WestInverness.org.uk

A new broad-based administration for Highland Council has been agreed following lengthy talks between Independents, Liberal Democrats and Labour groups on the Council.

A new land and environment committee will be set up, de-centralisation measures will be introduced, and the programme of the administration agreed in 2007 between SNP and Independents will be reviewed.

Independent Sandy Park will remain as Convenor of the Council with Lib Dems Michael Foxley coming in as Leader of the Administration and David Alston in charge of Council budgets. Independent convenors of four main strategic committees [ Housing & Social Work, Transport, Environment & Community Services, Resources and Gaelic] will remain in post, with Liberal Democrat nominees taking the vice-convenorships except Transport, Environment & Community Services Committee where Lochaber Labour councillor Brian Murphy will become vice-chair. His Inverness Labour colleague Jimmy Gray will be proposed as Provost of Inverness at the next meeting of the Inverness City Committee.

The opposition will comprise SNP and Non-aligned councillors.

The council membership of 80 currently comprises:

Independents - 30
Liberal Democrats - 20
Labour - 7

SNP - 17
Non-aligned members - 6

Talks are continuing between Liberal Democrat, Labour and Independent groups on Highland Council to set up a new coalition to run the authority following the collapse of the Independent/SNP administration set up in May 2007. This ended in acrimony when the SNP quit just 13 months later.

While formal agreement has not yet been reached, hopes are high that the more broadly-based adminsitration will be agreed soon. The Council is currently in recess and the next cycle of meetings is scheduled to start in early August, by which time arrangements will require to be in place.

Meantime, allegiences continue to shift, with the number of  Non-aligned councillors rising to five or possibly even six, mainly at the expense of the Independent group. As at 4th July the Council composition was as follows:

Independent 31 (or possibly 30)
Liberal Democrat  20
SNP 17
Labour 7
Non-aligned 5 (or possibly 6)

Total number of councillors = 80

A slightly subdued full Council meeting, held against a background of intense political activity as the various party groups discussed setting up a new administration to replace the Independent/SNP arrangement that fell a week previous.  All SNP office bearers, including the Provost of Inverness, formally resigned from the administration in the morning.

The movement of councillors, mainly Independents,  towards Non-aligned also began to gather pace.

Notable items on this day:

• Single Outcome Agreement which is to be submitted to the Scottish Government by the end of June 2008 was approved;
• An indicative capital programme was approved which will now go to the various service committees in the August cycle of meetings;
• As part of a process for monitoring attendance by members appointed to outside bodies, a list of these appointments will be placed on the Council website;
• Support was given to a proposal for a Polish consulate in Inverness

A paper on Play Development  attracted significant member comment comment, including claims by Inverness West representative Alex Graham and others that play areas had suffered serious neglect for a long period.

The SNP group on Highland Council have left the Administration set up just one year ago with Independent councillors. They quit on Wednesday (June 18th) leaving the Independents, who currently number 33 out of 80 councillors, alone in the administration.

Black Isle Independent councillor Isobel McCallum has resigned as Vice-Chair of the Planning, Environment and Development committee after questioning whether SNP member Pauline Munro (Inverness West) should be the Council’s agriculture spokesperson.

Indicative of the stresses of recent events, doubts have emerged over who leads the Independent group, with press reports suggesting that both Cllr McCallum and Convenor Cllr Sandy Park made claims to the leadership.

Intensive discussions with the various groups and between them will occur in the next few days, but the Council meeting scheduled for Thursday 26th June will be held as planned.

Posted: 21 June 2008

Dropped into Northern Meeting Park tonight (Tuesday 3rd June) on the way home and watched Northern Cricket Club practising — along with local schools they are the main users, and have been there for many years.

Every time I visit I am greatly impressed by the size of the Park, which comprises about four acres of green space right in the town centre, and also growing more aware of the users and its importance to the community. The fact that it is being considered for building, even for a Museum and Art Gallery, is a scandal.

Apart from cricket, the three local schools who lack playing fields — St. Joseph’s, Bishop Eden, and Central — all use it during the week and for their sports days. It is also used for the Marymas fair and maybe the Tattoo could return there.

It has been atrociously maintained by Highland Council with only minimal maintenance, and suffers periodic vandalism from intruders after hours.

Saving it from being destroyed for a Museum we don’t actually need is essential, and I was glad to see Fields in Trust (formerly National Playing Fields Association) members in action in Eastgate recently collecting signatures for a petition against building on the Park

The Highland Council has become the first public body in Scotland to have its Gaelic Language Plan formally approved by Bòrd na Gàidhlig. Intended to boost the status and use of the language, it will be implemented across the Council area between now and 2011.

