 | 'Like the mad uncle in the attic no-one mentions, Mr McLeish seems an embarrassment to the Labour family. So much so that he is the only key party figure to be excluded from a campaign leaflet for a council by-election in his Central Fife heartland.' Dvaid Scott, Scottish Government Editor in the Scotsman, 26 th March 2002. |  |
There was a by-election for the Thornton, Stenton & Finglassie ward of Fife Council on the 18 th April 2002 following the resignation of Labour Cllr Angela McCallum on 7 th February 2002 over Hernry McLeish's handling of the 'Officegate' affair.
Thornton, Stenton & Finglassie is in the new Glenrothes Westminster parliamentary seat (held by Labour's John MacDougall MP). It is mostly within the Kirkcaldy Scottish parliamentary seat (held by Labour's Marilyn Livingston MSP) and partly within the Central Fife Scottish parliamentary seat (held by Labour- Co-op's Christine May MSP).
Scottish National Party gain from Labour. Swing: 10.9 % Labour to Scottish National Party.
| 18 th April 2002 By-election Turnout 38.6 % (-15.6 %) | |||||
| Candidate | Logo | Party | Votes | % | % change |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| David Cunningham |  |
Scottish National Party | 575 | 40.9 % | + 5.7 % |
| James Young |  |
Labour | 448 | 31.9 % | - 16.0 % |
| Jane L. Kerr |  |
Liberal Democrat | 220 | 15.6 % | + 8.9 % |
| James Balfour |  |
Scottish Socialist Party | 64 | 4.6 % | (+ 4.6 %) |
| James Parker |  |
Conservative | 54 | 3.8 % | - 6.4 % |
| William A. Leggat |  |
Independent | 45 | 3.2 % | (+ 3.2 %) |
| Scottish National Party gain from Labour | |
Scottish National Party majority | 127 | 9.0 % | |
| 6 th May 1999 Turnout 54.2 % (+ 14.9 %) | |||||
| Candidate | Logo | Party | Votes | % | % change |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cllr Angela F. McCallum | |
Labour | 949 | 47.9 % | - 3.8 % |
| David Cunningham | |
Scottish National Party | 697 | 35.2 % | - 5.1 % |
| Aldra A. Corbett | |
Conservative | 202 | 10.2 % | (+ 10.2 %) |
| Jane L. Kerr | |
Liberal Democrat | 133 | 6.7 % | - 1.2 % |
| Labour hold | |
Labour majority | 252 | 12.7 % | + 1.3 % |
| 6 th April 1995 Turnout 39.3 % | |||||
| Candidate | Logo | Party | Votes | % | % change |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Angela F. McCallum | |
Labour | 554 | 51.7 % | |
| William Canning | |
Scottish National Party | 432 | 40.3 % | |
| Crystal McCleave | |
Liberal Democrat | 85 | 7.9 % | |
| Labour win | |
Labour majority | 122 | 11.4 % | |
Following the resignation today (Thursday) of Fife Councillor Angela McCallum Ð who worked part time for the Third Age Group Ð the SNP MSP for Fife Ms Tricia Marwick MSP today reiterated her call for an independent inquiry into Fife Council's awarding of grants to the Third Age Group. Ms Marwick said:
"I am not surprised by the allegations that Angela McCallum has made today in her letter. They back up my demand from day one that there has to be a full independent, external inquiry into Fife Council's awarding of grants to the Third Age Group.
"This inquiry must investigate the practices of Fife Council past and present, and once again I am calling on Audit Scotland to carry out this inquiry as the stinking mess of Labour's Fife fiefdom has got to be cleansed once and for all for the benefit of all the people of Fife.
A Labour councillor who helped run a charity which rented office space from former First Minister Henry McLeish has quit.
Angela McCallum was due to stand down at next year's council elections owing to ill health, but has brought forward her resignation - blaming media harassment over the controversy.
The member of Fife Council said she felt "badly let down" by Mr McLeish's handling of the affair.
Council leader Christine May has pledged that any wrong-doing would be rooted out and dealt with.
The Officegate controversy which led to the Central Fife MSP's resignation as first minister last year centred on his constituency office in Glenrothes.
He claimed expenses from the House of Commons on the office during the 14 years he was Westminster MP for Central Fife - but failed to declare the £36,000 he made from sub lets.
Amid mounting controversy, Mr McLeish decided to quit when a further sub let involving the Third Age Group came to light after he had declared details of five others to the media.
Ms McCallum, who suffers from rheumatoid arthritis, said she had been proud to work for the Third Age Group.
