Wood Archives - Page 5 of 5

Truth, Untruth And Consequences: Part Two

Aberdeen City, Articles, Community, Environment, Featured, Information, Opinion No Responses »

Sep 012011

A look at more contradictory information from different arms of the council – with deadly consequences for the Tullos Hill Roe Deer by Suzanne Kelly.

In the first instalment of ‘Truth’, I revealed part of Valerie Watts’ response to my formal complaint.
This contained the shocking story of how we have already paid £43,800 for a previous failed plantation on Tullos Hill – and that Ms Watts failed to clarify the existence of this debt when asked.
In fact, Aberdeen Council (ie the taxpayer) “could be liable for a reclaim of up to £120,333.91” if trees to be planted fail, says a Forestry Commission Scotland letter.

The second part of the story will examine Watt’s response in more depth, revealing yet more contradiction; council use of general statements to justify the specific Tullos Hill situation; and the deliberate snubbing of experts who offered objections to as well as solutions to this completely arbitrary tree-planting.

As detailed in Part One, I launched a formal protest following my researches into the details of the tree scheme and the cull; these can be found in Aberdeen Voice. I found no fewer than 10 main points, which I felt the Council should be called to account on.
See: https://aberdeenvoice.com/2010/12/10-more-reasons-to-call-off-the-deer-cull/

The Council and I have traded emails back and forth. My specific, targeted questions are largely going unanswered. Either that, or I get sweeping, non-specific statements (such as ‘deer culling is perfectly normal’ – which has nothing to do with killing deer to protect trees that could be elsewhere – or not planted at all). This all wound up in my formally complaining, and the initial response from Ms Watts was much in the same vein as what I had heard before. I sent a reply, which I had to chase twice.

The first time I chased my reply was 8 July. The Council now say that they sent a reply to me on 11 July, and this date appears on a letter sent via email (although there is no trace of it in my inbox).

Interestingly, their first letter, also sent by email, was addressed to me at my home, and was posted. The second letter the city says it sent on 11 July did not include my street address, and certainly did not ever reach me in the post. I do wonder why they would change their method of communication.

But there are larger points at stake.

Time is running out, and this article cannot touch on all the new information or recap all of the previous points raised. There are previous stories still available on Aberdeen Voice, and a good deal of information can be found on the internet.

If at the end of reading this and other articles you decide you want the deer spared, then please contact your councillors as soon as you can, as well as the City Council. Your voice can make a difference yet. Details of councillors can be found at:
http://committees.aberdeencity.gov.uk/mgMemberIndex.aspx?bcr=1

Here is a selection of some (certainly not all) of the issues arising from my last letter from Valerie Watts – the one that never arrived either in the –post or by email at the time it was meant to have been sent. Sadly, I am not getting any closer to getting any definitive, meaningful answers, which the following examples will show. It is time for everyone concerned for the deer to consider other forms of action.

Income from trees? Depends who’s talking

Various council officers and rangers have written to me saying that there will be ‘income streams’ from the trees.

In fact, some of the reports say that some income can be relied upon from this giant forest in time. I asked Ms Watts for the financials. She replied:

“There is no business plan to justify the potential future timber crop and subsequent potential income stream.”

Either Ms Watts is right and the rangers and others who mentioned an income from the trees are wrong – or the City is confused. In fact, here is what the public consultation for phase 2 said:-

“… the trees should be well established and require minimal maintenance before they start generating income”

Which leads us to Watts’ comments on the public consultation.

Public Consultation: ‘was robust’

We have already established what a flawed, misleading document this phase 2 consultation exercise was, but Ms Watts insists the consultation was ‘robust’.

Those supporting the tree scheme are adamant that the consultation was never about the method of tree planting, and it was not relevant. This is the excuse they give when asked why shooting the Tullos deer was not in the document.

If it had been mentioned, the scheme would never have passed the public consultation in a million years. But people like me and those I have spoken to cite this passage from the public consultation as the reason we thought the deer were safe:-

“Where necessary some sites will require rabbit fencing to minimize damage from rabbits…”

If you read this document, you would come to the conclusion that animal damage had been considered: why mention fencing to control rabbits and not mention damage from other animals? I concluded –as did dozens of others (and more) that if deer were a problem, they would likewise have been mentioned.

We now know that in November 2010 the Council and Scottish Natural Heritage were already planning to shoot the deer to plant these trees: they just decided not to tell us this.

The Scottish Natural Heritage letter suggests handling the public over the deer. Well, the public has most definitely been misled by this poor excuse for a consultation. It was biased. It withheld information. To date, no one has come forward despite my requests to say they were the author of this document; the author certainly has some questions to answer.

See: shhh-dont-mention-the-pre-planned-deer-cull

The Media can’t see the Trees for the Forest

Perhaps the most pompous claim Ms Watts makes is that the media got the facts wrong, and that the community councils got misinformation from the media, so didn’t understand the scheme.

I find it a bit late in the day to blame the media – does Ms Watts include the P&J, EE, BBC, STV, Northsound, and the Scotsman as well as Aberdeen Voice? Where and when did the City’s Public Relations staff counter any inaccuracies in the media? In fact Ms Aileen Malone, convener of the housing committee and large proponent of this plan spoke to the media on many occasions. Here is what Watts wrote on the matter:-

“Aberdeen City Council has no control over how the media report Council meetings. In this case the media did not accurately report on the decisions of this Committee and have continued to publish inaccurate information about this project. They have published their interpretation of the committee decisions.”

