Land deal could bring city jobs boost Bungling council revealed private info in error
Perth could be set to enjoy an engineering jobs boost on the back of a land deal agreed this week, the PA can reveal.
A council committee was advised to accept an offer for 1.2 acres at the northern end of Arran Road from engineering company TRAC International Group on Monday, after it was said the deal could lead to dozens of new jobs being created in the city.
But despite the deal being lauded as a “good news story” by the councillor who chaired the meeting, Councillor Caroline Shiers, the PA is only able to reveal the detail of it after another bungle by council officers involving what was supposed to be private information.
The proposal was supposed to have been considered in private and was discussed at the tail end of the meeting at a time when the room had been cleared of journalists and members of the public.
However, council officers kept on recording the meeting on camera after the room was cleared, then went and uploaded the entire video to the internet.
It is the second time in the space of two months that officers have blundered when handling private information.
Last month the PA reported how officers inadvertently revealed how much the council had been prepared to pay to acquire part of a commercial waste company after they published minutes of another meeting held in private online.
Towards the end of the original near-30 minute long recording of Monday’s meeting, the council’s investment manager Serge Merone could be seen and heard telling property subcommittee members: “We have a proposal that we think is good value for money in terms of the equivalent transactions on site. It is also an offer which is good for the local economy because it will attract a company with high value jobs. The company is TRAC International Group.”
Perth City North councillor
Dave Doogan could then be seen and heard saying: “I’m really, really pleased to see this.”
Perth City Centre councillor Chris Ahern raised some concerns he had about parking in the area, saying it was “impractical” to create 42 parking spaces on the land.
He had earlier said: “We currently have an issue in North Muirton. We have people parking from the Motor Mile, people parking from SSE [and] people parking from the existing businesses in Arran Road at the moment.
“We’re fortunate we’ve got five units that have now been built and there’s sufficient car parking there for the staff. However, on this one, it’s highlighted here we’ve got 81 jobs going in and it’s completely unfeasible that they’re going to create a car park ... probably not even to manage half that.
“We’ve also now bought the ground at the back of the existing Food and Drink Park which is going to create even more businesses coming in.
“What are we doing to address the car parking issue?”
Mr Merone said it was up to individual employers to create enough parking spaces for their staff.
Asked to confirm any of what was discussed and agreed during the private part of Monday’s meeting, a PKC spokesperson said yesterday: “We cannot confirm any details of a the discussions held during the private session of the property sub-committee on Monday October 21.
“We apologise to the officers, elected members and interested third parties for the administrative error and can confirm that the footage has now been deleted.”
The PA also approached TRAC International Group for confirmation of the deal but had received nothing by yesterday’s deadline.
We apologise to the officers, elected members and interested third parties for the administrative error