In her resignation letter, she said she had worked part time for the organisation in 1995 and 1996.
Audit committee
"I was proud to work for them and feel that I and they have been badly let down by the first minister's decision not to acknowledge their existence as part of his full and frank disclosure and the resulting media attention," she wrote.
Fife Council's audit committee is carrying out an inquiry into allegations that it paid £40,000 to the charity - which provided services to old people - after it had been wound up.
Scotland's auditor general, Robert Black, has also been asked to investigate by Scottish National Party MSP Tricia Marwick.
Ms McCallum said she had raised the matter with the head of the council's social work department after she discovered the group was still receiving council cash.
She said she was told the arrangement had been put in place "to ensure that the day centres continued to operate".
Ms McCallum now plans to "rebuild her life in peace" and campaign on behalf of arthritis sufferers.
Fife Council leader Christine May said she was "very sorry" that Ms McCallum had resigned.
She also promised that the council investigation would not be a cover-up.
She said she was "extremely concerned" at the damage the affair had done to the image of Labour and the council itself.
Independent inquiry
Ms May said she had told the council's chief executive, Douglas Sinclair, that she wanted his report on the affair to be "full, open, frank and honest".
Ms Marwick said the allegations in Ms McCallum's letter backed up her demand for an independent inquiry into Fife Council's grants to the Third Age Group.
Scottish Tory local government spokesman, Keith Harding, also called for an independent investigation.
He said the resignation made it clear that "not everything about the officegate affair has been brought out into the public domain".
THE Officegate affair, which brought down Henry McLeish, was re-ignited last night by the resignation of a councillor who blamed the former First Minister for keeping important facts from the media.
Angela McCallum was heavily involved in the Third Age Group, the charity at the centre of the scandal. Last night, she quit as a Fife Labour councillor, blaming ill-health and press harassment for her decision. However, in her resignation letter, Ms McCallum suggested Mr McLeish had known much more about the rental arrangements for his constituency office than he had revealed, even during the news conference when he promised to make a "full and frank disclosure" of all the facts.
Ms McCallum even hinted that the former First Minister knew all about the crucial sixth sub-let of his office - to the Third Age Group - when he revealed the other five sub-lets.
She claimed his decision to hide this knowledge from the press caused serious problems for her and the staff who worked there.
She said she felt "badly let down" by his failure to acknowledge their existence as part of his "full and frank disclosure".
The former First Minister resigned last November after admitting that he had sub-let half of his constituency office to five organisations, including Fife Council.
But it was the revelation that he had also let the office to the Third Age Group and had failed to declare this with the other lets that forced him out of office.
Mr McLeish refused to comment on Ms McCallumÕs resignation last night.
However, her decision to attack him in this way is likely to cause him considerable embarrassment, particularly as he had hoped the furore over the affair had largely died down.
The links between the Third Age Group and Fife Council resurfaced last week when it emerged that the charity had received grants of more than £40,000 from the council after it had been wound up.
Fife CouncilÕs financial contributions to the group are the subject of being investigations by the Accounts Commission and an internal council inquiry.
Ms McCallum was the co-ordinator of the group between 1995 and 1996. In her letter, she said: "I feel that I and they [the charity workers] have been badly let down by the First MinisterÕs decision not to acknowledge their existence as part of his Ôfull and frank disclosureÕ and the resulting media attention."
She also claimed the Third Age Group was financed by the council after it was wound up in a deliberate ploy to ensure the day centres continued to operate.
Stuart Randall, the Leader of Fife Council's Conservative Group, today called for disciplinary action against any Councillor or Council Officer who fails to be open and honest with the 'Officegate' investigation. On Saturday Christine May, the Leader of the Labour Administration, admitted she suspected someone had not been "open and honest" with the Chief Executive's internal inquiry.
Cllr Randall has also renewed his call, first made on 17 November last year, for an external inquiry in to the 'Officegate' affair, as the public has lost faith in the objectivity of senior Officers.
Cllr Stuart Randall says: "This charade has gone on long enough. First Henry McLeish resigned, then Cllr Angela McCallum. There are bodies everywhere, but the Chief Executive still holds there's no wrongdoing without a smoking gun. That just won't do.
"Even before the internal investigation into the first five leases was finished, the CE had pronounced: "Fife Council and the former regional council acted entirely properly in all dealings with Mr McLeish". It came as no surprise, therefore, when the report to Committee concluded just that; what else could it do? The CE had prejudged his own investigation. At very least the verdict should have been not proven because adequate records were simply not available, but Officers were in no doubt what the Chief Executive expected to hear. The matter should have been referred to an outside body instead, as I said at the time.