The Plan includes:

• Playing a leading role in the development of pre-school, primary and secondary Gaelic education.
• Allowing greater public access to Council services in Gaelic.
• Raising the profile of the language by using it alongside English on signage and literature.
• Gaelic tuition opportunities for Council employees.
• Assessing the impact on Gaelic of all new developments within the Council’s sphere of influence.

Gaelic Committee Chairman Councillor Hamish Fraser said the Plan will focus the Council’s commitment to Gaelic and oversee policy and planning for Gaelic throughout all Council services.

Question Time - Highland Council 8th May

The question submitted by Inverness West Cllr Alex Graham asking when the City of Inverness Committee would be able to exercise its powers of scrutiny was provided with a response which totally failed to answer the question. Question and answer are below.

In a follow up question, The Provost stated that the information for the City Committee would be available by 30th June.

[Note that although the Council papers referred to the Convenor, it was actually the Provost of Inverness who replied.]

Questions to the Convener

The following Questions have been received by the Chief Executive in terms of Standing Order 42:–

(i) Mr Alex Graham

“With reference to the motion passed at Inverness City Committee on Monday, 4 February 2008 which stated that:

“The Administration was establishing the type of information and the method by which it could be reported to Wards which could be aggregated on a City wide basis for reporting to the City Committee in accordance with the Committee’s powers. The detail of the process for reporting the information both to Wards and the City Committee would be the subject of a further report to the next appropriate meeting of the City Committee” and noting that two subsequent meetings of the City Committee have been held without further report on this matter, please advise of the current position and when it is expected to provide the information concerned so that Inverness City Committee can discharge its responsibility to scrutinise service delivery in the City of Inverness in terms of Paragraph 2.2 of the Schedule of Powers delegated from the Highland Council.”

The Convener’s response to Alex Graham is circulated.

Mr Graham will be entitled to ask a supplementary question which will be answered by the Convener.

Item 8 - Questions to Convener
Response - to Mr Alex Graham
In response to your question –

The Corporate Manager (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch & Strathspey) is working with a group of Officers from each Council Service to prepare the information that can be reported at Ward level across all 22 Council Wards. Initially, this information was prepared for Ward 7 (Cromarty Firth) as reported by the Corporate Manager to the Inverness City Committee on 4 February 2008. The proposals for Ward reporting were also circulated to all 80 Elected Members via their own Ward Business Meetings.

As information across all 22 Wards was being collected and collated over the past few weeks, some changes have had to be made to the original material. This has resulted in improvements to the original both in the method of capturing the information and in its presentation. For example, taking the first suite of information on ‘Council Facilities’, this has been improved by adding information on staff numbers, unit costs and regulation and inspections to the original Property database held by the Housing and Property Service. This will stop any duplication in reporting of the information and make the system more efficient.

Meanwhile, the business of scrutinising service delivery continues to happen at Ward level, particularly through Ward Business Meetings. Service representatives are regularly invited along to discuss requirements and priorities for the Ward thus enabling Members to scrutinise what is going on in the Ward and to report back to their communities either through the Ward Forum or at Community Council meetings. The work to capture the information for Ward Reporting will be finalised shortly and will be presented to Members following completion.

The longest and most turbulent meeting of the Council since the elections in May 2007 was marked by the first major setbacks for the Independent/SNP administration.

• The Administration was defeated on two votes relating to the composition of the Political Arrangements Working Group, eventually resulting in a victory for Caithness councillors who wanted one of their number (Cllr Coghill) added to the Group following the removal of (expelled SNP) Cllr David Bremner
• A request received from the Scottish Independence Convention for the Council to consider a motion “to support a referendum on the political future of Scotland” was defeated. After lengthy debate the Council voted to move on to next business.
• By the narrowest of margins (37 votes to 36) it was resolved to keep Discretionary Ward Budgets at the same figure of £59,659 for all wards, a 5% increase on the previous year.
• The Council unanimously agreed to keep Roy Bridge School open, overturning a decision taken in December 2006 to close it. Financial projections used at that time have since been found to be flawed.

The consequences for the Administration remain unclear, but having broken ranks with impunity some Independents will be more likely do so again. The SNP seriously mis-judged the mood of their colleagues.

The Freedom of Ross & Cromarty was awarded to Hamish Menzies conductor of Dingwall Gaelic Choir for almost 35 years.

HRH The Prince Charles was awarded the Freedom of Caithness in recognition of his strong involvement with Caithness and the North Highlands.

In other business, the Council agreed to keep Roy Bridge Primary School open after figures used in the 1996 closure consultation were found to be wrong; £200,000 was put towards the final settlement of the capital costs of the Eden Court Theatre in what was held to be the last such request; and support an extension of the term of office of local councillors in order to de-couple Council and Scottish Parliament elections.