It should be noted that when the media have published inaccuracies in the past the Council swiftly jumps in to make corrections when it suits them. We saw the recent debacle of the City countering its own press office’s release about the frequency and costs of using outside consultants. I also recall a Press & Journal editorial stating that the P&J would apologise when it made errors, but would not apologise for publishing information the City released and subsequently retracted.

Scottish SPCA don’t understand the project – says Watts

The work and the position of the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals is world-renowned and respected. Except here.

The Scottish SPCA issued a statement specifically about the Tullos cull: they called it ‘abhorrent and absurd to kill deer to protect non-existent trees.’ Ms Watts doesn’t believe the Scottish SPCA are clever enough to have formulated its stance, and writes the following:-

“You quote the Scottish SPCA in your response. We* have been unable to find any evidence from the charities [sic – she must mean charity’s] policies that it has one that is against culling.

“We are in the process of checking this with the organization. We believe that the quote from Mr Mike Flynn is based on inaccurate reporting of the committee decision in the media. If the SSPCA were financially able to and prepared to relocate the deer legally within the project timescales, then the City would be amenable to them doing so.”

However, this amazing about-face needs examining, regarding allowing the deer to be relocated. The Council and the Scottish Natural Heritage made their positions clear previously that moving deer was not a solution.

I wrote to the Scottish SPCA to get their feedback on Watt’s paragraph above, and spoke to Mike Flynn on 26th August. He explained the difficulties in catching and moving deer, and says this idea just does not work. Mike confirmed the Scottish SPCA’s position on culling: it is to be carried out only where there are clear animal welfare issues or public safety issues.

Flynn confirmed that a person from the City did contact the Scottish SPCA to ask for its policy on culling. He was not happy that Watts believes he didn’t understand the issues and had been misinformed by the media. He understands, and is happy to stand by the previously-stated position: it is abhorrent and absurd to cull the Tullos Hill Roe Deer to plant trees. And whatever anyone at ACC may say, Mr Flynn is right.

* (somehow Ms Watts is now a group or is using the royal ‘we’ –she does not spell out who she means when she says ‘we’)

My Opinion and Conclusions Summarised

• The main conclusion I reach from months of research and asking questions is that I will be given different information from every council official, officer and elected member I speak to.

• They are united in one thing: they want the deer shot and the trees planted at all costs.

• The expert they hired after a tender process (note – the cost of this expert should be queried) is not interested in other experts’ opinions: this is no longer detached scientific expertise, but dogma.

• They are not actually as united as they think they are. There is increasing SNP resistance to this plan, which must be encouraged. Ms Malone insists the ‘tree for every citizen’ scheme was a Lib Dem election pledge. Ms Watts writes the Lib Dems and SNP jointly pursue this scheme, which “… has the mandate of the people of Aberdeen.” This Mandate is most definitely in the past tense – now that we know what the planting means for our deer and other existing wildlife.

• Most importantly: it is not too late to stop this insane scheme!

Watts next? – my opinion

A radio presenter had invited me and Aileen Malone to speak about the deer situation some months back.

Aileen was far too busy to spare the 20 minutes of a Sunday morning for this phone-in debate. A shame – as she could have rectified all the ‘misunderstandings’ which Watts claims the media are putting about. The show’s researchers were told I was not part of any group. And, I am not.

Still, the presenter seemed keen to draw me into an argument about direct action and getting people to stand in front of guns. I do not want to tell anyone to do anything, particularly anything to do with gun-toting shoot-to-kill mercenaries. However, it is plain that reason, logic, expense and the will of the people are being thrown out the window.

Before I had seen Emily James’ film about average people taking direct action, ‘Just Do It’ (at the Belmont a few weeks ago), I would not have considered taking steps to directly intervene in this tree plan. I am now re-thinking my position. When campaigning and logic have no effect, other (peaceful) means may be needed.

In the meantime, please get in touch with your elected representatives. Details of councillors can be found at:
http://committees.aberdeencity.gov.uk/mgMemberIndex.aspx?bcr=1

Tell them what you do and do not want to happen regarding Tullos Hill. Stopping this cull is not down to me or any one group – it is down to everyone.

If anyone wants a postcard to send the City, or a poster to put in their window, or to be kept informed of any developments, please write to oldsusannah@aberdeenvoice.com – sooner rather than later.

Old Susannah No. 49 – Board Stupid

Aberdeen City, Aberdeenshire, Articles, Community, Environment, Information, Opinion, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Aug 292011

Old Susannah watches the latest developments in the ‘Deen and the wider world and feels like a deer caught in headlights. Here is this week’s look at what’s happening where and who’s doing what to whom. By Suzanne Kelly.

Evening Express readers were rejoicing in the streets last weekend as the results of the ‘Happy Tots’ photo contest were revealed. Little wonder then, that there has been no word there or in the P&J of Anthony Baxter’s continued world tour of his award-winning film ‘You’ve Been Trumped, or the screening of Emily James’s film ‘Just Do It’ at the Belmont. Nor was there space for the little matter of the council’s ongoing deer debacle.
Word has it that the SNP is growing squeamish over the blood-letting that the little creatures (ie the LibDems) will suffer at the ballot box when the voting season opens, and are looking for a way out.