"Now history is repeating itself with the investigation into the infamous sixth lease. On December 6 the CE declared: "The Council's actions with regard to the Third Age Group are beyond reproach" and he said "there has been no breach" of the Council Employees' Code of Conduct. How can this possibly be squared with Cllr May's assertion that someone has not been "open and honest"?
"A trend has emerged and the smell is unmistakable: there is something truly rotten in the Kingdom. Things have become far too cosy. Officers owe their loyalty to the general public, not the Fife Labour Party, no matter how great the risks for career advancement. When Councillors step out of line it must be reported and dealt with openly. Justice must be done, but also seen to be done. Shredded documents do not prove innocence; they can just as easily protect the guilty.
"Sadly there have been many instances during my three years on Fife Council which left a very bad taste in the mouth: Officers queued up to defend deliberately misleading press releases; standing orders have been stretched or broken to help the Administration out of a hole; free-speech has frequently been curtailed in the debating chamber when the Labour Group became uncomfortable. The behaviour of some committee chairman has been nothing short of a disgrace, but not once have senior Officers intervened. The Chief Executive has refused to admit there is a problem and has even resorted to threats of legal action.
"This was not what I expected when I came in to local government from industry. Like the Chief Executive, I want to see Fife Council's reputation restored, but continuing to pretend that the public has faith in internal inquiries is not the way to do it. Fife is being talked of as The New Monklands, and that is not a comparison with which we can be proud.
"Both elected members and Officers who should know better have lost the plot. A clear-out is long overdue and I believe heads must roll."
The ongoing scandal in Fife, involving Henry McLeish MSP, and until November 2001, ScotlandÕs First Minister, Fife Council, and the Fife branch of a charity called Third Age, which seems to be as elusive as the Third Way, rumbles on.
Tricia Marwick, SNP, MSP, who lives in Glenrothes, used to work for Shelter, and has been active in politics for at least 20 years, had never heard of them. According to reports, the charity received two annual grants of £20000 per year after it had been wound up; it seems to have started operating around 1996, and rented part of Henry McLeishÕs constituency office for about two and a half years. The word used for the rent was "peppercorn", but it amounted to £25 per week, and it was Mr McLeishÕs failure to mention this that led to his resignation.
The charity at one stage employed Lynda Struthers, who was Henry McLeishÕs election agent; Ms Struthers now works for Fife Council as a debt officer. The groupÕs management committee consisted of six council officials, Ms Struthers, Maureen Rodger, an election agent for Henry McLeish and also a Fife social worker, Fife Labour Councillor Angela McCallum, Fife Labour Councillor Elizabeth Henderson, Brian Wilson, former head of the councilÕs elderly care department, and Christine Latto, a Fife social worker. The group was wound up in February 1998, but was given grants of £20089 in April 1998 and April 1999; the meeting in March 1999 was attended by Mr McLeishÕs wife, Julie, who was a regional manager for elderly care.
All this may be perfectly legal, and moral, and there may well be good and cogent reasons for these actions; an investigation by Fife Council has revealed that everything was above board, but then it was investigating itself, so one would expect that result. Two things make this seem suspicious; in the first place, it seems passing strange that Mr McLeish would "forget" rent from a charity which had involved two of his election agents, and his wife, albeit in a more remote way, and secondly, although charities are required by law to retain accounts for a period of six years after cessation of their activities, somehow Fife Council had shredded all records appertaining to the charity, "due to lack of storage space". It is not clear whether the shredding took place before or after the Glasgow Herald started making enquiries. We do know from Peter MacMahon, Mr McLeishÕs special adviser that when the Herald went a looking that the Chief Executive of the Council contacted the Leader of the Council, Labour Councillor, Christine May, who contacted Mr MacMahon, who said "Tell them nothing".
In the Scottish Parliament, John Swinney, SNP , asked the First Minister, Jack McConnell, if he would support an investigation into the matter by Audit Scotland; Mr McConnell replied "If he did his homework he would know that an inquiry is already under way." As the subject only came up because the Herald and the SNP had pursued it, Mr McConnellÕs point score was understandable. John Swinney replied "What we have here is a Labour council, giving money to an organisation run by Labour activists, renting office space from a Labour MP. The connection is Labour, Labour , Labour, and it stinks. Will he clean up Scottish politics and start with Fife council?"
