Just who is running this show?

IT’S ironic that in a week when the people of Moray are exercising their ultimate democratic right to elect new MSPs and a new Scottish government, our local authority finds itself at the centre of a controversy over an undemocratic move.

Elected councillors turned up for a committee meeting, expecting to debate and make a decision on whether a distributor road for Elgin should be rerouted along Wittet Drive, only to be told that it was off the agenda.

The decision had been made by the council’s chief executive, Alastair Keddie, who felt that further discussion on the road plan should not commence before the Moray Economic Strategy, which takes into consideration the future of the RAF bases, is complete.

The question has been raised: "Who is running the council?"

The people of Moray, our readers, will be puzzled as to why this action was taken by an official and not by the councillors we elect to make decisions.

Aren’t officials supposed to do councillors’ bidding? Why was a proposal to defer not placed before the committee so that councillors could decide on it?

Why did Mr Keddie not face the councillors in person to explain his move to pull the road plan from the agenda, instead of leaving it to other officials to do so?

The convener and deputy convener of the council sit on the economic development and infrastructure committee. Were they party to his decision, and if so, why did they not speak up for it?

Was there a fear that the road plan would be thrown out? Isn’t that for councillors to decide?

These and many other questions remain to be answered, and the people of Moray – the voters, those who pay the council tax – deserve answers.

Councillors opposed to the multi-million-pound road plan and campaigners, some of whom may face seeing their homes demolished, are incensed, and rightly so. Campaigners think officials are determined to push a plan through, regardless of what the public or some councillors think. That is a disturbing view which can’t be allowed to persist.

It may suit officials to hide behind rules, regulations and small print, but they can’t be allowed to ride roughshod over democracy.

Who is running the council? That’s a question the people of Moray will be posing.

The chief executive has to explain himself more fully, and the elected members have some explaining to do, too. Are they going to allow this to go unchallenged? Their own credibility in the eyes of the public could be at stake.