STIRLING COUNCIL STILL TO DECIDE

There were furious scenes at the meeting of Stirling Council on Thursday evening (24th May). Labour councillors were accused of “bottling” a vote to elect the Leader of the council, and of cynically manipulating procedures in order to hang on to power.

Labour were in control of the administration until the election on 3rd May. Following the election, Labour have 8 councillors, SNP have 7, Conservatives 4 and Liberals 3.

Liberal and Labour have made an informal alliance. At the meeting of the council on 17th May, Labour and the Liberals forced through the election of a Labour provost. However, the election of the Leader of the council, and the election of all the other executive and committee posts, was deferred.

With Labour and Liberals controlling 11 votes out of 22, they have the benefit of the provost’s casting vote for procedural matters but not for appointments to the various council posts including Leader. In the event of a tied vote the decision would be made by a cut of the cards.

At yesterday’s meeting (24th May) the Labour-Liberal alliance deferred the vote for the Leader and all the other posts, leaving the council’s administration in chaos. Until these posts are filled every single decision, from the most important to the most minor, will have to be decided by a meeting of the full council. Labour and Liberals intend to make the council meet every Thursday at 10.00 in the morning.

The leader of the Conservative group at Stirling Council is Cllr Alistair Berrill. He says that Labour and the Liberals are playing games at the expense of the people of Stirling. “The council’s business is set to grind to a halt. A large modern council cannot function by meeting every week to take every single decision. Labour and the Liberals know this perfectly well, but the effective running of the council is clearly less important to them than desperately clinging on to hope of power and allowances.”

He added, “The ironic thing is that the one piece of business they insisted on forcing through last night was approval of councillors’ expenses. The Conservatives made a formal proposal that councillors’ expenses should not be paid until this mess is sorted out, but Labour and the Liberals voted it down.”

Cllr Berrill added a prediction. “Election of the Leader of the council has been formally deferred until 28th June. However, there will be other meetings before that date. If one councillor happens to be absent due to sickness or other commitments, I am sure that once again Labour and Liberals will manipulate the Standing Orders to bring forward the election as urgent business, and force through their nomination. So much for democracy!”