This is not the first instance of Labour organisations destroying evidence; when Mr McConnellÕs own constituency secretary was asked at the time of the Lobbygate enquiry into Beattie Media and its relationship with Jack McConnell what had happened to the notebook in which she had taken notes of a call from Beattie Media, she said that she had destroyed it "as was her routine". At that time she had been in the job for almost six weeks; some routine! Other notorious political shredders were Westminster and Brent Tory Council, who shredded evidence in the "homes for votes" investigations; Dame Shirley Porter, (venerated by Baroness Thatcher) has been told to pay back the council £26 million (or about that sum) but flew back to Israel whence she has transferred her £58 million fortune. The latest example is the auditors, Arthur Andersen, who shredded evidence relating to Enron before they were subpoenaed by the US Congress.
Incidentally, Mr McConnell said in the course of the Parliamentary exchange that he did not accept the practice of shredding documents so soon; admirable, we think his constituency secretary burned them.
BRIDGET McConnell, the First MinisterÕs wife, was yesterday dragged into the Officegate affair when it was disclosed she attended a meeting of the Third Age group, the charity at the centre of the row which led to the resignation of Henry McLeish.
In her role as community services manager with Fife Council in May 1996, Mrs McConnell attended the annual general meeting of the charity at Glenrothes. It was reported at the meeting that the group had an office in Hanover Court, where Mr McLeishÕs constituency headquarters is located.
While there is no suggestion that Mrs McConnell had an involvement in the group, the disclosure she was present at the meeting, in her capacity as a council official, comes in the wake of controversy over the role played by Julie McLeish, the former first ministerÕs wife, who is currently an official of the council.
Tricia Marwick, SNP list MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, said: "I find it an astonishing coincidence that the First MinisterÕs wife and the former first ministerÕs wife should both have an involvement in a small charity in Glenrothes."
Ms Marwick, whose concerns about the Third Age group have led to an investigation by a public-sector watchdog, the controller of audit, refused to comment further on Mrs McConnellÕs attendance at the meeting which took place after the new Labour-run Fife Council replaced the former regional council.
However, the disclosure will be seen as another twist in the affair. It may lead to questions being asked about whether Mr McConnell was aware of the Third Age group renting office space at Mr McLeishÕs Glenrothes office prior to the revelation that led to Mr McLeish quitting as First Minister last November.
Mr McLeish stood down after admitting that he had sub-let half of his constituency office to five organisations, including Fife Council.
But it was the revelation that he had also let the office to the Third Age group and had failed to declare this with other lets that forced him out of office.
Third Age became the subject of a new political row at the end of January when it was disclosed it had received £40,000 from Fife Council despite the fact that its management group had been disbanded.
A week ago, a report of an investigation carried out by Douglas Sinclair, the chief executive of Fife Council, showed that council officials, including Julie McLeish, had broken rules by authorising the payments.
The annual meeting of the Third Age group was attended by Mrs McConnell in her capacity as community services manager. She remained with Fife for the following two years. In 1998, she was appointed head of culture and leisure with Glasgow City Council, a post she still holds.
Her appointment to the post with ScotlandÕs biggest local authority was attacked in some quarters as Labour cronyism because her husband Jack, then a prospective MSP, was former general secretary of the party in Scotland.
Mrs McConnellÕs attendance at the Third Age annual meeting in May 1996 is disclosed in a section of Mr SinclairÕs report that has not been made public. Appendices to the report show that Mrs McConnell was among 20 officials, volunteers and councillors attending the meeting.
There is no reference to Mrs McConnell having made any comment at the meeting. It was reported that the groupÕs office was in Hanover Court, Glenrothes, and that its co-ordinator, Angela McCallum, had taken up her role with the group the previous June.
Last month, Ms McCallum resigned as a Fife councillor, blaming ill-health and press harassment for her decision.
A Fife Council spokeswoman refused to comment, saying the appendices were a confidential part of the report.
Mrs McConnell could not be contacted for comment.
SCOTTISH Labour Party chiefs were today maintaining their silence over reports linking the wife of First Minister Jack McConnell to the charity at the centre of the Officegate affair that led to his predecessorÕs downfall.
Bridget McConnell, then a Fife Council employee, is reported to have attended a meeting of the Third Age Group in 1996 at which a councillor discussed the charityÕs office accommodation at Hanover Court in Glenrothes.
Henry McLeish resigned as First Minister last November when, after having disclosed details of five sub-lets at his Hanover Court constituency office, it emerged he had arranged a sixth let, for the Third Age Group.
Last week Fife Council published an edited version of an inquiry report into the group, which considered payments made by the local authority to the charity for a two-year period after its management committee was disbanded.
While the report, by FifeÕs chief executive Douglas Sinclair, said there was no evidence that funds were used by the charity for any purpose other than that for which it was intended, it excluded the names of council employees not already made public since some might still face disciplinary procedures.