Let’s hope so. Not even the most gullible politician believes the promised carbon off-setting benefits of this unwanted forest has any merit. The Public Services Ombudsman likewise are weighing up the City’s actions over the deer. The Ombudsman may soon look at other matters, but that is another story for another time.

In the larger, non EE world, there is violence at every turn it seems. Happily we can all feel safer for a few reasons. One, the use of tasers seems to be going up in the UK. This seems to coincide with the number of deaths caused by tasers likewise increasing – but then again, that means less criminals on the streets.

It also means less innocent people on the streets, but you can’t have everything.

Tasers don’t cause severe agony I’m told, but there was a police official who was going to make a film demonstrating how innocuous the tasers were, using himself as a guinea pig. Unfortunately, he was in excruciating pain, and his little film didn’t have the desired effect. Tasers are only used by calm, rational, well-trained men, and not angry cops who might repeatedly taser a suspect until they die. Usually.

But I feel even safer still: the US Navy’s been spending time (and lots and lots of money) developing a means to make their weaponry even more deadly. It has been said that this new technology means weapons can explode with up to five times the energy of existing armaments. I guess this is their way of trying to be more energy efficient, so that’s quite good. As things stood, NATO was only able to destroy the world a few dozen times over. Now we can sleep soundly in our beds.

Old Susannah enjoyed the (mostly) sunny Tullos Hill picnic last Sunday and was happy to see some new faces there.

It is a beautiful hill with beautiful panoramic views over city and sea – so it’s got to go. Sadly, a second group of picnic-ers failed to find the main party, but a good time was still had.

Anyway, time for some definitions.

Board:

(noun) a collection of people who have managerial, supervisory, or other responsibilities and powers, e.g.. ‘Board of Directors’ ‘Board of Governors’.

Private company boards are established (normally) to oversee methods and manage reasonable, defined objectives. However, we are in Aberdeen, and are ruled by Aberdeen City Council.

There is no shortage of boards set up by the City and given powers – powers which are always used in a fair, reasonable and democratic way. The Licensing Board did itself proud two years ago; it ran straight to the Press & Journal to say a dozen or so restaurants and clubs, etc. were not compliant with new licensing laws. These wrong-doers were named and shamed in the press, and faced being closed, fined, and having their licenses revoked.

In a truly dramatic style, this was announced about a week before the traditional Christmas lunches and dinners were to be held.

Naturally you would expect a Board to have possession of all the facts before going to the papers. Yet somehow this board made a few tiny mistakes. A few of those it named as non-compliant with the law had, er, long gone out of business. Slightly more embarrassing, at least two of the named-and-shamed establishments were fully compliant, having jumped through hoops made of red tape.

Old Susannah had planned a lunch in such a place, and called the Board once I knew for certain how wrong the Board was. I spoke to a woman; she was very helpful. She asked me who I was to question the board, and told me I must be mistaken. However, a day or so later, the Board had gone back to the P&J with a grudging retraction. My Christmas lunch went ahead, and all was right.

But here are a few lines from the Board we should all be looking at:-

“The role of the Project Monitoring Group is to oversee the Union Terrace City Garden project’s progress and ensure that Council’s interests, and that of the majority of Aberdeen citizens, are protected as the project progresses. The membership of the Project Monitoring Group comprises Councillors Malone (Chair), Boulton, McDonald, Kirsty West, Wisely, Young and Yuill”.

“For reference, the membership of the City Garden Project Management Board comprises Councillor John Stewart (Chair), Councillor Callum McCaig and Valerie Watts, ACC; Tom Smith and Colin Crosby, ACSEF; Jennifer Craw, the Wood Family Trust; Bob Collier, Aberdeen and Grampian Chamber of Commerce; John Michie, Aberdeen City Centre Association; Lavina Massie, the Aberdeen City Alliance, Maggie McGinlay, Scottish Enterprise and Paul Harris, Gray’s School of Art”.

– Aberdeen City Council Website

I guess it must be an Aberdonian thing, but here we have a board to oversee a project which 55% of people responding to a survey don’t support. (Arguably the number against ruining UTG is higher, as a tiny hiccough in the online voting system changed negative votes to positive ones – I guess it’s hard to use this new-fangled technology).

Isn’t it wonderful that this Board just sprang into being without the need to trouble the taxpayer or voter as to their thoughts?

Perhaps it will be a difficult job to be a board member here – for one thing these selfless souls have to ‘oversee the progress’ of the project which is unknown (there is no scope, timescale or budget agreed – but I’m splitting hairs). If you look at the paragraphs above, you might get the idea that not progressing the project is not an option.

The tricky bit will be how on earth to ‘ensure that Council’s interests, AND that of the majority of Aberdeen citizens, are protected as the project progresses.’

I vote we protect the Council’s interests above all else. The project will progress, and the vastly different interests of the Council and the citizen somehow have to be both ‘protected’. This Board (led by one Mr Gerry Brough) has so far protected us by employing a wide range of techniques.

These include setting up a company to take the project forward with no mandate from the people, stacking the board with people who want a Wood Group solution for UTG, and by redacting minutes to protect us from truth. I feel as protected by Gerry Brough and this board as I do by the US Navy and its brand new super-explosives.

It is unclear who designed the make-up of this board, but I wonder – did they have a small, subconscious desire for the project to go ahead?

It almost seems as if most of these people are desperate for the gardens to be turned into whatever Wood (and Milne) want. Then again, the presence of Jennifer Craw to represent the Wood Family Trust is a reassuring sign that everything is totally impartial and ‘above Board’.

