Letter in The Herald Monday 29th October 2007  

  The Communities’ Inheritance

There is a welcome flurry of activity behind the scenes about the Scottish communities' inheritance - all common good assets, heritable and moveable and their asset management - possibly thanks to the research of Andy Wightman and James Perman, followed by petititions 875, 896, 961 to the Scottish Parliament.

Since 1975 the accruing and separate burghs' assets of the communities have been cynically used by district/regional councils to prop up budgeted departmental expenditures. Common-good heritable and moveable assets are the community's portfolio of assets, are supposed to be recorded on an asset register, separately, annually audited and insured, and open to public inspection. Transactions should be commercially sound, whether acquisitions, sales or rents, but have degenerated, in many cases, into semi-peppercorn rents for more than 100 years' duration.

Glasgow City Council, like others, has unloaded former housing provision into a separate entity outwith councillors' responsibilities, also the communities' millions of pounds of common-good assets into a charity and trading company of unelected trustess, with a minority of councillors.

Glasgow's chief executive remains unable to produce a current record of heritable common-good assets, and none at all of moveable assets, including the Burrell Collection - a legal duty.

Advertisements for staff for Culture and Sport Glasgow (common good assets) suggest no roll-over of existing Glasgow council employees together with their existing responsibilities, contracts, pensions. Whether new contracts have been offered, from the former museums' director down, is kept from public knowledge.

M E Mackenzie, Springhill Road, Peebles.