Four councillors who voted to allow a rapist taxi driver to keep his operator's licence have quit Highland Council's licensing committee.
Good!
David Brown, 50, was jailed for six years and nine months in May after attacking an 18-year-old female passenger in December 2023. Last month, following a request from Brown's family, the committee's six male councillors voted to allow his operator's licence to continue, while its four female councillors voted against it.
What were they thinking?
After criticism of the decision, the chairman Sean Kennedy along with John Grafton, Duncan Macpherson and Willie MacKay have resigned from the committee. Independent councillor MacKay has also resigned as a councillor, while Grafton has been suspended by the Scottish Liberal Democrat group on Highland Council.
SNP councillor Chris Birt, another one of the six male councillors, has been asked by his party's leader on the council, Raymond Bremner, to resign from the committee.
Asked? He should have been fired!
and there is another case where someone didn't report a crime and lost his license. These licensing bodies are basically kangaroo courts.
ReplyDeleteI rather think that being asked to resign is the equivalent of being fired but without actually saying it.
ReplyDeleteStonyground.
Why did this go to a full committee? License applications are dealt with by an application committee of three members, in camera, with no record of individual councillor's decisions, simply the committee decision. (Is the law in Scotland different?)
ReplyDeleteWith this case I would say that renewal application would have to come to commitee for life, and never be delegated to officers. When I was on licensing we had a chap who'd made a mess of his life in his teens with a disclosable offence. He was now in his 50s with a 30-year clean record, but still had to make an annual renewal application which had to go to committee.
Update: I see it was an operator's license, not a driver's license. That may well be a full committee decision, but we always considered being a driver the most dangerous position, as you're alone, anonymous, can avoid supervision.
ReplyDelete