I received your final response to our complaints re the conduct of the
Scottish Government and North Ayrshire Council in regards to Largs BID (
co-incidently ? on 30th August, the same day that the invoices demanding
payment of the BID levy arrived in businesses throughout Largs)
I have therefore been busy organising our appeals against the" improperly charged levy" with the N.A.C.
Decision on complaints against the Scottish Government
Firstly, we are not lawyers au fait with the handling of the legalities of appeals. You say I should have raised Derek Mackay`s failure to respond to my e-mail of 11th November 2012, but we only found out his involvement with BID after the initial appeal to (the vaguely termed) Scottish Ministers after we submitted our initial appeal on 29th November. The fact is that Kenneth Gibson MSP, after consulting with Derek MacKay, informed me on 19th December that he "was adjudicating, and that the BID ballot was unlikely to be overturned"! All subsequent appeal letters from Largs businesses carried a foot-note protesting the conflict of interest that the Minister in charge of promoting BID was adjudicating on our appeal.
Next, I consulted Kenneth Gibson MSP on 15th December 2012 because the next stage of the appeal requiring individuals to state which regulation had been contravened was confusing. A copy of Regulations 11 (1) and (2) had been included, but NOT Regulation11(3) which required complainants to "specify the reasons".
IT IS ABSURD for you to have expected us to read the full Regulations in order to be aware of the requirements.
It is obvious to us that it was deliberately misleading, and, yes, it did put us at a disadvantage.
Also, as Mr Gibson told me to get the next appeal letters in before close of Parliament for the Festive Season, a matter of days, I was unable to get follow up appeals from all the initial 35 complainants of 29th November. This allowed Derek MacKay to fudge the figures, discount all but 14 deprived of a ballot paper in the BID ballot, and finally on Good Friday we received a denial of our appeal on the grounds that this 14 would not have affected the "yes" ballot result !
Decision on complaint against North Ayrshire Council
Next you state that" it was open for businesses to take up their right of appeal" and" raise a complaint if they felt that they should have had a right to vote but did not receive ballot papers" whether the Council`s list had been produced or not".
HOW PATENTLY ABSURD when I was the bearer of bad tidings to so many of the 82 I found before the deadline of 17th May for our submissions to your Office.
They did not know they had been left out of the BID ballot.
Also, your SPSO literature clearly states that you will only consider complaints after the full appeal process has been completed. So, as I repeatedly stated, THEY WERE NOT ONLY DEPRIVED OF BALLOT PAPERS, BUT ALSO THEIR RIGHT OF APPEAL.
Shame on you for upholding this abuse of democracy.
I have therefore been busy organising our appeals against the" improperly charged levy" with the N.A.C.
Decision on complaints against the Scottish Government
Firstly, we are not lawyers au fait with the handling of the legalities of appeals. You say I should have raised Derek Mackay`s failure to respond to my e-mail of 11th November 2012, but we only found out his involvement with BID after the initial appeal to (the vaguely termed) Scottish Ministers after we submitted our initial appeal on 29th November. The fact is that Kenneth Gibson MSP, after consulting with Derek MacKay, informed me on 19th December that he "was adjudicating, and that the BID ballot was unlikely to be overturned"! All subsequent appeal letters from Largs businesses carried a foot-note protesting the conflict of interest that the Minister in charge of promoting BID was adjudicating on our appeal.
Next, I consulted Kenneth Gibson MSP on 15th December 2012 because the next stage of the appeal requiring individuals to state which regulation had been contravened was confusing. A copy of Regulations 11 (1) and (2) had been included, but NOT Regulation11(3) which required complainants to "specify the reasons".
IT IS ABSURD for you to have expected us to read the full Regulations in order to be aware of the requirements.
It is obvious to us that it was deliberately misleading, and, yes, it did put us at a disadvantage.
Also, as Mr Gibson told me to get the next appeal letters in before close of Parliament for the Festive Season, a matter of days, I was unable to get follow up appeals from all the initial 35 complainants of 29th November. This allowed Derek MacKay to fudge the figures, discount all but 14 deprived of a ballot paper in the BID ballot, and finally on Good Friday we received a denial of our appeal on the grounds that this 14 would not have affected the "yes" ballot result !
Decision on complaint against North Ayrshire Council
Next you state that" it was open for businesses to take up their right of appeal" and" raise a complaint if they felt that they should have had a right to vote but did not receive ballot papers" whether the Council`s list had been produced or not".
HOW PATENTLY ABSURD when I was the bearer of bad tidings to so many of the 82 I found before the deadline of 17th May for our submissions to your Office.
They did not know they had been left out of the BID ballot.
Also, your SPSO literature clearly states that you will only consider complaints after the full appeal process has been completed. So, as I repeatedly stated, THEY WERE NOT ONLY DEPRIVED OF BALLOT PAPERS, BUT ALSO THEIR RIGHT OF APPEAL.
Shame on you for upholding this abuse of democracy.
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