Dalgety Bay councillor wants Fife Council to cut the grass

That’s the view of Dave Dempsey, leader of the Fife Conservatives, who highlighted this week that patches of grass in a car park in Dalgety Bay town centre have been left uncut because of Fife Council’s decision to slash the budget for grass-cutting and weed-spraying by 30 per cent.

The Dalgety Bay councillor says this is caused by a centralised council instead of breaking up budgets locally so the public best decide where they want resources to go. He said: “Following a 30 per cent cut in the budget for verge-cutting, grass-cutting around car parks and weed-spraying, a decision was made in Glenrothes to stop cutting grass at any car park.

“This wasn’t widely publicised, if at all, and the consequences only came to light as the grass grew longer and longer.

“That is now being reviewed and hopefully the grass in Dalgety Bay, which should be regarded as town centre rather than car park, will be cut.

“However, this sort of thing is going to happen again and again until the political leadership of Fife Council finally come good on its promise to decentralise.

“Budgets are allocated centrally and the prime instruction to budget holders is ‘Don’t overspend’.

“What the public get for the money is a secondary consideration.

“The solution is for budgets to be invested locally so that a council officer who knows the area and who will work closely with local councillors and communities can allocate the ever-scarcer resources to what the public really wants.

“Do that and the grass that needs cut will be cut when it needs it. Grass in out-of-the-way places that no-one’s bothered about can be left alone.

“But it won’t happen till we get a political administration whose actions match their words.”

Fife Council co-leader David Alexander said: “I’d have more time for Dave Dempsey and the Conservatives if they took responsibility for the actions of their government and themselves.

“It goes like this: the Tories continually cut the block grant to Holyrood. This has an impact on all public services.

“Then Fife Council budget time comes along and the Conservatives do not put forward a budget. That means they are supporting our budget.

“But, if anything happens as a result of the financial pressures we are under, they complain about the consequences.

“It’s absolute hypocrisy. Our staff are working wonders under enormous pressure to do the best they can for Fife. Officers have already said they will deal with safety issues if they are a problem.”

Co-leader David Ross added: “Contrary to Dave Dempsey’s claims, area committees and local councillors have considerable power to influence grass-cutting and environmental operations in their area.

“The council is continuing with its long-term policy of decentralising services to local areas.

“Yes, the council is facing significant financial challenges because of central government budget cuts, but if Dave is seeing particular problems emerging in his area then it’s because he’s ‘asleep at the wheel’ and needs to take more responsibility for addressing local issues rather than blaming others.”