[29th January - updated below] Helensburgh Councillor, Vivien Dance – who literally stole the show by taking over the lectern during question time at the Rally for Castle Toward in Dunoon’s Queen’s Hall last weekend – and who had already resigned her senior post in the current administration of Argyll and Bute Council over the issue, sent the following email to the Council Leader this afternoon:
‘Good afternoon Dick,
‘Having studied the detail and ramifications of today’s press releases from Cabinet Secretary Alex Neil and Michael Russell MSP, I submit my resignation from the Administration of Argyll and Bute Council with immediate effect.
‘I have not supported the position taken by the administration on Castle Toward at meetings since the beginning of December and have made my views clear at every opportunity.
‘I intended to air my dissent once again when the issue of ‘my behaviour’ was debated further on Monday 2nd at the next meeting of the administration [minute of meeting held on 19th January refers].
It is recognised by many that a week is a long time in politics, five days for me would now seem like a lifetime in the light of today’s events as the views expressed by senior members of our national government confirm to me that this administration is failing to adhere to the Council’s constitution and I can no longer tolerate inclusion in such a grouping.
‘Vivien
Councillor Vivien Dance J.P.
Independent Councillor
Update 29th January: Councillor Dance has travelled a great distance in coming to a position of voting on the merits of an issue.
Both she and Lomond Councillor, George Freeman, were members of the coalition administration led by Dick Walsh’s then Alliance of Independent Councillors, during the School Wars of 2010-11. This was fought over Education Director, Cleland Sneddon’s, swingeing programme of closing 26 rural schools in one go.
Cuncillor Freeman voted against the administration’s proposals because Luss school, in his ward, was, in every sense, quite wrongly threatened with closure.
The Alliance had a theoretical policy of not whipping a vote, leaving every member free to vote with their conscience.
However, Councillor Walsh licensed a posse – a sort of Four Horsemen of Mr Freeman’s apocalypse, to hun hi down and drive him out of the party for his ‘behaviour’ in voting on the evidence. The enthusiastic leader of that lynch mob was Councillor Vivien Dance.
Councillor Dance personally benefited from Councillor Freeman’s removal – but that will, of course, have been one of those tricky little unintended consequences.
