues have used the system to complain about elected councillors. Some of these complaints will have merit and councillors who behave badly must be pulled up. However, recent cases are a cause for concern.
Glasgow Labour councillor Fiona Higgins was reported after she used robust language to criticise cuts to teacher numbers. She has now hauled the Standards Commission to court over fears any investigation would not be fair.
Hers is a test case for free speech and will have ramifications outside the confines of Glasgow council. Her colleague, George Redmond, is also angry with the Standards Commission over an investigation into allegations he denies. Redmond, who exposed a major scandal in the city chambers, believes the stress caused by his own case led to a heart attack.
Call for reform
The time has come for a rethink of the standards system that should put free speech at its core. Councillors should be investigated for wrongdoing, not as a way of settling old scores.
The SNP Government has repeatedly said the main reason for spending millions of pounds of taxpayers’ cash to nationalise the Ferguson Marine shipyard was to protect jobs. The Port Glasgow business was saved from immediate closure in 2019 and allowed to continue slowly building two large ferries which were needlessly complex and ruinously expensive.
Ferguson Marine jobs at risk
Fergusons’ reputation for quality, built up over more than a century, was allowed to be trashed because of an overblown contract that no one – be it in Government or CalMac – has ever admitted was a mistake. The second of the two ferries is due to finally be finished this year. And how are workers rewarded? One quarter of them now face being axed. Remember, this is a state-owned business.
The SNP promised Fergusons more orders for smaller vessels in March but the contracts have still not been signed-off. John Swinney should sign the deal and save jobs.
