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News / Trustees resist “kneejerk” reform

SHETLAND Charitable Trust is to seek further legal advice on how the £200 million community fund should be run following strong criticism from charity regulator OSCR.

At a meeting of the trust on Wednesday morning an overwhelming majority rejected radical reforms proposed by independent trustee John Scott, the isles’ lord lieutenant.

Instead trustees voted in favour of council convener Sandy Cluness’ motion to seek more advice before accepting any constitutional change.

For some time the trust has been in the firing line for the way it deals with conflicts of interests as 21 of the 23 trustees are also councillors on the local authority.

In July, the Scottish charity regulator OSCR identified a “real risk of systemic and specific conflict” and imposed a system of “tailored monitoring” on the trust.

Speaking after Wednesday’s meeting, Mr Cluness, a staunch supporter of the status quo, said he now accepted that some change might be necessary, but not in the way proposed by Mr Scott.

He refuted any suggestion that seeking further advice was another attempt to delay change.

“If there has to be change then we have to go down that route. But OSCR is not telling us what change we have to make and I think we are bound to take the best possible advice before we change.

“This system has existed for 30 years and has provided a lot of infrastructure and services to the community.

“This is not an attempt to further delay it, indeed what we have said is that we do this as quickly as possible,” he said.

Mr Cluness won the vote against John Scott convincingly by 12 votes to three with four abstentions.

An attempt by Betty Fullerton to get the job done within a three month timeframe and to look further at Mr Scott’s proposal was also heavily defeated.

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Mr Scott had proposed replacing the current system with a board of 15 trustees, 10 of which would be elected by the community, three appointed by the council and further two co-opted by the new board.

During a 90 minute debate which at times had personal undertones, Mr Scott told trustees that the legal advice available could not be clearer and that “big change” was needed.

Iris Hawkins said that the trust “really got into bother” when the wind farm developer Viking Energy was transferred as an asset from the council to the charitable trust.

When she suggested it might need to be transferred back to the council, she was told that from the trust’s point of view it would not be advisable to sell an asset that could potentially be very lucrative.

Gary Robinson urged the meeting to vote for Mr Scott’s motion as trustees had to ensure “that the control of the charitable trust remains with the Shetland community”.

Valerie Nicolson said she was not ready to vote for either of the options particularly after a working group she had been a member of had worked out a compromise which was then thrown out by trustees in February this year.

“We need change but we need it planned, advised and supported,” she said.

Trust general manager Ann Black and council chief executive Alistair Buchan are now tasked to find the legal expert capable of doing the job and establish the likely cost of the advice.

If trustees feel the lawyer’s fee is excessive it will again be debated at a trust meeting. “OSCR wants to see progress, but they don’t want to see a kneejerk reaction,” trust chairman Bill Manson said.

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