Local Government Committee, 01 Feb 2000

Meeting date: Tuesday, February 1, 2000

Official Report 193KB pdf

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Petition (Accountability of Assessor)

The next item of business is petition PE56, of which members have been given copies. I will tell members what I suggest we do, and they can decide if they want to do it or do something different. I suggest that we ask the Executive to comment on the issues that are raised in the petition and, depending on its response, we may want to take further evidence, possibly from the Scottish Assessors Association.

That is a good suggestion. Just the other week, we were discussing warrant sales. Assessors should not get away with such treatment. In the situation that is mentioned in the petition, a member of the public was looking for an apology, but everyone down the line ignored his view that the law had been broken. If he had received an apology, we would never have known about this matter.

The underlying concern is that a person acting on behalf of the public may have to abide by a set of rules, but if they think that the essential issue is to get on with business, they may just forget about the rules. I hope that if assessors act in the same way in future, those who are affected can go the local government ombudsman, where the case could be heard and something could be done about it. The way in which the petitioner was treated is appalling.

It may be that we will want to revisit that matter once the Executive has taken a view. Your comments will be noted. I do not know whether there is a way in which we can inform the petitioner about how the matter is being progressed.

We are obliged to advise the petitioner of the action that is being taken. We will write to him through the Public Petitions Committee to tell him what action is being taken and to say that we will get back to him in due course.