Edinburgh Sucks! | Who could be the defectors?

City Council

Who could be the defectors?

By The Basa ⋅ March 29, 2006 ⋅

Our mailbox was busy yesterday and last night with possible names of the defecting councilors from Labour. It seems that there is quite a lot of infighting going on in the Edinburgh Labour party. Our guess about Jack O’Donnell jumping because of the multiple investigations, not into Craigmillar, but the ‘cabal’ who run the ‘poverty industry’ in the area was way off mark.

There is great infighting between Dougie Kerr, Gordon Munro and Phil Attridge. Attridge and Munro share an office at the Chambers but they will also have to fight each other for selection at the next council election as the boundaries have all changed. Gordon Munro seemingly is known to be a bit of a sneak by a large proportion of councillors and because of the friendships between the three of them, it now seems that Dougie Kerr is threatening to go to the Fiscal about Attridge’s over indulgence with the wacky baccy. Could one of these three be making the move to another party. Attridge’s secondment from Lothian Buses is about over if it isn’t already so he will have to start handing out daysavers again sometime soon. As Munro isn’t, shall we say well thought of by his colleagues, would it not be a slap on the face to them if he decided to jump ship?

Second candidate is seemingly an open secret among social workers but they forgot to tell the Evening News. Their convenor Kingsley Thomas is seemingly one of them. Thomas has been having a bit of infighting with Planning convenor Trevor Davies over who will be leader when Teflon Don attemps to get more salary from the public purse down the road at Follyrood. Thomas thought he had a chance at taking over the leadership role but seemingly Davies had other ideas. The upshot is that our correspondents seem to think that Kingsley Thomas is one for jumping.

Third prospective jumper is more difficult and again involves a battle for nominations. Lord Provost Hinds and fellow knitting club member Elizabeth Maginnis are up for reselection in their area with long time union man and councillor of 20 years Billy Fitzpatrick. Fitzpatrick is well pissed off and seemingly feels that his is being squeezed out by the two ladies and has recently been ranting about standing as Independent but some of our correspondents say he will jump ship first before taking the ‘coonsillors redundancy’ which is being offered to councillors to stand down before the next election. Lesley Hinds has seemingly been trying to follow Teflon Don and look for a MSP nomination but none were forthcoming. Others tell us that Fitzpatrick won’t jump ship, he will just take the 20 grand.

Still yet more information on a possible jumper is that since former Lib Dem cvlture spokesman John Longstaff defected to Labour and was actually quite good at the job, Ricky Henderson the administration’s current spokesman thinks that before he may be squeezed out of the cushy job and he will do the jumping.

Oh, what a wicked web they weave. With politicians being politicians, who knows? We just hope that the first round happens soon because the one sure thing that our correspondents have told us is that there are probably other defections waiting to happen when the three currently expected eventually do.