Citizens opposed to the project should not bother their heads about the decision the board made: there will be no opportunity at the upcoming public consultation to vote to leave the gardens as is. You get to vote on which of the six shortlisted projects (again chosen by a handful of non-elected people) you want – and that’s that. And this wonderful, unbiased board has just decided at its last meeting to start lobbying government officials to pressure them to go ahead and fill in our garden.

If you want to write to the Board and tell them how happy you are with their work so far, please do. And if you feel like doing some lobbying of your own, you can always write to the Scottish Futures Trust to tell them how happy you are about these fantastic garden-raising plans.

The City is some £50,000,000 in the red

But of all the many boards we have working hard to keep Aberdeen the efficient vibrant, dynamic hub it is, there is a board composed completely of planks.

I refer of course to the Budget Monitoring Board: the City is some 50 million pounds in the red that we know of. That really is some job they have managed these past few years.

Dictatorship

(noun) system of government wherein a single person or small group has undemocratic control and powers over the citizenry; often a totalitarian state.

Despite their threatening and irrational behaviour, it looks as if some of the world’s most hated dictators are set to topple. These hated figures have held onto power at all costs, some for many years, despite people demanding that they go. Dictators try to threaten journalists and other critics; they use threats of legal action to silence opposition. These dictators often look slightly deranged and dress in odd garments, and often look over-tired and slightly bloated.

One of my favourite quotes from the ‘Harry Potter’ series of books by the inimitable JK Rowling went something like this (I paraphrase).

“Dictators always fear the people that they oppress, for they know that one day, someone will rise above the masses and over-throw them.”

– Apologies for the bad phrasing JK, but it’s true. Those who come to power and then disregard clear voices of opposition and who do not play fairly will eventually be overthrown, or just voted out of office.

So dictators, do everyone a favour and just leave when asked to go. (PS – in a related development it seems that Libya has finally got rid of Gaddafi).

Next week: start queueing now: the great St. Nicholas House furniture sale is ON! Grab a future heirloom from the used, battered desks and chairs. You paid for them once – here’s your chance to pay for them again (not to mention the brand new furniture you bought for Marischal College). Sale stars 3 September.

Reversing The Destruction Of Disability Services – Part 3

Aberdeen City, Aberdeenshire, Articles, Community, Featured, Information, Opinion No Responses »

Aug 242011

Aberdeen Voice presents the third of a six-part tragedy by Jonathan Russell concerning the decimation of services for disabled people in Aberdeen – and asks what we can do to reverse the destruction.

A Comedy of Errors Meets MacBeth: Act I.

In last week’s article the work of the Community Placement Team was described and the challenges it faced outlined.

The Community Placement Team’s good practice had been highlighted in the Social Work Inspectorate Report as one of the few areas of good practice in Social Work Services within Aberdeen City Council.

What follows is the story of how managers, criticised in the Social Work Inspectorate Report (for amongst other things their lack of engagement with the front line) then went on to close the team down.

Two weeks after the publication of the Social Work Inspection Report the then management of Learning Disability Services informed me as Team Leader that the team was to have a budget of £200,000. Management had no idea what the actual budget allocated was: but this would have meant a halving of the team’s budget.

Staff had just received a re-grading as part of the Single Status agreement, so in terms of service delivery, the cuts were even potentially more than fifty percent.

Following the Council meeting to agree cuts to budgets, we met with the Head of Service. He informed us that a cut had been made in the Supported Employment budget, which he said included our team. I questioned whether they had actually cut the right budget, as this was not the Community Placement Team Budget. The Head of Service said he would investigate and reply to us.

As usual in such situations we received no reply. However what we ourselves discovered was they had cut (with council approval) a grant from the Department of Work and Pensions. This was not in their jurisdiction to cut, and could not possibly make any savings to the council.

The budget they cut was Workstep, which supported people with disabilities find and retain jobs in the open market. The Community Placement Team operated this service, but had no control of the budget. We had challenged management on a number of occasions that the budget received from the Department of Work and Pensions was not being fully utilized or used appropriately. The Workstep scheme supported clients in full time work – including those employed by Glencraft, the well-known social business in the city for people with visual and other disabilities.

In reality this budget cut made no savings, and the Community Placement Team at this stage was still intact.

We did however lose two excellent staff members who left for other work due to the obvious insecurity of the situation. The Head of Service also ended the partnership we had had with Cornerstone, telling us that Cornerstone were ‘rubbish’ (at a later stage he told us that Cornerstone were ‘much better’ than us). We lost from this process another excellent team member who moved – like many other staff in the council – to Aberdeenshire Council.

On top of this there had been a whole series of meetings of top officials within the council about disability services. These meetings did not involve front-line staff.

Clients with a physical disability were particularly affected by these cuts

What happened as a result was the closure of Aye Can – a social business aimed at those with more complex needs – and as the name suggests, re-cycling. Aye Can received much of its operating costs through the landfill levy at no cost to the council, but this was not taken into account when making the cut.

Inspire – with support from the Scottish Government and Sir Ian Wood – heralded that they would take over and improve on Aye Can.

The type of clients they were looking for were the more able ones. These would often have been clients who would have been able enough to be in more inclusive work settings in the community. Of course in the end, money having been spent on new premises and it being heralded as the way forward (with clients being paid proper wages) it never re-opened, and was lost as a service. More recently Garden Crafts, a similar social business, has been closed.

