September 29.
Councillor Mortimer rather aggressively accuses me of making cheap
political points following my observations on his own comments about the
referendum Glasgow City Council organised on local government
reorganisation (September 22).
The real cheap political trick is the imposition on the people of
Scotland by a Government which has no moral and very little political
authority of the reorganisation of local government along lines quite
clearly designed to assist the Conservative Party and no-one else.
Councillor Mortimer, with all the aplomb of a wee Glasgow fly man,
also quite deliberately broke an all-party agreement regarding the
referendum. This he did, in my opinion, to promote himself and his own
chances as the Tories' candidate in next year's Euro elections.
Indeed, it would be fair to say that as far as King's Park and
Toryglen are concerned they are the fodder used by the Tories to assist
Glasgow's own ''peerie Norrie'' to promote himself.
If, as he claims, he is a Glaswegian first then I would ask him to
come along with me to St Andrew's House to meet Ian Lang and present the
case for Toryglen and King's Park remaining within Glasgow.
This surely would be a chance for him to show that he is not putting
the narrow sectarian interests of the Conservative Party against the
clearly expressed wishes of the people of Glasgow.
The referendum cost #25,000, which is not a lot of money for such an
exercise.
Compare this to the billions squandered by the Tories over the poll
tax fiasco, which even one of Councillor Mortimer's own colleagues felt
unable to pay.
Finally, on his claim to be Glaswegian first and Conservative second,
it is well known that Councillor Mortimer was a member of the Labour
Party for a time, I think around the time that Tommy Sheridan was also
in the party.
This by my arithmetic makes him a Conservative third, or are there any
other parties Norman Mortimer has been a member of?
Cllr the Rev. Stuart MacQuarrie,
Convener,
General Purposes Committee,
Glasgow City Council.
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