Reports today suggested unpublished appendices to the report include minutes of the Third Age charity, listing Mrs McConnell as present at its 1996 annual general meeting where Councillor Angela McCallum, the first co-ordinator of the Third Age, spoke about the office arrangements. Mrs McCallum reportedly told the meeting: "The first few months were spent locating and setting up office accommodation which we now have at Hanover Court."
Mrs McConnell was unavailable for comment today, while a Labour spokeswoman said the reports were not a matter for the party.
LIKE something out of Stalinist Russia, Labour apparatchiks stood accused yesterday of resorting to historyÕs airbrush.
The reason: the exclusion from election literature of the man whom they all professed to love only a few short months ago.
Remember Henry McLeish? Some would apparently prefer to forget him in Central Fife.
Like the mad uncle in the attic no-one mentions, Mr McLeish seems an embarrassment to the Labour family. So much so that he is the only key party figure to be excluded from a campaign leaflet for a council by-election in his Central Fife heartland.
John MacDougall, the Westminster MP for Central Fife, is there. So too are the contact details of Catherine Stihler, a member of the European Parliament. And a helpline number is given for Christine May, the Labour leader of Fife Council.
But one name is missing. No name-check anywhere for the local MSP, the First Minister until last November.
Opponents seized on the omission. Tricia Marwick, an SNP MSP, said: "The Labour Party obviously wants to win this election, but they recognise that Henry McLeish is a liability to them."
But a Labour Party spokeswoman stressed: "The idea of Mr McLeish being airbrushed out is just crazy." Labour sources blamed an "oversightÕÕ Mr McLeish has already had to suffer the indignity of having his endorsement as a candidate to be returned to Holyrood next year turned down by the Labour Party.
He was selected by his local branch but the Scottish executive committee refused to endorse him until the investigations into the Officegate scandal are complete.
His latest discomfort has also been compounded by the fact the by-election was caused by the resignation of Angela McCallum, a Labour councillor, over the Officegate affair which brought him down.
The Scottish National Party won the Fife Council seat of Thornton, Stenton and Finglassie South last week; the result was as follows:
| David Cunningham | Scottish National Party | 575 |
| James Young | Scottish(!) Labour Party | 448 |
| Jane L Kerr | Scottish(!) Liberal Democrat Party | 220 |
| James Balfour | Scottish Socialist Party | 64 |
| James Parker | Scottish(!) Conservative & Unionist Party | 54 |
| William A Leggat | Independent | 45 |
Our new councillor, David Cunningham is
56, and married with two children; he has been in the SNP since 1970, and is
a lecturer in Further Education in Glenrothes. The Labour candidate, who was
strongly tipped to win, had originally been a very hardworking and well
respected councillor in Thornton, until he was shunted aside in the melee
that passed for boundary changes, and put into the Weymss seat, which he
lost to an independent; perhaps the Labour Party are now pondering the
wisdom of that move. The by-election was caused by the resignation of Angela
McCallum, who had been Henry McLeishÕs election agent, and who was also
involved with the Third Age Charity; she felt betrayed by Mr McLeishÕs
failure to support her, and her health suffered. This whole mess was
relentlessly pursued by Tricia Marwick, list MSP for the area, and is far
from being over.
There are pointers to ponder in this
by-election; the first is that the Scottish Socialist Party had a pathetic
vote in what should have fertile ground for them, only scoring 64 votes.
(In East Ayrshire they only got 39 and in
the postal ballot in Teith Ward, Stirling Council they could only muster
52.) The second is the strong campaign waged by the Liberals in Fife, and
this should be a warning to the SNP, that the Liberals have a siren song, as
they are never going to achieve power but they can always be the good guys,
or girls as in this case.
However, the SNP won the seat, which
counts; in another by-election in East Ayrshire the same night there was a
14% swing to the SNP, and only 52 votes behind Labour who held the seat, but
second place doesnÕt make the scoreboard; the Labour vote was down in both
seats, and the SNP vote up. A fuller account of these results will be given
in the May issue of the Scots Independent.
Tricia Marwick: If Helen Eadie is so proud of Labour's record - and if she is particularly proud of the Fife chancellor and the Fife MSPs - will she explain why, the day after Gordon Brown's budget, the Labour party lost a seat to the SNP in the Thornton, Stenton and Finglassie council by-election?
Helen Eadie: I was party to that election. [Laughter.]
The Deputy Presiding Officer: Order.
I am grateful to Tricia Marwick MSP, David McDonald and Martyn Greene for information concerning the by-election.
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