from Sunday Herald, 31 January 2010
A major Scottish local authority has been accused of “tyranny”, “bullying” and “Orwellian corporatism” for attempting to close down dissent and silence critics.
In the wake of bitter controversy over plans for a new golf resort by the US tycoon, Donald Trump, Aberdeenshire council has moved to suppress the rights of rebel councillors.
Powers to raise motions for debate at the council have been severely restricted, prompting councillors to question whether Aberdeenshire is still a democracy.
Aberdeenshire council has been badly divided over the Trump plan, with a small minority of councillors strongly opposed to the billionaire’s scheme to build two championship golf courses, 950 holiday homes, 500 luxury homes and a 450-bed hotel on a unique natural system of sand dunes at the Menie estate near Balmedie.
But the council’s ruling Liberal Democrat and Conservative coalition, along with Scottish Nationalist councillors, has supported the plan. As a result some councillors have split from the LibDems, and helped form the five-strong Democratic Independent group.
They have encountered increasingly difficulty raising policy issues, with about half of their motions being barred. They include motions on funding for schools, airport expansion, the Calman Commission on devolution and targets to cut climate pollution.
The group has formally complained, but to no avail. And now the council has amended its standing orders to make it easier to rule motions out of order, and to prevent similar issues being raised again in the future.
“For many years the council was worthy but dull - now it is neither,” said councillor Martin Ford, a leading anti-Trump rebel and a member of the Scottish Green Party. “The democratic ethos has gone and with it equality of rights. Instead of democracy, we have a tyranny of the majority.”
According to Ford, the changes hampered the ability of councillors to represent their constituents. “Proper, evidence-based decision making at full council is compromised by tribal and bullying behaviour,” he alleged.
Councillor Paul Johnston, the leader of the Democratic Independent group, accused the council of trying to shut people up. “They are casually dismantling good democratic governance and replacing it with elements of Orwellian corporatism,” he said.
“They have forgotten fairness, and abandoned proper process for the arbitrary demands of the crowd of councillors. To make sure the rules allow them to behave in this way, they have changed the rules.”
Councillor Debra Storr, a member of the independent group as well as the Scottish Green Party, argued that it was a fundamental tenet of liberal democracy that those you disagree with should be heard. “It is dreadful that the LibDem-led administration of Aberdeenshire council is set on destroying the right of minorities and the public,” she said.
“It is depressing that the Conservatives and the SNP, who are the official opposition, have gone along with this.” She was also concerned about new restrictions on members of the public making representations to the council.
Another independent councillor, Sam Coull, accused the ruling coalition of a fix. “There is now no real way for a councillor to get a motion through the firewall, with the Provost as the very last immovable obstacle,” he said. “He can rule anything he likes out of order at a whim, without having to give any reason or explanation.”
Coull has been a councillor since 1977, representing three different local authorities in the Aberdeenshire area. “This is by far the worst council it has been my misfortune to sit on in the last thirty years,” he told the Sunday Herald.
Aberdeenshire council pointed out that the changes to the standing orders had been voted through by a majority of the 68 councillors in an open meeting. “The changes were agreed following a comprehensive debate on a number of proposed changes, aimed at modernising the council and committee processes and to aid the effective delivery of its business,” said a council spokeswoman.
“Standing orders are quite clear in that they may be suspended if supported by a two-thirds majority. Therefore the focus is on the councillor to make a robust case as to why the motion is relevant to the council’s business.”
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