GRASS CUTTING U- TURN
GRASS cutting will remain in East Kilbride after councillors didn’t realise the implications of budget savings in February. Around 1000 residents in Mossneuk and Gardenhall – including East Kilbride West councillor David Watson – were set to foot the bill for maintaining land originally adopted by the now defunct East Kilbride District Council.
However, the land will now continue to be maintained as normal after the Labour, Conservative, Lib Dem and Independent groups banded together to defeat an SNP amendment to end the service in March 2021.
In February’s budget, councillors agreed to save around £ 30,000 annually by not maintaining land they didn’t own on eight sites across South Lanarkshire.
Agreements have been made with landowners of seven of those sites but the eighth included adopted land which Cllr Watson believed the council should continue to maintain. Supported by the other councillors for East Kilbride West, Monique McAdams and Ian Harrow, Cllr Watson put forward a motion to a meeting of the full council on September 23.
He said: “The budget paper suggested that this was on land not in council ownership. In Mossneuk, the land has been maintained by the local council for the last 45 years. It is land with adopted footpaths and street lights.
“Numerous residents have shown me their title deeds. The open space was adopted by the local authority. No adoption papers from East Kilbride District Council survive. Any changes to the status quo should be based on the full info.”
SNP council leader John Ross ( Hamilton South) had attempted to kibosh the motion before it had even been presented because Cllr Watson, as a resident who would be affected by the outcome, had declared an interest. Cllr Ross was “seeking clarity” as usually a councillor
who declares an interest does part in debating and voting.
He also questioned whether the motion was competent if the proposer had declared an interest.
According to the Councillors’ Code of Conduct, it is for each member to decide if they should declare an interest in an item and if that interest would affect their ability to come to a decision on it.
Cllrs Watson, McAdams and Harrow had all been left frustrated as they had to wait until six months after the budget was agreed to bring the issue back to council under the “six- month rule”.
Cllr McAdams said: “Cllrs Watson, Harrow and myself all missed the consequences
not take for our area. It is still not clear who owns the land. This is not how it was presented to us. All of us agree that the council shouldn’t be spending money on private land.”
She added that the situation had taught her “not to assume” that all the necessary background work had been done before a report is presented to councillors.
Chair of the community and enterprise committee and SNP councillor John Anderson ( East Kilbride Central South) claimed the motion was “factually incorrect” and proposed an amendment to continue maintaining the land until March “to allow officers and residents time to establish alternative arrangements”.
However, councillors backed Cllr Watson’s proposals by 35 votes to 24 with only the minority SNP administration opposing the motion.
Leader of the Independent group Margaret Cooper ( Avondale and Stonehouse) said: “This is a situation where we don’t always get it right. The Independent group fully support Cllr Watson’s motion. We need a detailed report before further decisions can be taken.”
Around 100 sites maintained by the council could be on private, unadopted land with investigations ongoing to determine what arrangements should be in place.