The next development was the introduction of Eligibility Criteria: which was a way for the council to say no to providing services to the community, and restricting what as a council it would provide.

Management said that this would mean that we could no longer provide any of our leisure activities, as they did not fit the criteria, and all leisure groups were closed down. Clients with a physical disability were particularly affected by these cuts, but so were those with a learning disability.

Supports to many in employment ended. Of course management would later deny having cut leisure services.

In the coming weeks, further articles will be published, written by the ex-Team Leader of the then Community Placement Team, documenting what happened, and making suggestions for the future of services for people with disabilities in Aberdeen City. Read the fourth part of this six part tragedy, subtitled ‘A Comedy of Errors Meets MacBeth: Act II’ in Aberdeen Voice next week.

Half-truth And Consequences: The Chief Executive Replies

Aberdeen City, Articles, Community, Environment, Featured, Information, Opinion No Responses »

Aug 172011

For the past several months Voice’s Suzanne Kelly has been attempting to persuade Aberdeen City Council to stop its planned cull of the Tullos Hill roe deer, which the City insists is necessary in order to plant tens of thousands of trees. At least four community councils representing tens of thousands of people have likewise condemned the cull, as have 2,400 petitioners and hundreds of letter-writers. As the proposed cull looms, Suzanne updates readers regarding her search for answers.

The public were initially invited to consult on a tree-planting scheme. The consultation document said rabbits would need some form of control (fencing) – but no mention was made of the deer slaughter – even though the City and Scottish Natural Heritage had already planned to kill the creatures. The animals have lived on the hill for at least 30 years with no cull; their average lifespan is 6 or 7 years, and they are a source of pleasure for local residents.

But the City wants the cheapest method to plant the trees. As they are spending public money, they must go with the most cost-effective methods available. Do they really always take such care with our money I wonder.

Aileen Malone – the most vocal City proponent of the plan has stated that ‘A Tree For Every Citizen’ was a LibDem Election pledge, and a LibDem/SNP plan according to City Council Chief Executive Valerie Watts.

The plan therefore, she writes:

“has the full backing of the people of Aberdeen.”

Search for the Truth:

Whether or not the people back this plan is not the only area where the City and the deer campaigners differ.

For my part I made formal complaint to Valerie Watts in May. The City’s response in June was riddled with generalisations and flawed logic – and a serious omission (more about that follows). I countered the City’s answers in mid June. I waited for a response and chased this up on 7 July. Nothing happened.

I chased a reply again on 8 August – and sent a copy of the email to the Public Services Ombudsman, asking them to look at the delay. Watt’s office then replied to me very quickly – saying that they had already answered my questions.

The City’s says it sent me an email on 11 July (there is no concrete electronic proof of it yet) with a response to my counterpoints. I searched my entire email without finding any trace. I will see if I can get an expert to determine if I accidentally deleted any incoming email on my end, and I will be asking for proof from the City that the email exists on its servers (I find it very interesting that their first answer to my complaint came by both email and hard copy in the post. The second reply certainly did not show up in the post either, and did not have my home address at the top, which the first document did).

But I digress. The quality of the City’s reply is astonishing.

It again glosses over facts, misinterprets my very clear questions, promises to send me attachments which I don’t have, and denigrates any professional opinions (SSPCA, outside experts) who disagree with a cull. I will be detailing the full amount of complaints to the Ombudsman and sharing the information in the press. However, there is one point that to my mind is so blatantly disingenuous that it looks for all the world like the shabbiest attempt at climbing out of a hole I have ever seen or heard of.

If any readers whether for or against the cull would like to give me their opinion on the following, I would be most grateful. I really want to know whether the following exchanges seem open, fair, and accurate to other people. It occurs to me that I may be over-reacting, but everyone who has seen this so far is, well, outraged.

Black and White facts:

In my ten-point initial complaint I wrote to Valerie Watts on 20 May, 2011, this was one of my questions – word for word:

“I would like to ask: is it true that the Council owes a sum for previous, failed planting? I was told that £44,000 approximately is owed by the City in this regard – please clarify”.

Ms Watts’ reply to me in early June (received on 7 June 2011) reads as follows regarding the point; again the text below is verbatim:

“Aberdeen City Council does not owe any amount to any organisation relating to a previous failed planting scheme.”

This reply surprised me greatly, as I had a source who was certain a debt definitely existed and had long gone unpaid. I asked my source for proof and they very quickly came back to me with proof positive that the City had been chased by the Forestry Commission for money; the proof was a letter from the Forestry Commission dated 2 March 2011 – See attached for ease of reference, but here is the crucial paragraph:-

“Tullos Community Woodland

“This is a failed WGS planting scheme. The scheme failed due to inadequate protection from deer and weeds. On the 4th November 2010 we issued Aberdeen City Council with an invoice for £43,831.90 – the reclaim of monies paid out under the above contract. This invoice was to be paid within 30 days. The monies have not been received. This invoice is now accruing interest and has led to a payment ban being put in place over your Business Reference Number”.

I found it astonishing that Ms Watts did not know about this debt; this was a fair amount of taxpayer money for a cash-strapped city to be spending on trees it could not successfully grow. She was still new in her post as Chief Executive – perhaps she did not know about it. It never once occurred to me that our highly-paid Chief Executive knew all about this debt but decided to respond to me as she did.

But that is exactly, precisely what happened: she knew all about it – and decided to not mention it.

