By Graham Huband

DUNDEE CITY Council has defended its decision not to intervene in the workings of a committee running a controversy-hit community centre.

The newly-formed Fair to Midlin Group, which claims to represent the interests of the people of Mid Craigie and Linlathen, called yesterday for the council to step in and suspend the activity of the Brooksbank centre’s steering committee.

The group believe the committee should be disbanded as its three members, being made up of representatives of Dundee Anti-Poverty Forum, Kiddie Kare and the Money Advice Support team who are all based at the centre, are using their leverage in the best interests of their own organisations and not the community as a whole.

Kiddie Kare and the anti-poverty forum were involved in a public spat in July when the former group’s chairman moved the charity out of the offices it shared with DAPF at the centre.

An investigation was conducted by the council but the outcome was not made public.

However, the new steering committee was formed to create a new charity from the merger of the three organisations and develop a proposal to improve the service provided within Brooksbank.

A spokesperson for the Fair to Midlin Group said yesterday the new steering group was failing to act in the best interests of the centre and community as a whole.

He said the new committee should be scrapped and a more inclusive community forum put in place to run the centre for the people of Mid Craigie and Linlathen.

The spokesperson said, “There has obviously got to be a structure in place (to run the centre) but that has got to be community-based and not necessarily run by groups housed in Brooksbank.

“If there was a community-based (steering) group that was nothing to do with the projects themselves then they would be able to look at things from a birds-eye view and run services in the building for the community.”

Dundee City Council said that the changes had been made in the best interests of the centre and the area.

A spokesperson said, “The city council is fully committed to Brooksbank centre, the local area and local people. The Brooksbank steering group will be undertaking a wide-scale consultation and subsequently will then be holding an open public meeting to form a new representative group in the committee.

“Over the last few months the city council has been working very hard to bring local groups together so that they can co-operate for the benefit of the local community.”