A New Dawn ?

20 seats

Well, an agreement has been reached to work with the SNP Group to run the Council. Andrew Burns will be an excellent Council Leader and we shall also nominate the Lord Provost.

After extensive and exhaustive talks over many hours on Saturday, Sunday and Monday our attempt to create an "Administration of all the talents" as per our manifesto, failed to progress because most of the other parties were unable to commit to the proposals we put forward. To cut a long story short that left only one realistic, viable option, a Labour/SNP coalition. Unusual ? Yes, but not unique and although we are normally sworn enemies, there does a come a time after the votes have been counted and the dust settled, to work with others in the interests of the very people who put us where we are. I'm pretty confident we can do that and look forward to the hard work ahead.

One important and optimistic footnote to this tale is that at last night's meeting of the five party negotiating teams, although agreement couldn't be reached on a cross party alliance, virtually all commented that they'd welcomed the dialogue and believed there was an opportunity for more joint working and openness going forward. Don't worry, that doesn't mean an "all-party love-in" with everyone agreeing with each other all the time. Of course there will be division and robust political debate, but perhaps there was a feeling that we could and should work harder at involving each other in our policy and decision meeting process.

The picture above shows a trial set up in the Council Chambers for full Council meetings and the 20 seats that will be occupied by Labour bums on Thursday 17th May.