September 20, 2011
Scotland

Sustainable Shetland joins criticism of trust reform proposals

The Shetland Times, www.shetlandtimes.co.uk 20 September 2011

Anti-windfarm group Sustainable Shetland has added its voice to criticism of the nature of reform proposed for Shetland Charitable Trust and the short consultation timetable.

Following an attack by the Association of Shetland Community Councils (ASCC) yesterday, Sustainable Shetland said today: “We find the proposed changes to the governance of Shetland Charitable Trust to be inadequate and unacceptable. Your proposals seek to continue the undue power and influence of councillors over the policy and governance of Shetland Charitable Trust.

“We object strongly to the extremely short timescale allowed for this consultation. The charitable trust’s own review group has taken two years to produce this proposal, the public of Shetland had just 16 days to respond. This does not meet good practice guidelines for community consultation and indicates the lack of weight given to genuinely reforming the trust, or consulting with the public.”

Sustainable Shetland had submitted a detailed response to the previous consultation on charitable trust reform, but had received no response from the trust on that occasion.
Members of the group believe all trustees should be directly and democratically elected.

Responding to comments yesterday by charitable trust and review group chairman Bill Manson that the process “was not couched as a consultation”, Sustainable Shetland vice-chairman Kevin Learmonth said: “Charitable trust adverts clearly said Governance Review Consultation, so the real problem here, illustrated by Mr Manson’s attack on the Association of Shetland Community Councils for daring to respond to the consultation, was that this process has been carried out in bad faith, in a ridiculously short timescale, against all measures of an honest, decent and respectful consultation.”

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2011/09/20/sustainable-shetland-joins-criticism-of-trust-reform-proposals/