As it turns out, the City had paid the debt not long before I wrote my question. A critic might on first thought side with the city – after all, the debt was paid. But I most clearly asked for clarification. I asked about a debt adjacent to £44,000 for a failed tree planting on Tullos Hill.

I found this shocking as far as it went, and was eagerly awaiting Watt’s reply. It is inconceivable to me that I would have accidentally deleted an email I was chasing and had looked for eagerly in my inbox for months. But here is the newly-received response from Valerie Watts, which pushes the word ‘disingenuous’ to a new level – if not straight over the edge to dishonest:-

“The £43,831.90 you refer to does not relate in any way to the current Tree for Every Citizen Project. This as a grant repayment from a previous planting scheme from 1996 which failed due to deer damage and a lack of weed control. This amount was repaid to the Forestry Commission Scotland prior to your enquiry so at the time of your enquiry dated 20 May 2011, when you asked “if ACC owed £44,000” our response was correct as the re-payment had been made against the 1996 grant payment prior to this date”.

First I note how conveniently Ms Watts says she was ‘correct’ as the repayment had been made. This of course ignores my asking for clarification of a £44,000 debt for a failed tree planting on Tullos Hill.

Secondly, the ‘weed control’ has not had any mention whatsoever in any of the public consultation documents. I find virtually no mention of weed problems in the Housing & Environment Committee minutes on this subject – just a gung-ho desire to find a cheap way to kill the deer.

The public certainly did not agree to this and are justifiably angry that the cull was kept secret. The city keeps repeating to me that the public consultation was not about the method to be used – yet it clearly talks about the method for keeping the rabbits out.

Thirdly, I think the Forestry Commission must be very generous: if the scheme was rooted in 1996, and they were only chasing their £43,800 in 2010, then that represents some fourteen years of waiting for payment. ( I wish my creditors took a similar stance). I would say that this old debt coming out of the city’s treasury at this tight financial time is something of a disaster.

So, in Ms Watts’ eyes, my asking about a ‘previous, failed planting’ and an approximate cost of £44,000:

“does not relate in any way to the current Tree for Every Citizen Project”.

I had not asked her to relate the current plan to the past debt. I had asked if there was a previous failed planting. Ms Watts goes on to describe – in her own words:

“a grant repayment from a previous planting scheme in 1996 which failed….”

I would very much like to know if anyone who reads this piece sees a similarity between the previous failed planting I asked about and the “previous planting scheme in 1996 which failed”. Does any reader see a similarity between the £44,000 I mentioned that I wanted clarified and the £43,800 repayment? Perhaps it is just me.

The bigger picture here is why the city is so desperate to take this completely arbitrary gamble to turn an existing wildlife area into a forest – a forest which apparently cannot be created without killing some of the existing deer. The residents do not want it, despite Ms Watts’ claims that they do. Protesters are told time and time again that this scheme is ‘cost neutral.’

If we had to pay £43,800 – and may indeed need to make more payments as the Forestry Commission letter hints at – then I for one cannot see any ‘cost neutral’ claim holding up.

Your help is needed – Urgently.

If you can spare a minute to contact me with your opinion of this exchange, it will be greatly appreciated. If you think I am right to now have serious questions on the honesty, integrity and suitability of Ms Watts to continue in her role , then please do let me and her know.

She is paid a higher salary than the Prime Minister, and is responsible for projects worth millions of pounds – but is apparently incapable of seeing a relationship between my question and the facts she had. If on the contrary you think that this £43,800 bill (note – in the Forestry Commission’s letter it emerges that we might wind up owing over £100K) is fair enough, that the matter of Ms Watts reply is not important, and the cull is fine with you, then I want to know that as well.

The deer and existing wildlife and plants have very little time left, and I do not even know if the City can answer simple questions accurately – and/or honestly. If you can in any way help to stop a slaughter which the Scottish SPCA calls ‘absurd and abhorrent’, please do speak up now.

It is known that many people inside the City government are concerned at the scheme’s details and some are looking for a way to end it. Let’s help them with some hugely-deserved public pressure on those who are pressing ahead with the cull regardless.

Finally, please come to a picnic on Tullos Hill next Sunday 21 August at 2pm. It may well be your last chance to enjoy this habitat as it exists.

Image Credit: © Catalin Pobega | Dreamstime.com

Failed Tree Planting Costs City Council ‘Deer’

Aberdeen City, Articles, Community, Featured, Information, Opinion No Responses »

Jun 082011

Aberdeen Council “could be liable for a reclaim of up to £120,333.91” if trees to be planted fail according to Forestry Commission Scotland. The entire ‘tree for every citizen’ scheme is now mired down in controversy, misinformation, mismanagement and cost implications says campaigner Suzanne Kelly as she urges councillors to stop the cull plans and get the facts right.

One Persons Beautiful Landscape Is Anothers Development Opportunity

Aberdeen City launched a scheme to plant a tree for every citizen. This was, in Aileen Malone’s words (at the 26 May Cults community Council meeting) a “Liberal Democrat election promise”.
This ‘Tree for Every Citizen’ scheme had attached to it a cull of deer living on Tullos Hill. This cull was planned as long ago as November 2010, but the City did not put it in the consultation for Phase 2, which closed at the end of January.

The Torry Community Council was likewise not consulted over any cull, and voted unanimously to condemn it.

Other community councils followed suit, protestors in their thousands registered their disapproval, and the council remained unrepentant and unwilling to consider any changes or compromise to their scheme.

