Don’t bang the drum

“Well here we are in a special place, what are you going to do here..” the opening lines of one of my favourite songs from Mike Scott and the Waterboys - a magnificent artist/band - very much in my mind after a meeting I was in yesterday afternoon and after last night’s opening concert of Celtic Connections - Common Ground. Mike Scott and Luka Bloom were the two artists that drew me to the event, but the great thing about this being an emsemble gig was discovering artists I didn’t know, such as Damien Dempsey and Karen Casey, two Irish performers I want to see again. Celtic Connections is an inspired and visionary festival, at exactly the right time of year, when the days are short , nights are long and we all feel in need of a lift. Add in some Burns suppers to go to and I think I can make it to the spring equinox.. In a slightly laboured segue into politics… speaking of common ground.. pity we couldn’t reach it earlier that day at the scrutiny committee where I was speaking to the call-in of our proposals for area committees. As previously outlined in this blog, we’re moving to ward based forums - 21 across the city, the most devolved decision making structures we’ve ever had. The issue for the SNP group who “called-in” the report agreeing these, was who takes the chair. In a slightly over the top press release they stated that the Labour administration nominating our members to chair “smacks of control freakery gone mad, and that they should look to other Labour led administrations to see that being in power does not mean being all-powerful ” . One slight technical hitch in the coherence of this as a party political case  - have they looked at Aberdeen ? An SNP/Liberal coalition administration taking all chairs of area committees , and West Lothian - dearie me - more Labour members elected than any other party (14) , but the 13 SNP members have done a coalition deal to take power and of their 9 area committees how many are given to Labour ? None - not a single solitary one… Perhaps I should reword their statement and quote it back ” The Labour administration need only look to SNP led administrations to see the SNP wish us to do as they say, not as they do “