Call for council chief Jeff Reid to resign
Nov 13 2008 by Brian Daniel, The Journal
CALLS were last night made for a North council chief to quit over comments he made over funding for Seaton Delaval Hall.
Coun Bob Watson, who represents Seaton Delaval on Blyth Valley Borough Council, is calling for Coun Jeff Reid, leader of Northumberland County Council, to resign over his claim that the National Trust did not want local authority money for its bid to buy the hall.
With the county council last night allowing £100,000 of local authority money to go to the campaign, Coun Watson said his claim that Coun Reid had misled the council and public had been vindicated.
He is to drop a complaint to the Standards Board for England over Coun Reid’s comments, but is now calling for the leader’s head.
Coun Watson, who has been part of Blyth’s leading Labour group for six years and is currently a member of the council’s cabinet, said the approval of funding is an admission from the leader that his earlier claims were misleading.
He said: “If that is an admission that he has misled the public and the council, he really should stand down. He has openly said they do not want it, he has either made it up or it is wrong, either way he has misled the council. He should really look to his own position and he should stand down.”
Coun Reid was quoted in The Journal on October 13 on the issue of whether £100,000 allocated by the Blyth council for Seaton Delaval Hall would be rubber-stamped by the county council’s joint transition forum, which must approve any unplanned large expenditure by any of Northumberland’s district councils in the run-up to the move to a new unitary authority. The Liberal Democrat said the forum had deferred consideration of whether to approve Blyth’s grant as it had been told the trust did not want local authority money.
Coun Reid said: “They told us they were accepting money from business and the public but not from public bodies, so we did not approve the expenditure.”
The trust contradicted his comments at the time, saying it would welcome money from either council. After reading our story, Coun Watson reported Coun Reid to the standards board – on the grounds that his comments were misleading the council and the public. Yesterday, however, the two councils issued a joint statement saying £100,000 would be provided for the campaign to buy the hall. The money will either come from Blyth before April 1 or the new council after that.
Coun Watson has welcomed the approval of the funding and is to drop his complaint against Coun Reid, now the money is guaranteed.
Coun Reid last night insisted the trust had not been looking for donations at the time he made his comments – and said he had a letter to prove it. “I am quite happy and quite at peace with the decisions I have made over this. If he really thinks I misled anybody, he needs to press ahead with his complaint. I have never lied in my political career.”
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