I launched a formal protest following my researches. I found no fewer than 10 main points, which I felt the Council should be called to account on.
See: https://aberdeenvoice.com/2010/12/10-more-reasons-to-call-off-the-deer-cull/

On 6 June I received Aberdeen City’s Chief Executive Valerie Watt’s response to this complaint (her letter was dated 2 June). Perhaps the City thought this reply was going to be swallowed whole without question.

My formal reply will be sent to her shortly.

While drafting my reply to Ms Watts, one of the thousands of cull opponents came up with a startling letter from the Forestry Commission to The City: it discredits claims the City has put in writing. I subsequently spoke to the author who confirmed the letter and who had some other interesting points.

This article examines the controversy and contradiction surrounding only the first two points of my complaint: there will be subsequent coverage of the remaining issues in the near future.

Did Aberdeen City Council owe money for a previous failed tree planting? This was the first of the ten points making up my formal complaint (The document, with responses from Aberdeen City Council Chief Exec. Valerie Watts can be viewed here: https://aberdeenvoice.com/?p=8978 )

My question:

“I would like to ask: is it true that the Council owes a sum for previous, failed planting? I was told that £44,000 approximately is owed by the City in this regard – please clarify.”

Council Response:

“Aberdeen City Council does not owe any amount to any organisation relating to a previous failed planting scheme.”

Forestry Commission Letter:

“ Tullos Community Woodland

The invoice per the letter writer was paid on 15 March 2011. The argument could be made that Ms Watts was being truthful: after all, no money was still owed when I made my complaint. However – I specifically asked for clarification. Do we really believe that the City’s answer to me was an honest clarification?

The letter from FCS can be viewed here: failed-tree-planting

The second point I raised in my letter of complaint concerned the ‘invitation’ for those concerned to raise £225,000 for alternative measures. Why ask the public to come up with a quarter of a million pounds within some 11 weeks if, as we now know, a cull was still going to be ‘required’?

My question:

“Despite the demand for £225,000, Pete Leonard, Head of Housing and Environment has written to say a cull would still be required. In an email to Suzanne Kelly, Pete Leonard has stated it is SNH’s position that a cull would still be required. Therefore, the demand for money made by a committee to its electorate is shown to be completely misleading.”

Council Response:

“The £225,000 was for alternative means of planting the trees (not just for fencing) from deer damage. To quote from the Committee minute for the Housing and Environment Committee of 1^st March 2011, the additional recommendation stated

‘(in relation to Tullos Hill) that an invitation be extended to the individuals and organisations who have objected to these deer control measures to raise the sums necessary to provide and maintain alternative measures, including fencing and rehousing of deer by no later than 10 May 2011 (the sum to be approximately £225,000).’

“Also as stated in the minute of this meeting that prior to the division

‘The Head of Environmental Services highlighted to the Committee paragraph 3.2 of the report which advised that the progression of option four (tree planting within smaller deer fenced enclosures surrounding individual planting blocks) would not mitigate culling on Tullos Hill altogether, as a reduction cull of deer locally due to loss of habitat from approx 60 hectares of this site would still be required, in the view of SNH.’

“The whole Tree for Every Citizen Project is being funded from grants and contributions from businesses. As the majority of this funding is from the Scottish Rural Development Programme which is public money from the European Union, the EU require that best practice and best value methodologies are used. The grant rates available are based on these terms. For a tree-planting scheme on the scale of that proposed for Tullos Hill, the use of individual tree shelters or deer fencing (which still requires a deer cull to reduce the population) does not represent best value or best practice. To spend money on these alternative means would require funding that was not from the public purse.”

Ms Watts’ reply also contradicts itself in terms of the money demanded by the public to save the deer: they were always going to kill deer anyway – whether or not the public paid up. I can find no instance of the City counteracting the many press articles and media stories that their demand was in order to save the deer: they had a chance to say that some killing would still be required. They did not take this chance as far as I can see.

From beginning to end the proposed tree planting and resultant Tullos Hill Roe deer cull plan has been plagued by misinformation and lack of consultation.

These have been highlighted in Aberdeen Voice (“shhh! don’t mention the secret deer cull” and other articles) and by the BBC, STV, local radio Northsound and SHMU, and so on. The biggest mystery remains why they will not consider any compromises. A Forestry spokesperson confirms that our Council can plant elsewhere if they want to.

Perhaps it is time for them to consider a plantation that is not in an arson hotspot where deer currently live?

More on this issue to follow…

Tullos Hill Ablaze

Aberdeen City, Articles, Breaking, Featured, Information, News No Responses »

May 192011

By Alan Robertson.

Two separate fires broke out on Tullos Hill on the evening of Wednesday 18th May from around 8.30pm until the Fire Brigade brought them under control approximately an hour later. The fires were at either side of the hill and one of the fires stretched across an area I would estimate to be approximately 200 metres.

Despite the fact that both fire outbreaks were on green gorse land, the recent dry conditions allowed them to spread extremely quickly. Had conditions been different with a prevailing wind to assist, the blazes may have covered a far greater area at speed and caused more extensive damage.

There has been a history of wilful fire raising on the hill. At present this results in brush fires. The Fire Brigade have estimated that in one summer the cost to their service was in excess of £35,000.

These latest incidents raise further concerns about the viability of Tullos Hill for the proposed planting of 40,000 trees by Aberdeen City Council in their plan to turn the area into a forested area designated Diamond Wood status by the Woodland Trust. Should a similar fire or fires start in a large forested area, as proposed by the Council, the potential for a large scale blaze across a vast area of Tullos Hill would appear to be a real possibility.

Worryingly, Tullos Hill is an area where methane gas, produced by the decomposition of buried waste, is vented from underground using special equipment that is spread across the entirety of the hill. The potential combination of a large forested area and the continual venting of highly flammable methane gas could present a major risk to the surrounding industrial estates if a large forest fire was to take hold.

Tullos Hill is also in close proximity to Tullos Primary School.

71 fires occurred in 2006 according to Grampian Fire And Rescue Service – down from 132 in 2005. This reduction has come about as the result of a range of measures undertaken by the Fire Service in partnership with Police, the local community, schools and media.

http://www.grampianfrs.org.uk/subdreamer/index.php?categoryid=8&p2_articleid=20

However the incidence and potential risk of fires on Tullos Hill will be exacerbated if the proposed extended forestation were to go ahead and this further calls into question the Council proposals to plant a large number of trees in this area.

Unplugged In The Park

Articles, Community, Events, Featured, Gigs and Concerts No Responses »

Sep 032010

By Dave Guthrie.

On a quiet Saturday evening a couple of weekends ago a celebration took place in Union Terrace Gardens.
As evening fell, small groups of people began arriving with picnic blankets, candles, lanterns and glow lamps to take part in ‘Unplugged in the Park’, a low-key event loosely organised by Friends of UTG.

Amidst a sea of shimmering lights the audience were treated to storytelling, poetry, some amateur dramatics ( rather wittily entitled ‘Trees Not Wood!’ ), some fine music and African drumming.

The first lantern-balloon, released perhaps too soon, rose slowly in the still night air and there was some apprehension as it hovered close to the trees and HMT but there was a collective sigh of relief – and a few cheers – as it caught the breeze and seemed to head decisively in the direction of St Nicholas House.

Later launchings were trouble free.

A couple of bobbies strolled through the Gardens, no doubt grateful for a few minute’s respite from the street-level intensity of a city-centre Saturday night, as everyone enjoyed the entertainment and the spectacle.

Perhaps the only sour note rose from the two under-maintained port-a-loos standing in for the Grade ‘B’ listed Victorian facilities which have been allowed to fall into a sad state of disrepair.

The weather was kind, with the showers not arriving until most of the crowd had quietly dispersed and the clean-up operation was well under way.

Once again, the Gardens had provided an oasis of calm in the city centre which people could enjoy fully with the minimum of fuss.

Rapunzel’s Rant – Build A Car Park!

Creative Writing, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Sep 032010

I’ve got lots of money and want to build a car park, so f*ck off – A poem by Rapunzel Wizard, a locally based performance poet who is 96% human and 4% woolly mammoth, and refuses to get a proper job or a haircut.

Union Terrace Gardens is eyesore ugly

Out of keeping with the rest of Union Street
An island of green in a sea of grey
It would look better as an underground car park
Cost you 90 million to pay and display
Turn Aberdeen into a top destination
Sir Ian Wood say, but I would nae

But
Sir Ian’s got more money, than a bunch of skagheads
Sir Ian’s got more money, than the trees or grass
Sir Ian’s got more money, than a bunch of joggers
Sir Ian’s got more money, than Peacock Arts

Sir Ian would leave a legacy
Where you won’t see the trees for the wood.
Sir Ian would leave a legacy
Turn our parks into car parks

Turn our parks into car parks
Sir Ian Would
But I’d rather he didn’t.

What Would You Do With £50m?

Satire and Humour No Responses »

Jun 242010

Here is a list of ten better uses for the 50 million quid. Please let me know what you think or if any amendments should be made or whatever. I’ve got an artist drawing a few of them up for added funniness!!

1. Buy enough rocket fuel to send a certain executive board into deep space and, if that is not enough money, raise business rates to pay for the rest!

2. Give £1000 to each household in Aberdeen so we can all party our way out of recession.

3. Invest in research to resurrect Scotty from Star Trek back from the dead and get him to beam undesirable councillors up! Would make a change from beams of sunlight supposedly shining out of their backsides!

4. Pay for the new Aberdeen Football Club stadium and use the change to pay Cristiano Ronaldo to play the second half against Rangers.

5. Spend it on a fleet of tanks with huge water cannons loaded with vast quantities of quick setting soundproofing foam to spray on vehicles pumping out excessively load boomf-boomf music.

6. Add an extra 50p to the budget and pay for the Lord Provost’s winter clothes collection!

7. Build a time machine on the cheap and go back to the 1800’s where we could pay for 1000 city squares with the leftover cash!

8. Buy every person in Aberdeen with a disability a new souped-up electric wheelchair, decked out with performance tyres, race car seats and leather trim as an apology for closing down day-centres!

9. Demolish the Bon Accord centre and replace it with a huge fountain flanked by gold statues of Willie Miller, Joe Harper, Denis Law, Jim Leighton and Alex Ferguson, each mounted on a giant rowie held in the beak of an even bigger seagull! An artist’s impression would be good. Maybe we should put aside £25m for the consultation, and run a design contest?

10. And finally…Pay for a tenth of the CSP shambles!

…. So what do you think? Do you have a better ( or sillier ) way to spend £50? Write to us with your ideas

Article by Ross Cunningham

Illustrations by Anita Inverarity

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